Sexual Violence in the East of DRC
As in many of today's conflicts, 70 per cent sexual of violence victims are civilians, the majority of whom are women and children. Rape and sexual violence are being used as a weapon of war: «Women’s bodies have become the battlefield of those who use terror as a weapon of war: women are raped, abducted, humiliated, and endure forced pregnancy, sexual abuse and sexual slavery».
Sexual violence affects women of all ages, including female children, sometimes as young as five years old. Men are not immune to sexual violence. It can occur anytime. A 2002 report sponsored by UNIFEM states: « From Pweto down near the Zambian border right up to Aru on the Sudan/Uganda border, it’s a black hole where no one is safe and where no outsider goes. Women take a risk when they go out to the fields or on a road to a market. Any day they can be stripped naked, humiliated and raped in public. Many people no longer sleep at home, though sleeping in the bush is equally unsafe. Every night, another village is attacked. It could be any group, no one knows, but they always take away women and girls » [Rehn, E., and Sirleaf Johnson, E., The Independent Experts’ Assessment on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Women and the Role of Women in Peace-building, Progress of the World’s Women, Vol.1, 2002, UNIFEM.]
Although exact numbers prove difficult to obtain, NGOs and United Nations institutions in the field in East DRC estimate the total number of rapes at 14 000 in 2005 and 13 000 in 2006. In 2007, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes evaluated the situation of raped victims hospitalized in the South Kivu province in the DRC: he discovered evidence and heard testimony describing «sexual violence so brutal it defies imagination». According to Holmes, «more than 32,000 cases of rape and sexual violence have been registered in South Kivu alone»- but this represents just a fraction of the total number of women who have experienced immense suffering. [John Holmes, «Congo’s Rape War», Los Angeles Times, (October 11th 2007), available on line : <http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-holmes
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Sexual violence affects women of all ages, including female children, sometimes as young as five years old. Men are not immune to sexual violence. It can occur anytime. A 2002 report sponsored by UNIFEM states: « From Pweto down near the Zambian border right up to Aru on the Sudan/Uganda border, it’s a black hole where no one is safe and where no outsider goes. Women take a risk when they go out to the fields or on a road to a market. Any day they can be stripped naked, humiliated and raped in public. Many people no longer sleep at home, though sleeping in the bush is equally unsafe. Every night, another village is attacked. It could be any group, no one knows, but they always take away women and girls » [Rehn, E., and Sirleaf Johnson, E., The Independent Experts’ Assessment on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Women and the Role of Women in Peace-building, Progress of the World’s Women, Vol.1, 2002, UNIFEM.]
Although exact numbers prove difficult to obtain, NGOs and United Nations institutions in the field in East DRC estimate the total number of rapes at 14 000 in 2005 and 13 000 in 2006. In 2007, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes evaluated the situation of raped victims hospitalized in the South Kivu province in the DRC: he discovered evidence and heard testimony describing «sexual violence so brutal it defies imagination». According to Holmes, «more than 32,000 cases of rape and sexual violence have been registered in South Kivu alone»- but this represents just a fraction of the total number of women who have experienced immense suffering. [John Holmes, «Congo’s Rape War», Los Angeles Times, (October 11th 2007), available on line : <http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-holmes
11oct11,0,6685881.story?coll=la-opinion-center>
Sexual violence has numerous psychological, physical and social consequences. Such consequences affect not only the immediate victim, but also her family and community. Many women and young girls are raped in front of their family members and fellow villagers, causing them to be ostracized and rejected. The widespread looting, destruction and killing that accompanies sexual violence provokes displacement of populations which exposes displaced people to socio-economical vulnerability. In 2007, fighting in East DRC caused 800 000 people to flee their homes. Sexual violence has a very serious impact on women’s mental and physical health: they are highly exposed to the risk of transmission of sexually transmitted infections, such as HIV/AIDS.
Approximately 22% of raped women contract HIV. Their genital organs are often so badly mutilated that surgical intervention is necessary, not to mention that women can also be disfigured, mutilated or assassinated. Many women suffer from the effects of post traumatic stress syndrome, such as anxiety disorders, insomnia and depression. In addition, unwanted pregnancies have significant psychological and physical effects, including on the well-being of children born of rape. The current climate of impunity fuels the violence and aggravates the situation.
