Congo (Kinshasa)

Congo is “the rape capital of the world,” according to Margot Wallstrom, the UN's Special Representative for Sexual Violence in Conflict. Speaking to New Europe last September she had a sharp message for the warlords and bandits that were preying on civilians in Eastern Congo, “This time we'll get you. We do not accept this.”

The head of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has welcomed the guilty verdicts handed down this week by a military court for rape and other human rights abuses committed by national army personnel in the country's volatile east.

Amnesty International has urged authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to step up reforms to its justice system following the conviction of a military general for crimes against humanity.

Lieutenant Colonel Kibibi Mutware was sentenced to 20 years in jail for ordering an attack on the village of Fizi, eastern DRC, on 1 January, in which more than 35 women were raped.

The U.S. has praised Congo for securing the conviction of a colonel and eight other military personnel for carrying out mass rapes.

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley called Monday's conviction of Lt. Col. Mutuare Daniel Kibibi and the others a "significant milestone" in a country where sexual violence is endemic.

The court of military judges was paid for partly by U.S. legal aid agencies.

A senior United Nations official has welcomed today's verdicts by a military court in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) which mark the first time that a high-ranking commander and several other army personnel were arrested, tried and sentenced for conflict-related sexual violence in the strife-torn nation.

The trial of 11 Congolese soldiers, those accused of raping dozens of women in the town of Fizi, South Kivu on New Year's Day, is an encouraging first step in ending impunity for sexual violence in eastern Congo. It remains to be seen whether these trials will effectively punish all the perpetrators involved, from the commanding officer to the soldiers who committed the violations.

Lieutenant-Colonel Samuel Bisengimana, a senior commander with the Democratic Liberation Forces of Rwanda (FDLR), turned himself in to the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) (MONUSCO) on Wednesday (16 Feb) and will be transferred to a camp for demobilized soldiers in Rwanda today (17 Feb).

The UN backed Radio Okapi, which operates in the Democratic Republic of the Congo said, Saturday, that elements of the Democratic Liberation Forces of Rwanda (FDLR), from Wednesday to Friday, attacked and looted property from the villages of Mirangi and Busundule, in the Bwito area of DRC's North Kivu province.

Eleven soldiers accused of raping more than 60 women have gone on trial in the most high-profile case yet heard by the Democratic Republic of Congo's pioneering ''mobile gender court''.

The men are alleged to have carried out the attacks on New Year's Day in the town of Fizi, in the South Kivu province, where sexual violence is rife amid clashes between the army and local and foreign militias.

As part of its campaign against rape in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the United Nations and its partners this week opened a centre in the eastern city of Bukavu to provide a safe haven and training programmes for survivors of sexual violence.