Epedemic of Rape and Mutilation of Congolese Women

Many of us saw "Hotel Rwanda" which enlightened us to the horrors of the 90's Rwandan genocide. Hutus in that country slaughtered the ruling Tutsis on an unimaginable scale until the Rwandan (and Tutsi controlled) army regained control and began slaughtering Hutus in return. Many Hutu's, particularly the perpetrators of the genocide, fled into what was then Zaire (now Congo), which sparked a conflict there. The conflict spread into a full-scale regional conflict that included Burundi, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Angola and Namibia claiming the lives of millions of Africans. An outgrowth of this has been the continuous rape and mutilation of Congolese women by all sides of the conflict. Women that have been raped are attacked by an average of 2.8 men each and their genitals are often mutilated by sticks, bayonets or rocks. Many have been killed. John Holmes, the UN Humanitarian Chief writes in the L.A. Times about one particularly horrifying incident where a woman was raped by seven men, the last of which put his rifle inside her and shot away her reproductive organs. These horrors are the human costs of the too constant wars on the continent. There are economic cost as well, as a recent report illustrates. An annual $18 Billion a year is lost on the continent because of an estimated 15% reduction to the economies of African nations that go to war. The report also found that 95% of the arms that are used in the conflicts come from outside of the continent. The US was the only nation to vote against a resolution that would study a weapons treaty to track and limit these illicit arms sales (in fairness 24 other nations abstained from the vote as well). Another example of the far reaching effects of who we elect...