Sexual violence in DRC has reached an unprecedented scale: everyday, 40 women are raped in East DRC. It is time for this to stop!Alert
ALERT: DEATH THREATS MADE AGAINST CONGOLESE WOMEN’S RIGHTS ACTIVIST
The Coalition for Women’s Human Rights in Conflict Situations, Rights & Democracy, Québec Native Women, Fédération des femmes du Québec, Regroupement québécois des centres d’aide et de lutte contre les agressions à caractère sexuel (CALACS), Table de concertation des Grands Lacs, Amnistie internationale Canada francophone, Regroupement provincial des maisons d'hébergement et de transition pour femmes victimes de violence conjugale and Association Québécoise des organismes de coopération internationale (AQOCI)Call on the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), local authorities and United Nations Mission in the DRC (MONUC) to ensure the protection of Julienne Lusenge, an activist committed to women’s rights and the struggle against sexual violence, and to prosecute those who have made threats against her.
While on a mission in Europe organized by Paris-based International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) to promote the struggle against impunity and sexual violence in the DRC, Julienne Lusenge, the coordinator of Solidarité féminine pour la paix et le développement intégral (SOFEPADI), was informed that she had been the target of death threats on March 31, 2008. When she refused, they responded: “If you do not open the door, you will leave Beni the way you left Bunia. Furthermore, it will be you who opens Julienne’s door for us.” These threats allude to Ms Lusenge’s flight in October 2002 from Bunia as a result of harassment from militias that she had criticized, particularly for their acts of violence against women.
Two unidentified individuals appeared at the home of one of her colleagues and demanded Ms Lusenge’s home address.
The threats made against human rights activists and, more specifically, women’s rights activists are particularly serious and indicative of the climate of impunity and violence that reigns in the Eastern DRC. Insecurity created by the proliferation of armed groups that continue to operate beyond the reach of State and MONUC control (the UN Mission in RDC) is compounded by the muzzling of activists by government representatives and high-ranking officials.
These situations must be denounced in the strongest possible terms.
They violate international law as well as international and regional commitments undertaken by the DRC. Not only do they violate women’s dignity, they undermine the hope and capacity of Congolese society to put an end to sexual violence.
Freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and the right to physical integrity must be ensured by government authorities in order to maintain a functioning, strong and active civil society capable of participating in building peace and democracy.
Consequently, signatory human rights organizations have joined forces to:
DENOUNCE the climate of insecurity in which human rights activists operate in the DRC and especially those struggling against women’s sexual violence;
URGENTLY CALL ON the Government of the DRC and the appropriate authorities to take all necessary steps to protect human rights activists and their families from all acts of retaliation, physical attack, intimidation and threats;
DEMAND that the police and magistrature investigate and prosecute those responsible for the threats against Julienne Lusenge, and ensure the protection of her family and colleagues at SOFEPADI in Beni and Bunia;
CALL ON representatives of the UN and regional organizations concerned about these violations to take the necessary measures to protect human rights activists and to work with national authorities and civil society to reinforce the rule of law.
Montréal, Wednesday, April 9, 2008
FIDH: Massive rapes in Democratic Republic of Congo
A shame for the humanity - 5/11/2007 At the international day of the Elimination of all forms of violence against women, the FIDH and its organizations members in RDC: ASADHO, the Voters 's League and Group Lotus, call for the international mobilization against sexual violence in DRC. With the "Democratic transition", one could have hoped for the decrease of the number of such crimes, but they continue to be perpetrated with the same intensity. Six month’s babies as well as 70 years old women don't escape to the terror. Those crimes not only distinguish themselves by their intensity but also by their cruelty. Their authors, militiamen, insurgents, rebels, but also of the members of the Congolese army, enjoy a quasi-absolute impunity.
We require the means of systematic and exemplary repression of the criminal authors of sexual violence to be put in place.
