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INSIDE AFRICA

Violence Against Women in Conflict Zones; Under-equipped Darfur Peacekeepers

Aired August 9, 2008 - 12:30:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ISHA SESAY, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Isha Sesay. Welcome to INSIDE AFRICA, your weekly window to the continent. In this week's show, sexual violence in African conflict zones. We explore the vast scale of the problem and some potential solutions.
And we'll talk to playwright and human rights activist Eve Ensler about her efforts to put an end to it.

Also ahead, activists call out specific U.N. members for not giving Darfur peacekeepers the equipment they need to protect civilians and themselves.

Two United Nations agencies are calling for urgent action to end violence against women. The directors of the U.N. Development Fund for Women and the U.N. Population Fund co-chaired the session on the subject at the International AIDS Conference in Mexico City. Both say gender-based violence not only increases the risk of contracting HIV, it often serves as an obstacle to treatment.

The U.N. Security Council recently acknowledged that sexual violence is a major problem in many war zones. The council labeled it a tactic of war, and unanimously passed a resolution demanding, quote, "the immediate and complete cessation by all parties to armed conflict of all acts of sexual violence against civilians."

While such attacks are rampant in many African conflict zones, the Democratic Republic of Congo is one of the most extreme examples.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: Human rights activists say more than 2,200 rapes were reported in the DRC's violent Nord-Kivu province in June alone. That's despite a U.N.- backed peace deal between the government and rebel groups in January. And given the stigma attached to being a raped victim in many African cultures, the real number will likely never be known.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): People in my neighborhood just point fingers and say, "you're a raped woman."

SESAY: The former commander of the U.N. peacekeeping force in Eastern Congo has witnessed the huge scale of the problem firsthand.

MAJ. GEN. PATRICK CAMMAERT, FORMER U.N. COMMANDER: Indeed, it is sometimes more dangerous to be a woman than a soldier in conflict. It is a shocking brutality. I thought that I've seen it all in the missions -- United Nations missions that I was deployed in, but this is unbelievable violence, that it is really stopping your short in your tracks. It is unbelievable.

SESAY: The attacks are often so vicious that many survivors require multiple surgeries over a span of years to repair their bodies. Some never regain control of their bodily functions.

DR. LUC MALEMO, HEAL AFRICA: We think that the first reason that the rape is too violent, some of them they will use after -- after raping the lady, they will use maybe -- then may use a weapon, a knife, or even a piece of wood, and some of them have been shot on after being raped.

SESAY: And it's not uncommon for children to be sexually violated.

DANIEL HOMRICH, MEET JUSTICE: I've seen 6-year olds, I've seen -- when you see a child like that react sexually, and be trained and really molded, much like you think molding a soldier to fight in combat -- to think about that and to say, this 6-year old is being molded to perform sexual acts, it is extremely disturbing.

SESAY: The perpetrators may be rebels, military soldiers, police officers, and even in a few documented cases, U.N. peacekeepers.

CAMMAERT: When you talk about the United Nations, I think that the focus will be on the training of peacekeepers, that they understand what a mandate to protect civilians under imminent threat, including sexual violence, what it means, and -- and what it means on the ground when they're facing these kind of situations.

SESAY: The Security Council first addressed the issue of sexual violence in conflict zones nearly eight years ago, in response to atrocities committed in the DRC and the Balkans. The critics say the U.N. has acted with little sense of urgency.

HOMRICH: I think for too long, this issue has been denied, that this is just victims elsewhere. That these are just people that don't matter. These are throwaways, these are people without a voice.

SESAY: Perhaps now that the Security Council has spoken with one voice, governments and armed groups will face greater pressure to protect civilians from the scourge of sexual violence.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: The Security Council has launched a formal inquiry to determine the extent of sexual violence in conflict zones. It's expected to release its findings next summer.

