The following newscast may be inappropriate for young children. It certainly was difficult to prepare. The topic is rape and it is very disturbing.

Jane: During the 14-year civil war in Liberia in West Africa (from 1989 to 2003), three quarters of the women were raped, mostly gang-raped, with many suffering internal injuries. Now, 6 yrs after the war, mass rape continues. This year, according to Doctors without Boarders, 28 % of the sexual violence cases reported from January to April, involved children aged 4 or younger, and 33 percent involve children aged 5 through 12.

In his May 21 2009 editorial NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF says that "it has been easier to get men to relinquish their guns than their sense of sexual entitlement… The war seems to have shattered norms and trained some men to think that when they want sex, they need simply to overpower a girl." Kristoff points out that there is overwhelming evidence that "the best way to deal with rape - whether in Darfur or Liberia, or even in the United States - is to demystify it, dismantle the taboos, and address it directly".

Joan: So what is being done? Liberia's president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first woman elected a president in Africa, is determined to eradicate rape. On an international basis, the United Nations Security Council held a formal session last year on sexual violence, and the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued its arrest warrant for Sudan's president in part because of mass rapes.

President Obama is expected to appoint former Rep. Howard Wolpe, D-Mich., to a second stint as special envoy to Africa's Great Lakes region to address the ongoing violence in Democratic Republic of Congo.

Jane: It is interesting that there was quite a bit of pressure to get him to appoint someone specifically to Congo, although he did have an appointee to Sudan who has been looking for a common approach to several countries including Sudan and Darfur. Representative Wolpe does appear to have outstanding credentials for the position. However, I am concerned whether the cultures are close enough to begin to communicate with each other.

Joan: But there is some good news:

From Women's eNews: Last week, the Congolese army came under scrutiny from the United Nations and human rights groups for its role in raping, killing and looting sprees during military operations in the two eastern provinces of North Kivu and South Kivu.

Human Rights Watch called on the army to hold accountable soldiers involved in the rape of 143 women and girls, more than half of the 250 rape cases the organization documented in North Kivu.

"The Congolese army is responsible for widespread and vicious abuses against its own people that amount to war crimes," Anneke Van Woudenberg, a senior researcher in the Africa division at Human Rights Watch, said in a May 19 report.

On May 13, Senators Barbara Boxer and Russ Feingold chaired subcommittee hearings on rape, focused on Congo and Sudan, where, as I mentioned, the brutality is particularly appalling. Additionally, Senator Feingold will travel to the Democratic Republic of Congo or DRC, to investigate and see first hand the injustices against women.

In his opening statement, Senator Feingold said, "The stories I heard in eastern Congo are horrifying.  Yet even more horrifying is how common such stories have become for women and girls across eastern Congo and other conflict zones, including those in Sudan.  Rape and other forms of gender-based violence are not just outgrowths of war and its brutality – they can also be weapons of war.  In the past few years there has been an increased focus on the urgent need to address these brutal tactics – whether through UN Security Council resolutions or NGO campaigns – and the United States has an important role to play in helping to facilitate such initiatives and ensure sound policies are implemented. I hope today’s hearing will evaluate how the United States and our partners, including regional and international organizations, can best do so in the context of our overall strategies to promote lasting peace and stability in Congo, Sudan and all conflict zones.

Jane: The hearing. included testimony from 2 panels of experts, including John Prendergast, co-founder of the Enough Project; and Eve Ensler, founder of the women’s rights group V-Day but who really is best known for writing and starring in The Vagina Monologues.

The hearing focused on the two countries where rape has been used widely as a weapon of war: Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) which is now known as the “rape capital of the world” where doctors and aid workers speak of the problem as an “epidemic.” And, Sudan. Well, that’s where the government-sponsored Arab janjaweed militia raped Darfuri women in order to dilute the bloodlines of non-Arabs.

Joan: That's why I call this about Tribalalism, Torture and enTitlement (I know, not exactly a “T” word). Among these warring countries the conflict is about tribalism. And of course, to a woman, rape is the ultimate torture. And about entitlement: part of the mentality in rape the occurs with war is that women are a possession to which men see themselves entitled. To rape another man's woman is to destroy the value what he perceives to be his personal property.