We require that that repression aims all criminals, whatever they are, whatever is their function, and where that they are" specified Souhayr Belhassen, Chairwoman of the FIDH. http://www.fidh.org/spip.php?article4930
The increase of the violence in the North-Kivu accentuates the risk of ethnic nature - massacres. Amnesty International, September 10, 2007
The organization pulled out the alarm facing the increasing risk of the violence giving space to interethnic massacres and other attacks to Human Rights. Many people who escaped from the fights have reported rapes and other homicides of civilians to Amnesty International. The recruitment and the use of children by the armed groups is still going on in the North and South Kivu. http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/fraAFR620142007?open&of=fra-COD
An article of IRIN (Humanitarian Affairs Coordination Office) explains", The International Committee of the Red Cross (CICR) expressed its concerns facing the violence perpetrated against the civilians, and notably of the women and children, in South Kivu, the Eastern of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where abductions, executions, rapes and depredations are frequently reported to the organization. "RDC: The civilians alwaysimprisonedin the violence in the South Kivu - IRIN - July 3, 2007 http://www.irinnews.org/fr/ReportFrench.aspx?ReportId=73062
Reports
Numerous reports have been published. You will find reports on different issues. Click on the issue.
sexual violence
justice
medical, psychological and social consequences
SEXUAL VIOLENCE
Report of HRW on the violences committed in the North-Kivu, "New crisis in the North Kivu" 23/10/2007 -HRW document the murders, the rapes and the depredations there committed by all parts to the conflict. The report of 96 pages, "New crisis in the North Kivu" describes in detail the crimes against the civilians committed by the Congolese soldiers of the army, by the troops of the renegade general Laurent Nkunda, and by the fighters of an opposition strength Rwandan named democratic Strengths of liberation of Rwanda (FDLR). http://hrw.org/reports/2007/drc1007/
Wynne Russel, "The violences sexual against the men and the boys in the conflicts" in The sexual violences: weapons of war, hindrance to the peace, Magazine forced Migrations, March 2007, n.27, http://www.migrationforcee.org/pdf/MFR27/12.pdf (in French). Courses article evoking the sexual violences committed against the men and the boys in time of war whereas they are rarely evoked.
Genre en Action – Report on the documents that were prepared for the AWID Forum organised in Bangkok in October 2005: Two videos explaining the situation in Eastern DRC regarding sexual violence. These videos can be acceding through the French web site of the organisation, in an Article titled: “Mettre fin à la violence sexuelle en RDC”. The address is: http://www.genreenaction.net/spip.php?article3772
Report of Doctors without borders, "Nothing new in Ituri: The continuous violence", August 2005. This report has been published following the departure of MSF of the vicinity of Bunia. http://www.msf.ch/index.php?id=199&L=0
HRW- “Seeking Justice - The Prosecution of Sexual Violence in the Congo War” - 07/03/2005.
The report of 59 pages explains in detail why the measures taken by the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo are insufficient to pursue those that made guilty of rape during the war. Human Rights Watch called the Congolese government and the international financial backers, notably the European union, to adopt urgent measures to reform the judicial system of Congo. The report is on line to the http://hrw.org/reports/2005/drc0305/
Report of Amnesty International: “DRC: Mass rape: Time for Remedies” - 26/10/2004 -.
This report founds on research and interviews led by Amnesty International in the East of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), in 2004. it is on line with the global campaign of Amnesty International Stop to the violence against the women. This document underlines one of the major needs of the rape victims more especially: the access to the medical care. He/it also insists on the necessity of an urgent reaction on behalf of the international community, the financial backers and the government of transition of the DRC. In addition to make the state of the places of the different shapes of sexual violence, including with regard to the men, the report also approaches the sanitary impact, the absence of medical care and the psycho-social impacts of the violences. The report is on line to the http://www.amnesty.org/en/report/info/AFR62/018/2004
Network of the Women for an Associative Development, Network of the Women for the Defense of the Rights and the Peace, International Alert, “Women’s Bodies as a Battleground: Sexual Violence Against Women and Girls During the War in the Democratic Republic of Congo South Kivu (1996-2003)”, 2004.