Eve Ensler of "Vagina Monologues" fame is leading a campaign to stop sexual violence in the DRC. We'll hear from her about that after a short break. Also ahead, NGOs ban together to shame countries into helping Darfur's vulnerable civilians.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SESAY: Welcome back to INSIDE AFRICA. Playwright and human rights activist Eve Ensler has built a long track record as an advocate for women. She first rose to fame in 1996, performing her critically acclaimed off- Broadway show "The Vagina Monologues." That experience inspired her to create V-Day, a global movement and non-profit organization that has spent the last 10 years working to end violence against women.

Ensler's work has taken her around the world, including the Democratic Republic of Congo. There she has met scores of survivors of sexual atrocities, and a doctor who has dedicated his life to easing their suffering.

I recently spoke to Ensler about her mission and the personal impact of her work in Africa.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People will tell us, those of us who have survived violence, that our life is finished, but it's not true.

EVE ENSLER, PLAYWRIGHT/ACTIVIST: Well, about two years ago, I had the honor and pleasure, really, of meeting Dr. Denis Maguage (ph) in New York City. I was asked by OCHA, a U.N. agency, to interview him, to really explore the issues and explore the crisis that was going on then in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

And to be honest, I was a little resistant to doing this, because I knew once I opened the door to the atrocities in the Congo, there would be no return. That interview really changed my life, and meeting Dr. Maguage changed my life.

SESAY: What made it stand out for you? The violence, the brutality of the DRC?

ENSLER: Well, first of all, I think we could say the numbers. You know, it is -- it is suspected -- U.N. statistics are saying that 200,000, 250,000 women have been raped in the DRC over the last 10 years. A Reuters report came out that even when there is a cease-fire in Goma -- there was one on January, 23rd -- over the month of June, 2,200 women reported cases of rape in one month. That would be almost 70 women a day are getting raped in Goma, Congo.

And so, we're talking about numbers; we're talking about the crimes themselves. We're talking about gang rapes. We're talking about the use of guns, the use of sticks and the use -- in women's vaginas. We're talking about the raping of children as young as 10 months old, 8-year-old girls and women as old as 80. We're talking about whole communities of women who have been raped. We're talking about Dr. Maguage, who has to sow up women and then often send them back to communities where they get raped again.

SESAY: The women you met there, give us some sense of -- of how they view life now, how they view the crimes that they have -- they have suffered.

ENSLER: Well, I want to say something also. You know, one of the things we have to keep reminding people is that the Congo didn't just get born like this overnight. The centuries of rape of the Congo by the Belgians and colonialism and exploitation and racism -- the legacy of that, in my belief, is this legacy now of raping and raping, and the destruction of the Congo, and particularly the Congolese women.

I think, you know, that women there are some of the most kind, brilliant, resilient, fierce women I have met anywhere. And with few resources and power behind them and protection, and a working judiciary, those women could easily become the next leaders of the DRC.

I always tell the story of one particular girl, because I just fell in love with her, and I'm still very close to her, and V-day is helping her now go to school. But she was 8 years old -- I'm going to call her Noella to protect her identity. She was 8 years old when the militias broke into her home. They took her father in one direction, her mother in another, and her in a third. They killed her father, they raped her mother, and they held her, the militias, for two weeks, at 8 years old. And they raped her hour on hour upon hour. They shoved horrible things inside her.

When she was returned, she was incontinent. She wasn't able to hold her urine. And so she went to the Pansee (ph) hospital. This girl is one of the brightest lights, one of the most seeking spirits. She's a girl who's desperate to be educated, desperate to find her way in the world. She can't be operated on because her body is too young and she doesn't even have the tissue to have the surgery. So she pees on herself all the time.

In spite of that, in spite of that, this girl is going to school, is fighting to keep -- to find ways to find money for her family. Is a love force, you know, just a love being in the world. And she's one of hundreds of thousands of children, of girls, of older women, of middle-aged women who have been desecrated in their bodies, and yet their spirits and their brains and their whole selves are eager to find a way to keep life going and to turn the future of the Congo around.

