On April 15, 2010 Oxfam released a new report, “Now, The World Is Without Me”: An investigation of sexual violence in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. The report, which was commissioned by Oxfam and conducted by the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, is an extensive study of rape victims in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The study analyzed data collected over a period of four years from 4,311 female rape victims treated in Panzi hospital in South Kivu Province. The study’s reported that 60 percent of rape victims surveyed in the DRC stated that they were gang raped by armed men and more than half of assaults took place in the supposed safety of the family home at night, often in the presence of the victim’s husband and children.
The study reported that the level of rape was highest at points when military activities were in occurrence. However as the study showed the majority of rapists were vomited by either combatants, it also reviled that the rate of rapes committed by civilians has increased 17-fold during 2004 – 2008.
Susan Bartels, chief researcher from the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, said the research confirmed what had been reported anecdotally. “Sexual violence has become more normal in civilian life,” she said. “The scale of rape over Congo’s years of war has made this crime seem more acceptable.” (Guardian)
The report was issues just as the UN Security Council made their visit to DRC to discuss renewing the current UN peacekeepers mandate. Margot Wallstrom, the U.N. special representative on sexual violence in conflict, while visiting the Congo, seeks to persuade the Congolese government not to seek a withdrawal of U.N. peacekeepers. When commenting on the DRC’s legislation to outlaw sexual violence, Wallstrom said the country’s capacity to implement it was “near zero.”
” “How will it help if (the U.N. peacekeeping mission) withdraws? Will it help the situation here? I think not … I have a lot of fears,” she added in Kinshasa Monday. (Reuters)
When will the rapes end? This is a question that is being asked, not only in the Congo, but across the globe. However while the DRC remains one of the worst countries in the world for is exuberant use of rape as a weapon of war, it is not alone in this destructive act that not only destroys the bodies of women and girls, but serves to ultimately brake down civil society. Regardless of how the situation with UN peacekeepers is resolved the continuance of conflict in the country and high level of impunity for those perpetrators who use rape, it will not only become a weapon of war, but a societal norm as the reports increased numbers of civilian rapes begins to give increased light to.
The increased levels of civilian rape in conflict and post-conflict countries is and area where I have placed a great deal of my own personal research. Please see more on my preliminary research and work on Rape as a Weapon of War and it’s Long-term Effects on Victims and Society. The paper looks at the following key questions: Does rape as a tool of war leave a country with less chance of a solid and stable political future? What are the long term effects on the society as a whole? What are the ongoing effects of stigmatizing, victims, including a look into the effects of marriages among victims. This also entails looking at the inequality and gender discrimination women face in times of war, including social exclusion, and how this symbolic form of violence affects that marginalization in the future and in times of peace. The paper concludes with recommendations on for more in depth analysis and studies on primary and secondary victims, as well as the rapist.
