En ny undersøgelse viser at antallet af voldtægter i DR Congo er 26 gange højere end hidtil antaget, skriver det amerikanske tidsskrift American Journal of Public Health. Flere end 400.000 congolesiske kvinder i alderen 15 til 49 blev i en 12-måneders periode i 2006 og 2007 udsat for voldtægt, fortæller tidsskriftet.
The study, “Estimates and Determinants of Sexual Violence Against Women in the Democratic Republic of Congo,” represents the first-ever estimates of sexual violence in DRC based on rigorous examination of government-collected and nationally representative data. Previous estimates have used police and health centre reports. The United Nations reported last year that only 15,000 women were raped during that time.
“The study creates another compelling argument that sexual violence in the DRC is not only a grievous mass violation of human rights but is a security threat to the entire DRC,” said Michael VanRooyen, MD, MPH, Director of the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative. “While there are certainly limitations to the use of these data, the message is important and clear: Rape in the DRC has metastasized amid a climate of impunity, and has emerged as one of the great human crises of our time.”
Sexual violence occurred in all provinces, the study shows, while the number of women raped at least once in the eastern conflict area of North Kivu—67 per 1,000—is more than double the national average of 29 per 1,000. That means a woman in certain parts of the Congo is 134 times more likely to be raped than a woman in the United States, which has an annual rape rate of 0.5 per 1,000 women.
Rates of rape in other provinces show that Congo’s sexual violence pandemic is not limited to armed-conflict zones. In fact, the outlier Equateur province showed rates higher than the conflict-affected South Kivu and Orientale provinces (65 in Equateur to 44 and 38 respectively). This is a new and highly significant finding.