The problem is the international community has utterly failed -- utterly, and I mean utterly failed to protect the women in the Congo. Where is the U.N.? Where is MONUC? Where is the Security Council? Where is the international community? Where is that government in the Democratic Republic? And who is putting pressure on that government to stop these atrocities?

SESAY: How do we tackle this, Eve? I mean, in these -- in these societies, by the time they become societies of conflict, you could say that the violence that we see against women really is a product of the violence women face during peace time, you know. It's -- it's somehow a result of the way women are viewed in those societies, and that's -- that's the after-effect, so to speak. How do you deal with that? How do you change those attitudes in peace time so that it does not lead to savagery during conflict?

ENSLER: Well, first of all, we have to start creating a world that operates in a different paradigm. The old paradigm of patriarchy, of domination, occupation, invasion, genocide, racism, exploitation, we have to begin to just rearrange and transform this paradigm.

And I think really what we have to start thinking is how do we live in a world where we dishonor the earth and we dishonor women and think that life will continue? If we do not bring children up, boys and girls up to honor girls, to honor boys, for boys to respect girls and to respect themselves and have the dignity of their own lives, so that they don't grow up to be rapists, so that they don't grow up to attack their own -- the women who can love them and nurture them.

And I think the other thing we have to do is we have to start making violence against women an issue that matters to everyone in the world, and not this issue that we get to later when all the other issues are done.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: Ensler has teamed up with UNICEF to create an antiviolence campaign in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It's called "Stop Raping Our Greatest Resource." Her V-Day organization is also raising money for a facility in the DRC where rape survivors can live while receiving an education and leadership training. It's called the City of Joy.

Like civilians in the DRC, displaced people in Darfur are vulnerable to sexual violence. Up next, dozens of non-governmental organizations put out the list of countries they say could do much more to protect them.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Making business news in Africa this week. South Africa's largest labor federation staging a one-day nationwide strike in response to high energy, food and fuel prices. The Congress of South African Trade Union says it was a warning to employers not to offset their own expenses with layoffs. The group called the strike after the government allowed state-owned Escom to raise power prices by 27.5 percent.

Oil companies in the troubled Niger Delta region reportedly have repaired two key pipelines damaged by rebel attacks late last month. Nigeria's oil minister telling Reuters news agency the repairs will allow some production to resume. Royal Dutch Shell had temporarily halted pumping through a major pipeline. The region's main rebel group, MEND, claimed responsibility for two pipeline attacks that week.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: You're watching INSIDE AFRICA. Welcome back.

Peacekeeping troops, aid workers and human rights activists say rape is an ever-present danger for displaced women and children living in the camps of Darfur. Many are sexually attacked when they gather firewood on the outskirts of the camps, but the Sudanese government denies that rape is a serious problem in Darfur.

On a project to protect civilians in Darfur, the U.N. Security Council authorized a peacekeeping force of 26,000 U.N. and African Union troops just over a year ago. As we reported many times on INSIDE AFRICA, only about 9,000 troops have been deployed so far, and they lack much of the equipment they need.

Now, human rights activists are trying to shame specific U.N. members into helping. A consortium of high-profile human rights groups recently published a report calling out countries it says could provide much needed helicopters, but have elected not to do so. Making the list are the Czech Republic, India, Italy, Romania, Spain and Ukraine.

I asked Save Darfur Coalition President Jerry Fowler about this tactic.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JERRY FOWLER, SAVE DARFUR COALITION: What we did was identify countries that have helicopters that are desperately needed by the civilian protection force in Darfur. And it's been over a year now since the Security Council authorized this force. It still doesn't have helicopters. It still doesn't have trucks. It still doesn't have logistic support that it needs. And so we thought it was time to really start pointing the finger at countries that could come through with these resources.

SESAY: Explain to us why it's so important that these helicopters are delivered to the peacekeeping mission.

FOWLER: Well, as you can imagine, Darfur is a very vast area. It's about the size of France. And to move civilian protection forces around requires helicopters.

