Somalia gang rape victim accuses African Union force
By <
http://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/author/afp12327/> AFP |
<
http://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/2013/08/somalia-gang-rape-victim-accuses-af
rican-union-force/> August 20, 2013
NAIROBI, Aug 20 - Abducted, drugged and gang raped in Somalia: a young
mother details the most brutal of allegations against African Union troops
and Somali soldiers in a case causing widespread anger.
"The soldiers raped me. I tried to defend myself but they beat me badly and
I passed out," she said, speaking to the Somali Channel television about the
attack earlier this month.
She alleged she was stopped on the streets of Mogadishu by three soldiers
from the national army, blindfolded and forced into a car, before being
handed over to African Union troops, where she says she was repeatedly
raped.
She has needle marks on her arms from where she says drugs were injected
during the several hours long assault in the Maslah compound, a Ugandan
troop base on the outskirts of Mogadishu.
"There were other women in the room. one of the them badly bleeding," she
added, speaking from a hospital bed.
The woman, in her late 20s with a young baby, was unconscious during the
attack and says she does not know how many men raped her. She was later
thrown back onto the streets.
AMISOM, the 17,700-strong United Nations-mandated force that supports the
government in its fight against Al-Qaeda-linked Shebab insurgents, said it
has launched an investigation together with the Somali army.
"Appropriate action will be taken once the facts of the case have been
established," AMISOM said in a statement.
Somalia's Prime Minister Abdi Farah Shirdon said in a statement that the
government was "deeply troubled by the alleged rape. involving a number of
personnel from AMISOM."
AMISOM, fighting since 2007 in Somalia and funded by the UN and European
Union, insists it "strongly condemns . sexual abuse or exploitation".
The force is mainly made up of troops from Uganda, Burundi and Kenya, with
smaller numbers from Djibouti and Sierra Leone.
The case threatens to badly dent the reputation of the force, and play into
the hands of the Shebab.
Shebab fighters are themselves accused of horrific attacks and rape, but the
extremists' spokesman Ali Mohamed Rage gloated at the rape reports.
"Somali soldiers first abduct the girls and rape them, they also share them
with AMISOM troops," Rage said.
"The Somali troops are the remnants of the former warlords, they are killing
their people and raping our daughters and mothers. the African Union troops
are brutal."
Rape is pervasive in Mogadishu, but the extreme nature of the woman's
allegations and the accusations of AMISOM involvement have shocked many.
In the first six months of 2012, some 800 cases of sexual violence were
reported in Mogadishu alone, according to the United Nations Office for the
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), which refers to the rapists as
"unknown armed men and men wearing military uniform".
Many more cases are believed to have gone unreported.
"Sexual violence in Somalia is one of the most serious and urgent human
rights challenges facing the government and people of Somalia," said
Nicholas Kay, UN special representative for the country.
Kay, who expressed his "grave concern" at the rape allegations, has demanded
investigations be "rigorous and prompt".
"If there is a case to answer, any perpetrator should be prosecuted," Kay
said in a statement.
But Maryan Qasim, Somalia's minister for human development, insisted there
was "major exaggeration and inflation of the number of attacks". She also
said alleged victims who speak out in the media should be "shot".
Somalia's army, an often rag-tag force incorporating militia fighters, has
repeatedly been accused by rights groups of a string of abuses against
women, including rape.
In March, Human Rights Watch (HRW) detailed the "enormous problem" of the
rape and sexual abuse of women and girls in Mogadishu, including by
government soldiers and militia fighters.
But HRW said that many of those attacked are too frightened of reprisals to
tell the authorities.
Even reporting on rape in Mogadishu carries its own risks: a Somali
journalist and a rape victim he interviewed were both sentenced to a year in
prison in February, but they were released after two months in jail after
the case sparked widespread international criticism.
Received on Tue Aug 20 2013 - 12:14:30 EDT