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Fatuma Kapuweli has a daily struggle to keep her children fed and out of danger.

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Stories From The Field

Rose, DRC

Rose, DRC

Breaking the silence around rape is extremely difficult, but for women like Rose, it's the first step towards healing.

Before the fighting started in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Rose* and her family lived quiet rural lives. She and her husband had three children, a small piece of land on which to raise them and a stall on the main road from which they sold fish caught in a local lake.

With the outbreak of conflict 15 years ago, their lives began to unravel. Their house was robbed, their business struggled. The final collapse came when armed men entered Rose's home with the intention of raping her two daughters. She pleaded with them to kill her and spare her children.

"That's when one of them pulled out a knife and tore my clothes. He left me naked in front of my girls and they raped me in front of them," Rose recently recalled to a social worker at a UNHCR-run camp for internally displaced persons in North Kivu.

Rose has become a regular visitor to the women's centre in Mugunga II camp, about 25km west of Goma which provides counselling, skills training and literacy courses. With UNHCR funding, the centre seeks to assist and empower women who are survivors of sexual violence, infected with HIV-AIDS, illiterate or otherwise socially excluded.

Breaking the silence is extremely difficult for rape victims in eastern DRC where the subject is taboo and victims ostracised. Many, like Rose, are abandoned by their husbands in the aftermath of the assault.

* Name changed