While international instruments prohibiting child soldiering now exist, including the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict (Optional Protocol), enforcement is lagging. There are an estimated 250,000 child soldiers today, some as young as nine, and not even a handful of recruiters have been brought to justice. There is an urgent need to create the political will globally to achieve greater accountability and the provision of adequate investment in policy and programs to protect children in conflict settings. There is also an urgent need to harness the expertise of wide-ranging stakeholders, including security forces. Security forces have an important role in supporting implementation of UN Security Council Resolutions 1612 and 1882, designed to help protect children in conflicts and bring accountability to recruiters. Forces are also often the first point of contact for child soldiers during and after combat. Many, including the United Nations, recognize the need for training for special military training, however, no country or regional organization, including the United Nations, African Union or the European Community, has yet developed the coherent policies, official doctrine or substantive practical guidance on how security forces should deal with child soldiers. Because it is relatively easy to establish an armed group of children and to maintain it indefinitely, the use of child soldiers increases the probability that a violent conflict will start, that it will spill across national borders, and that it will carry on longer than might otherwise be the case. Despite this, the issue of child soldiers has been viewed almost exclusively through the lens of human rights and child protection; rarely, if ever, has it been considered as the serious and immediate security issue it also represents. This has effectively left out the military and police from efforts to end to the exploitation of children as soldiers. CSI is working to strengthen the ability of military and police actors to respond - in a more cohesive way with all key actors addressing child soldier issues during a conflict and its immediate aftermath. By bringing together all the diverse actors able to influence the recruitment and use of child soldiers, the Child Soldiers Initiative (CSI) aims to foster a process of collaborative thinking and analysis of the problems that allows actors to better understand each other's perspective and builds significant new capacity for collaboration and effective joint action. Working with as broad a range of organizations and individuals as possible, CSI applies rigorous academic research and field-testing to inform programs of advocacy, education, field support training and advisory work. The Child Soldiers Initiative, The University of Botswana and Dalhousie University's Centre for Policy Studies conducted an Executive Seminar on Child Soldiers and Security Forces in Gabarone Botswana in December 2009. The Seminar, designed for executive level staff of national defense forces, directors of staff colleges and representatives of Ministries of Defense and Foreign Affairs, brought together 32 participants from 9 African countries. Regional Executive Seminar on Child Soldiers and Security Forces, Botswana, 2-4 December 2009.