War has raged through the Democratic Republic of Congo for more than a decade — it has been called the deadliest conflict since World War II.
The United Nations estimates that 200,000 women and girls have been raped in that time, some victims as young as three years old.
Both the Congolese army and rebel groups have used rape as a weapon of war.
Armed groups use rape to tear apart families, spread disease and weaken communities. Women are often victimized doubly — first by their rapists and secondly by spouses or family members who then find it dishonorable or socially unacceptable to associate with them.
Worldfocus special correspondent Michael J. Kavanagh of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and video journalist Taylor Krauss recently reported from eastern Congo. Together with Lisa Biagiotti and Bijan Rezvani, they produced this signature story.
Tags: displaced people, Ethnic Conflict, Malnutrition, Poverty, Rape, Refugees, United Nations, War, Women
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The fighting in the DR in Congo has gone on around 60 years, and in the last 10 years thousands and thousands of women have been tourtured, abused, raped, and humiliated. It’s sick to see that there is no one stepping in on this type of genocide. Since the UN hasn’t taken much action before the new elections took place, they have no hold on the Congo and the war that is going to be one of the biggest breaking wars known. What is going on is just like the Holocaust, yet American’s aren’t being informed about what is going on, yet with this war being one of the most brutal wars since World War II, it should be more important to us. I believe with more information going out to America, the more that we can try to help these women and children, especially for whats going to come. We should be bringing over more doctors and help so we can build hospitals all over the Congo to help the women and children who can’t afford being in a hospital. It should be the least bit of the women’s worries that they won’t have enough money to help themselves after being beaten, tourtured, and brutally raped, and they should be focused on protecting themselves and their children. We also need to put more psychological help because in the congo’s modern belief, the rape victims are shameful for being raped. We need people to help the villages know that these women don’t want to be raped. Along with understanding, we need to help the women and children who are raped so they are able to cope and stay strong and fight for their generations to be safe and try to resolve the raping problem.
If there is still this traditional stigma of protecting the family name and honor, what is the best way to convince men that it is not their wive’s fault for getting raped? How do you overcome such entrenched beliefs?
There are many different organizations, individuals, and institutions working on this. One way is sensitivity training and education - trying to change behavioral norms through understanding and empathy. Some groups, like the group SOPROP who introduced us to Georgina and Andre, have been very successful doing this (50% of husbands remain with their wives in some places, up from 10%)
Another solution is punitive. When men start learning they will pay a price for rape, the numbers drop. But as long as the conflict in eastern DRC continues, that sort of development of legal institutions can’t happen.
Is the reason that men decide to take their anger out on the women who have been raped, rather than the perpetrators, because it is the only way they can assert their dominance and masculinity when so much of that has been taken away by the army and the state? It it seems as if they are powerless against the actual perpetrators, and because of this they feel they must redeem themselves somehow
There are a lot of reasons. Powerlessness, humiliation, shame, opportunism, fear. Some reasons are at least understandable, i think, if not sympathetic. Men, like women, need to understand that it’s not their fault either, that they shouldn’t be ashamed themselves or afraid. It’s a long process.
Do women shun women that have been raped the same way that men do? Or this a purely masculine trend?
It is just wrong for the men to leave their wives just because their wife has been raped. If their wife has just been raped it is needed for the husband to console the wife. It was very depressing to hear the story of Gorgina(sorry if i spell it wrong). Gorgina still loves the husband and yet he will not accept her back because of the fear of hiv. The two made a commitment and for the husband to leave because of being “humliated” then what then kept their 33 years of marriage going. Hopefully the two will eventually get back together. Rape being used as a weapon is definitely taking advantage of people just because as the video said, women are hurt by the rapist and then left by the husbands leaving them with nobody. Thanks to the effort of building a shelter for the victims, they have a place to go if everyone else in the community rejects them.
How is the judicial system set up in DR Congo? If someone is accused of a crime do they have the right to a lawyer? Who would fulfill the role of a jurist?
Are there any organization outside of DR Congo trying to help the victims of these crimes?
Check out the V-day campaign or Heal Africa. The American Bar Association is doing exemplary work in eastern Congo building capacities of the Congolese justice system to try perpetrators and protect women. When you’re dealing with rape by Congolese soldiers, there are military courts, which are improving. With militia groups it becomes much more complicated - there’s little to be done. In the case of civilian perpetrators, there are some structures in place. Groups like Synergie des Femmes help with protection and lawyers and paperwork. There’s also many different examples of traditional justice systems in rural Congo - barter systems led by village elders, for example. Some women end up marrying their rapist in some cases. Again, the insecurity in eastern Congo makes the development of these kinds of structures extremely difficult for the moment.
There’s also ICTJ and the UN itself, who have programs supporting legal development.
A worldwide change in the way we view women needs to take place in order to stop injustices such as these. The only way that our world will ever get away from these acts of maliciously violating the rights of women is if we change every little aspect of our culture to eliminate any possibity for this kind of violence. I feel that if we can begin to instill virtues that reflect a Christian sentiment towards woman on even the smallest level, then our world will have much fewer of these horendous acts being commited.
Sorry about the typos above^.
What do you see as the obvious similarities in our culture as Americans that mirror the actions that we are hearing about in this video? What are some steps to eliminate this similarities?