Congo (Kinshasa)

The following Security Council press statement was read out today by Council President Vitaly Churkin (Russian Federation):

The members of the Security Council expressed their outrage at the recent case of mass rape in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo allegedly perpetrated by elements of the Front Démocratique de Libération du Rwanda (FDLR) and Mai Mai.

The United Nations knew Rwandan rebels were occupying villages in eastern Congo at the time the rebels raped nearly 200 women there, United Nations and aid officers said Wednesday, raising questions about why peacekeepers failed to move to protect villagers.

The recent savage rape and assault of scores of civilians in the remote and troubled far east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is a “brutal reminder” of the obstacles faced in keeping the peace in conflict zones, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today.

Rwandan and Congolese rebels gang-raped nearly 200 women and some baby boys over four days within miles of a U.N. peacekeepers' base in an eastern Congo mining district, an American aid worker and a Congolese doctor said Monday.

Will F. Cragin of the International Medical Corps said aid and U.N. workers knew rebels had occupied Luvungi town and surrounding villages in eastern Congo the day after the attack began on July 30.

A U.N. human rights investigation mission will be launched in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) Wednesday, U.N. officials announced Tuesday, after gruesome reports surfaced in the media of the systematic gang rape of nearly 200 women in a 21km stretch of 15 villages.

A mob of Rwandan rebels gang-raped at least 179 women last month during a weekend raid on a community of villages in eastern Congo, the United Nations said Monday.

The Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, or F.D.L.R., was blamed for the attack. The F.D.L.R. is an ethnic Hutu rebel group that has been terrorizing the hills of eastern Congo for years, preying on villages in a quest for the natural resources beneath them.

International Medical Corps is responding to an incident of mass sexual violence perpetrated by armed groups over the course of four days in a remote village in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. So far, at least 150 women are believed to have been targeted.

A survey conducted by American scientists among the population of eastern Congo challenges the traditional image of sexual violence as perpetrated by men against women – but NGOs assisting rape survivors urge caution in interpreting the study's gender findings.

A group of female Congolese journalists last month took part in a week-long training session in Goma aimed at teaching them the skills they need to contribute to IWPR's Face à la Justice radio programme, which is about to be relaunched.

Six children under the age of two have reportedly been raped or sexually molested in the Lubumbashi area, as part of apparent rituals in which the perpetrators believe they will acquire good fortune as result of the abuse.The new cases come in the wake of a number of similar well documented incidents of sexual violence against infants over the last year, which have alarmed activists and sparked calls for the introduction of the death penalty f