By Kylie M Tsudama
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa
GOMA, DR Congo – In the rape capital of the world rape is being used as a weapon of war and instances of this atrocity have recently increased.
The American Bar Association (ABA) has reported that rapes are committed by both militias and police and military officers. Ten percent of rape cases involve male survivors, according to the ABA sexual violence clinic in Goma.
Male rape is on a sudden incline since the joint military operations between Congo and Rwanda rebels began. Rape is being used as a tactic to humiliate and dehumanize the Congolese people and force them into submission.
Most men are afraid of the social stigma attached to the homosexual act and fail to report rape or sexual abuse. Most that do have suffered extreme abuse, including castration and assault leading to continued and severe bleeding. Many men would rather die than report rape and some have.
Brandi Walker, aid worker at a local hospital, said, “Everywhere we go, people say men are getting raped, too.”
Male rape cases are greatly less in number than female rape cases but aid workers say it is a lot harder for men to recover. According to Waker, a man’s identity is too connected to power and control.
“I’m laughed at. The people in my village say: ‘You’re no longer a man. Those people in the bush made you their wife,'” said one survivor.
Women for Women International, an aid organization based in Washington, focuses on how devastating rape is to society. The organization trains top police and military officials. They are learning how to prevent rape under their command.
“While we are an organization that values investment in women, you have to engage larger communities,” says Lyric Thompson, policy analyst at Women for Women. “In many places we work, the community leaders are men, so we use men’s position of influence. Our program in Congo is a model for other programs. It involves a huge paradigm shift from approaching men as the perpetrators – the enemy – to engaging them as allies; as fathers, sons, brothers.”
Last year the rape epidemic seemed to be easing but that has since disappeared. Between 50,000 and 100,000 women have been raped in the past decade of conflict.
For more information, please see:
Ms. Magazine – Rape of Men Used as Weapon of War in Congo – 06 August 2009
VOA – Clinton Says DRC ‘Worst Example of Man’s Inhumanity to Women’ – 06 August 2009
NY Times – Symbol of Unhealed Congo: Male Rape Victims – 04 August 2009
Christian Science Monitor – Congo: Confronting Rape as a Weapon of War – 02 August 2009
