Boy gunmen go on raping spree among the displaced

The shooting may have stopped in the Liberian capital Monrovia, but idle gunmen, many of them as young as 12, continue to rape and sexually harass the vulnerable inhabitants of its crowded camps for displaced civilians. “Sexual violence has been a major feature of the Liberian war,” Ross Mountain, the United Nations Special Humanitarian Coordinator in Liberia told IRIN. Aid workers say both government and rebel fighters, many of them child soldiers as young as 12, are preying on the 200,000 to 450,000 displaced civilians crowded into schools and other public buildings in the capital to seek shelter. Harry Evans, the head of Amnesty International in Liberia, said within the last week, 40 women and 20 girls had reported being raped in the Samuel Doe Stadium. This houses up to 50,000 civilians who fled rebel attacks on Monrovia in June and July. “Most of the incidents involved armed militias who entered the camp disguised as displaced civilians," Evans told IRIN. "The women and girls were raped when they went to take a bath.” The lawless, armed and often drunk fighters, most of whom are under 18, threaten to kill those who refuse to grant them sexual favours, he added. Concerned Christian Community (CCC), a local relief agency that offers psychological and social counseling to displaced civilians, said it had counseled 1,500 women and girls in Monrovia since 5 June, of whom 626 were victims of rape. “The victims were aged 8-54 years," CCC chief executive Mariam Brown told IRIN. "Some of the cases involved multiple rape of both mother and daughter and some had suffered the same ordeal before elsewhere,” she added. Brown said 60-65 percent of the rape victims were suffering from infections, mainly vaginal diseases. Four of them required urgent surgery, but CCC did not have the US $2,400 necessary to pay for their hospitalization, she noted. “Most of them were raped by government fighters or rebels. They each have gruesome stories to tell, but even where they know who did it, they cannot do anything because of the fragile security situation,” said David Foday, CCC's senior regional officer in Monrovia. “We offer some medical help but encourage the victims to go to the National Aids Control Programme because we are worried that many of them could have contracted HIV/AIDS,” he added. About 1,500 Nigerian soldiers, the vanguard of a West African peacekeeping force, was supposed to take over security in Monrovia this month. Armed soldiers and militiamen of both the government and Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebel movement were supposed to have left the battered city of more than one million people. But the reality is that the Nigerians are badly overstretched and government and rebel fighters still stroll openly around the parts of town they previously controlled with automatic rifles slung over their shoulder Astrid Van Genderen Stort, a spokeswoman for the UN refugee agency UNHCR, said that 10 days ago two women were taken out of the Samukai camp for Sierra Leonean refugees on the northwestern outskirts of Monrovia and raped. "We have since asked ECOMIL (the West African peacekeeping mission) to patrol Samukai, VOA and Banjor camps three times a day. They have also moved their checkpoint nearer the camp," she told IRIN. During intense fighting between government and rebel forces in Monrovia in June, July and early August, over 1,000 displaced people took refuge in the UNHCR compound at Mamba Point enclave. But even there, in a compound protected by private security guards, they were not safe. "There were several stories of harassment and rape among that group by armed men before they moved out this week," Van Genderen Stort said. Up to 500,000 Liberians - out of a population of less than three million - have been displaced from their homes by war. They now live in camps and temporary shelters alongside refugees from Sierra Leone and Cote d’Ivoire, mostly in and around Monrovia. “There is need to improve lighting in the camps, provide escorts for the women and encourage reporting," Melissa Winkler, communications director for the US relief agency, International Rescue Committee (IRC), said. Twenty women have so far reported being raped at the five centers in Monrovia, where IRC is working. “We are providing counseling, medical care, some legal assistance and other support to them,” Winkler said. Last week, IRC was selected by the relief agencies working in Liberia to lead an inter-agency working group on the prevention sexual abuse. “Throughout Liberia’s 14 years of war, rape was common, But it was mainly women that were targeted," one relief worker told IRIN. "Recently more younger girls, boys and old women are reporting having been abused by young male fighters,’ he added. In 2001, Amnesty International documented a string of unlawful killings, torture and rape carried out by both government and rebel forces in northern Liberia. Its report was entitled "Liberia: Killings, torture and rape continue in Lofa County." Amnesty said then: "The scale of rape by security forces against women and girls - some as young as 12-years-old - raises concerns that it's used as a weapon of terror in the civilian population. Women and girls have been raped- often by gangs of soldiers - after fleeing the fighting and being arrested at checkpoints." Not much has changed.