Congo (Kinshasa)

The first "Peace and Equal Opportunities in Congo after 50 years of independence" fair opened on 18th March at the premises of the Kinshasa International Fair (FIKIN). The three-day event, which was organised in collaboration of the United Nations system in the DRC, was held as part of the celebration of International Women's Day.

I was unemployed, trying to kickstart a career in political journalism, when I received a call from a BBC producer making a documentary about the Democratic Republic of Congo. My uncle works in the Congolese community in north London, translating, teaching English, offering advice; the documentary makers had come to him looking for a young woman, living in Britain but born in DRC, who had not been back for a long while. I fitted the bill.

Margot Wallström's two-year U.N. assignment to stem sexual violence in conflict areas begins March 1, with an immediate focus on the Democratic Republic of Congo.

With the United Nations peacekeeping forces set to begin a pull-out in coming months, women in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have little reason to see the move as a sign of increased personal security, experts warn.

Their likelihood of becoming victims of heinous rape crimes remains high. Impunity in the country only worsens their chances of falling prey to those using sexual violence as a weapon of war.

Gender activists from East and Southern Africa have expressed shock at the backward trends in the 50/50 campaign in recent elections. The African Union (AU) has set a goal of achieving parity between women and men in decision-making by 2020, while the Southern African Development Community (SADC) target calls for 50% women in decision-making in all sectors by 2015.

A training session for Congolese Special Police for Protection of Women and Children is being held from February 9, to February 19, 2010 by MONUC's (the UN Peacekeeping Mission in the DRC) Police component in Kananga in collaboration with UNICEF (United Nations Children's Fund).

Rape victims in the south east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, can usually be paid off with five goats and some money to forget an act. This is why, in a six month drive to re-shape attitudes towards the crime, United Nations staff are telling women they can go to court. One of the stops on the campaigns tour is the village of Mwitwobe in Katanga province.

Sexual violence used as a weapon of war in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo continues unabated as more than a decade of conflict in the area drags on. This week the world has again turned its eyes to this ongoing issue, as new figures released by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) stated that over 8,000 women were raped in the region in 2009.

I've learned some new words.

One is “autocannibalism,” coined in French but equally appropriate in English. It describes what happens when a militia here in eastern Congo's endless war cuts flesh from living victims and forces them to eat it.

At first glance there is nothing disturbing about the man playing tennis on the red clay courts of the Hotel Karibu. Other guests in the grounds of the hotel walk serenely across its manicured lawns, dine in thatched-roofed rondavels, or sip drinks while admiring Lake Kivu.