On of the panelist was Congo Activist and sister radio journalist, Chouchou Namegabe Nabintu' who pressed the Senators to end sexual brutality in The Democratic Republic Of Congo.Nabintu said "When a gorilla is killed in the mountains, there is an outcry, and people mobilize great resources to protect the animals. Yet more than 500,000 women have been raped, and there is silence. After all of this …we want you to act now."

Jane, it really does take women to point out these issues that are beyond the experience of men. We cannot expect them to fully understand, but we can expect them to give us the opportunity to be heard and then to act. This is why we need more women in every aspect of life, including politics, journalism, the courts, the law. Medicine. You name it. We need women in it.

Jane: On May 15 (IPS) – In Zimbabwe, Women’s rights groups have urged the establishment of a Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission to bring to justice people who committed human rights violations - including sexual abuse and rape.

The Women's Coalition of Zimbabwe called on Southern African Development Community (SADC) leaders to pressure the unity government of Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai to uphold a regional protocol on gender. Chair Emilia Muchawa said: "Any transitional process will not be effective unless it addresses the issues raised by those affected. Attempts of national healing and reconciliation without (justice) provide a short-lived remedy to conflict."

Sekai Holland, Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s office, who is responsible for National Healing and Reconciliation said they plan to do what the people of Zimbabwe including a reconciliation commission that brings to trial individuals who committed human rights offenses.

Joan: Last week, Bogotá correspondent Sibylla Brodzinsky wrote about women’s groups in Colombia that are pushing for more rape cases to be tried under the country’s special Justice and Peace Law. Local and national women’s organizations say there are thousands of cases of sexual violence – by right-wing paramilitaries and leftist guerrillas – that go unreported by women too afraid to talk. But now, the groups are campaigning to make women aware of their rights as victims and to push prosecutors to question paramilitaries about sexual violence.

Jane: Women in Mauritania Africa who press charges for sexual assault face the risk of jail time because of poorly defined laws and stigma that criminalize victims rather than offenders, according to a local UN-funded non-profit.

The subject of rape is still so taboo in Mauritania that there is no mention of it in the law, and the word is absent from government documents, according to the NGO Mauritanian Association for Maternal and Child Health, based in the Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott. "The problem of decriminalizing the victim is [that] the law does not define rape. How do you punish offenders if you have not clarified the crime?"

Joan: That is my enTitlement T., the idea that men are entitled to rape women, have sex when they want. Americans cannot be complacent and think that rape happens in third world countries while developed countries are more civilized. Not so, alas.  In the United States,

·         1.3 women are raped every minute. That's four women every three minutes or 80 every hour!

·         1 out of every 3 American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. The United States has the world's highest rape rate of the countries that publish such statistics. It's 4 times higher than Germany, 13 times higher than England, and 20 times higher than Japan.

·         1 in 7 women will be raped by her husband.

·         83% of rape cases are ages 24 or under.

·         1 in 4 college women have either been raped or suffered attempted rape.

·         1 in 12 males students surveyed had committed acts that met the legal definition of rape. Furthermore, 84% of the men who had committed such acts said what they had done was definitely not rape.

·         75% of male students and 55% of female students involved in acquaintance rape had been drinking or using drugs.

·         Only 16% of rapes are ever reported to the police.

Jane . Sadly, when rape is reported, the rape kits are not always processed in a timely fashion. We recently reported on more that 7000 rape kits that were not processed in LA and over 2500 not processed in Cleveland.

Rape is a pervasive crime against humanity not just women. It has been hushed up too long .It is time, as NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF said to "demystify it, dismantle the taboos, and address it directly."

Joan: Hopefully, as we get more women into positions of power, more women into the press, more awareness, we might be able to change things. And we must stop blaming the victim. Studies and understanding may help us solve the problem better, but we need solutions now that will protect women. Prevention of course is the best step, and we just need to figure that out. I think we can.

Jane Blanchard
Joan Froede