The women of the South-Kivu, starting themselves very early to mobilize, to denounce sexual violences and the impunity, as well as to fight for the restoration of the victims in their rights. In Bukavu, the provincial capital, a Coalition Against the Sexual Violences (CCVS) saw the day, following a dialogue between several local women's organizations. The CCVS prepared for the Congolese legislator, the propositions of the national penal law reform, in view of the redefinition and the backing of the repressive régime of the rape. These propositions remained however dead words.
The Congolese women also took some initiatives to provide concrete help to the victims. That is how "Houses of Women" were open by associations of women in the zone of Uvira, to offer, a shelter as well as a tool, psychological and medical support to the raped women. Due to this mobilization, more and more victims have courage to speak openly about all the exactions that took place, what facilitates their hold in charge and permits to know the extent and the size of the problem. http://www.grandslacs.net/doc/4053.pdf
Report of Amnesty International, "Democratic Republic of Congo: Surviving rape: Voices from the east", - October 2004 -
The following interviews are a selection of testimonies collected by Amnesty International in 2004 by Congolese having undergone a rape, of militants of the human rights and professionals of health. They are presented here in the setting of the country led by Amnesty International so that the victims of rape of the Democratic Republic of Congo (RDC) get the more numerous medical care, more of justice, as well as a more important social and economic support. All interviewed people gave their agreement so that their narrations are published. All details that could permit to identify modified them. The report is on line to the http://www.amnesty.org/en/report/info/AFR62/019/2004
Report of Amnesty:International "Democratic Republic of Congo. Children at war" -9/09/2003 –
Its a report of 63 pages that notes the recruitment of children soldiers and that approaches the sexual violences committed to their against. Today, the RDC is one of the countries to the world with the biggest number of children soldiers. During their formation, they generally undergo violent treatments and in some camps, some children died in deplorable conditions. One can force them to try to mark the hostile troops or to serve bodyguards for their chief or to force them to become sexual slaves. Boys and girls are also forced to transport the equipment, water, food and the munitions or again to act as cook. They are often sent on the forehead to fight. On the front line, the children are forced regularly to commit some exactions in particular of the murders or rapes against civilians or the hostile soldiers. Some should have killed their own family, whereas others have been obliged to commit acts of cannibalism or sexual with the bodies of their enemies killed during the battle. They are threatened, or receive the narcotics and the alcohol often to ruin their emotions so that they can commit these crimes. The children interviewed by Amnesty International after an escape or demobilized once gave accounts made especially awful on the manner whose conflict affected them. http://www.amnesty.org/en/report/info/AFR62/034/2003
Report of HRW: Ituri: "Covered in Blood” Ethnically Targeted Violence In Northeastern DR Congo
Violence targeted on some ethnic groups in the Northeast of the RDC - July 2003 - The Ituri is often described like one bloodiest corners of the Democratic Republic of Congo (RDC). In spite of three peace agreements supposed to put a term to the war that lasts since five years in Congo, the fights in the Northeast of the RDC intensified, end 2002 and beginning 2003. Beginning May 2003, the hundreds of civilians have been slaughtered in the city of Bunias and the score of thousands of others have been forced to flee. Some looked for shelter close to the surrounding wall of the United Nations, hoping to find a protection desperately against the violence. Whereas the international community concentrated on the city of Bunia, the massacres continued in other parts of the Ituri, far from the attention of the medias. As a witness described it: "The Ituri was covered with blood." http://hrw.org/reports/2003/ituri0703/
Report of Doctors without borders,"The war was following me" Ten years of conflicts, chaos and violence in the East of the RDC. 2002.