And just a very tragic and poignant example of why these helicopters are needed was provided last month when a U.N. patrol was attacked, apparently by militias supported by the government, as far as anyone can tell. And in a three-hour fire fight, seven of these U.N. soldiers were killed, and they couldn't get reinforcements because there were no helicopters to fly reinforcements to the battle scene.

SESAY: Your report was endorsed by the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. He himself has expressed his frustration with the slow progress, if it can be called that. What do we know of his efforts to basically get this mission moving?

FOWLER: Well, I think that the secretary-general and the people who work for the Department of Peacekeeping Operations have put out requests, but they cannot direct countries to make contributions. Really, the contributions have to come about through countries stepping up to their responsibility, and to the major powers, including the permanent members of the Security Council, using their diplomatic efforts to get countries to contribute.

So the failure to have contributions made for this protection force really lies with the member nations of the United Nations, and especially the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council.

SESAY: What is the sense about the fact that the Olympics is going ahead as planned, the issue of Darfur largely away from the spotlight, and China really not being held to account for the fact that they continue to do business with the government of Khartoum. What is the feeling in advocacy world?

FOWLER: Well, I think that to some degree China is being held to account, but so far there has not been enough action on their part in response to this. But I think the one thing that we may see over the coming 10 days and two weeks is not just a focus on the games and the competition, which is important, but a focus on China's role in the world. And in fact, there is -- there was news that China revoked the visa of Joey Cheek, a gold medallist winner from the Olympics, who has been an outspoken advocate for the people of Darfur. They gave him a visa, and then they revoked it, and, you know, things like that are continuing to call attention to China's role.

SESAY: In your opinion, again, this is just a personal thing, I'm sure you can't speak for Save Darfur Coalition -- is it right for the president of the United States to be attending the opening ceremonies?

FOWLER: Well, we were disappointed that he chose to go to the opening ceremony with so much left undone in terms of protecting people in Darfur. So we'd encouraged him not to go unless there was serious progress made in getting this protection force deployed.

Now that he is going, we hope he will take the opportunity to really have some honest conversations with China about their role in the world and about their need to do more to put pressure on Sudan, particularly in light of the recent genocide charges that have been brought by the prosecutor of the ICC against the president of Sudan. China has an obligation, under the genocide convention, to do what they can to prevent any further killing and genocide in Darfur.

SESAY: You've named and shamed six countries in particular that have the hardware that could be there in Darfur, but apparently -- or at least as your group says, they're sitting in hangars or being used in air shows. What next? I mean, if you've resorted to these tactics, where do you go from here?

FOWLER: Well, I think we will continue to use our voice, to use the voices of a growing constituency of conscience around the world to speak out on behalf of civilians in Darfur whose lives are hanging in the balance.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: The report also says that NATO states alone could provide more than six times the number of helicopters needed in Darfur. Fowler says people in countries with free speech can help by pressuring their own governments to act.

A democratically elected African government has fallen. Up next, details on Mauritania's coup.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SESAY: Welcome back to INSIDE AFRICA.

Let's take a look at some stories making headlines around the continent. The military junta now running Mauritania says it plans to hold free and fair elections as soon as possible. Army commanders staged a bloodless coup on Wednesday, ousting the country's fist democratically president in two decades. The takeover followed a bitter political feud over the president's overtures to Islamic radicals and alleged ties to a former dictator. The African Union, the United States and the European Union have condemned the coup.

Zimbabwe's main opposition party says it has signed a joint statement with the ruling party accepting responsibility for election-related violence that broke out in late March. A Movement for Democratic Change spokesman says the statement calls for halt to any further attacks. The two sides have been holding power-sharing talks for several days. Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe says the negotiations are going well.

A South African judge says he will decide next month whether to drop corruption charges against African National Congress President Jacob Zuma. Zuma is accused of taking bribes to hamper an investigation involving a French arms company. He denies the charges. As ruling party leader, Zuma is poised to succeed Thabo Mbeki as South African president next year.

Well, there we must leave it. Thanks for watching. Be sure to tune in next week for a brand-new edition of INSIDE AFRICA.

END