This publication is the fruit of a will to make more. To reveal the suffering that touches the populations since ten years in RDC, but also to reveal the courage of individuals obligated to rebuild their life again and always, indefinitely, in a world dominated by complex armed conflicts, of the waves of displacements and the waves of refugees. The testimonies that inspired this document are presented year per year. Of 1992 to 2002, every chapter will be introduced by a brief summary of the main events that took place during the year; the testimonies of people will describe then how they lived these évènements, how they affected them them, their life and the one of their compatriots. Is the report in two parts http://www.msf.ch/DRC-La-guerre-me-suivait.134.0.html
Report of HRW: "The War Within the War '' sexual Violence against women and girls in Eastern Congo." -June 2002 –
This report of 114 pages describes the sexual violences committed by the set of the factions armed in RDC. It documents the massive and systematic recourse of the rape and the sexual violences in the East of the RDC. The report is based on many testimonies of victims, witnesses and official who testify about some crimes committed by the soldiers of the army Rwandan and their Congolese allies, members of the Rally for Congolese Democracy (RCD), as well as by armed groups - the May May, and the Burundi groups and Rwandan. These fighters rape the women and the girls during their military operations in the goal to punish the local population for the supposed support that she/it brings to them '' enemies ''. In other cases, the armed groups and the May May the women and the girls remove to make some the sexual slaves. http://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/drc/
JUSTICE
Global Rights – “Sexual Violence: A Law Criminalizing Sexual Violence: What is it About ?”
Explanatory report of the law on the sexual violences, Action against the impunity for the human rights (ACIDH), Country for the human rights in Congo (CDHC), Coalition against the sexual violences (CCVS), Coalition for the adoption of the law project structural repression of the violences sexual, Global Rights, strategic Group of Kinshasa, Congolese Initiative for the justice and the peace (ICJP), Observatory of the cultural rights (ODC), Network Action Woman (RAF), " A law on the sexual violences, about what is it?, Text of orientation on the before project of law structural modification of the Congolese penal Code, of the Code of penal procedure and the Code of the organization and the judicial expertise", January 2006. http://www.globalrights.org/site/PageServer?pagename=www_afr_index_41 (In French)
Report of Global Rights, " S.O.S Justice, What justice for the vulnerable populations of the RDC?”
Report of assessment of the sector of the justice in the North and South Kivu, Maniema and North Katanga", August 2005. The present report presents an assessment of the sector of the justice in the Democratic Republic of Congo (RDC) as well as on the difficulties of access to justice met by the vulnerable populations in these provinces, notably in the cases of rape. The objective of this report is to attract the attention again on the decay of the judicial system in RDC, but also ,on the emergency to act in priority in the East in order to put an end to an impunity that makes persist yet the insecurity and the political, economic and social instability in the East of the country to one period crucial of the transition in RDC . Th report finally aims to incite every category of intervening parties in the sector of the justice (judicial actors, NGO local, NGO international, MONUC and system of the Nations United, other partners in development) to revalue the quality and the impact its actions, as well as its collaboration with the other actors, to reinforce the synergy of the efforts in progress or considered in this sector so that the available support benefits to all in the briefest delays. http://www.globalrights.org/site/PageServer?pagename=www_afr_index_41
Arletty Pinel and Lydiah Kemunto Bosire, "The traumatic fistulas: an advocacy for the repairs" in The sexual violences: weapons of war, hindrance to the peace, Magazine forced Migrations, March 2007, n.27, Course structural article on serious genital injuries caused by the sexual violences. http://www.migrationforcee.org/pdf/MFR27/10.pdf.
Jennifer Klot and Pam DeLargy, "The sexual violence and the transmission of the VIH/SIDA in sexual violence : Weapons of war, hindrance to the peace, Magazine forced Migrations, March 2007, n.27, http://www.migrationforcee.org/pdf/MFR27/13.pdf
Document of information of Doctors without borders, "Enough is enough, sexual violence as a weapon of war", March 5, 2004. This document of 8 pages exposes the consequences of the violences briefly sexual and formless on the situation in the East of the RDC. http://www.msf.ch/Stop-a-la-violence-sexuelle-co.128.0.html?&L=1%5C
Lauren Rumble and Swati B Mehta, " Help to the children been born of the exploitation and the sexual abuse" in The sexual violences: weapons of war, hindrance to the peace, Magazine forced Migrations, March 2007, n.27, http://www.migrationforcee.org/pdf/MFR27/11.pdf
Proposals
Agreement of cooperation between the Fund of rehabilitation of the victims of the International Criminal Court, the Catholic Relief Services and the archidiocese of Bukavu.
