South Sudan: Sexual assault victims call for justice

WHEN soldiers attacked a blind man’s village, he was given a stark choice between two options nobody should ever have to consider.

Warning: Graphic content

WHEN soldiers attacked and raided his village two years ago, Gatluok had no clue what lay in store.

The blind man soon learned he had to make a stark choice.

“Because of my blindness, I couldn’t run with the young men and so I was caught,” he told Amnesty International.

“They told me to choose if I wanted to be raped or be killed. I said I didn’t want to be killed and so they decided to rape me.”

His horrific story and what took place that day when forces raided his village in South Sudan in May 2015 is just one to emerge from a damning new report released by the human rights group.

The Amnesty International report reveals how the world’s youngest nation is reeling from sexual violence four years after a civil war broke out in the region.

The D o not remain silent Survivors of Sexual violence in South Sudan call for justice and reparations report also reveals how many are being targeted simply because of the race with survivors suffering life-changing injuries.

The report reveals how attacks have been carried out to terrorise, degrade and shame victims as well as intentionally stop them procreating.

“Elderly women, young girls and pregnant women were not spared,” the report reveals.

“Sixteen male survivors of sexual violence described rape, castration, or other forms of torture, including having their testicles pierced with needles.”

Four years into South Sudan's devastating civil war, the world’s youngest nation is reeling from sexual violence on a ”massive scale” a new Amnesty International report reveals. Picture: Ben Curtis/AP

NO ONE SPARED

Amnesty reveals how elderly women, young girls and pregnant women were not spared.

One victim named Nyagai revealed how she was gang-raped by government soldiers in Juba in July 2016 and no longer believes in God.

“Satan went through me the day I was raped,” she said.

A 13-year-old boy told how he was snatched from his bed, drugged and raped in the middle of the night and hasn’t been able to say much since.

“I don’t remember a lot,” the boy known as Batista told the Associated Press from a makeshift clinic in one of South Sudan’s displaced people’s camps in the town of Wau.

The teen said he was raped in December by a 45-year-old man he had seen around the United Nations-run camp but didn’t seek psychosocial support until May.

According to community members he has kept to himself and is in dire need of help.

The UN last year reported a 60 per cent increase in gender-based violence in South Sudan, with 70 per cent of women in its camps across the capital, Juba, having been raped since the start of the civil war in December 2013.

Amnesty’s regional director for East Africa Muthoni Wanyeki said it was premeditated sexual violence.

A sign promoting knowledge of gender issues hangs on the wall at a women’s centre for South Sudanese refugees focusing on sexual and gender-based violence. Picture: Ben Curtis/AP

“Women have been gang-raped, sexually assaulted with sticks and mutilated with knives,” Mr Wanyeki said.

“Victims are left with “debilitating and life-changing consequences,” and many have been shunned by their families.

The new report interviewed 16 male victims, some who said they had been castrated or had their genitalia pierced with needles.

Thousands are suffering in silence and grappling with mental distress. Some now have HIV while others were rendered impotent.

The report is based on interviews with 168 victims of sexual violence in South Sudan and in refugee camps in neighbouring Uganda, home to the world’s fastest-growing refugee crisis.

The report also reveals how some of the sexual assaults occur not during the fighting but among the millions of people sheltering from the conflict.

South Sudanese refugee women who suffered sexual or other gender-based violence play a board game at a women’s centre run by the aid group International Rescue Committee, in Bidi Bidi, Uganda. Picture: Ben Curtis/AP

“Some of the attacks appear designed to terrorise, degrade and shame the victims, and in some cases to stop men from rival political groups from procreating,” Mr Wanyeki said.

The UN Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan and others say both government and opposition forces use rape as a weapon of war — a strategy made worse because of the country’s culture of stigma.

Survivors are discouraged from speaking openly about rape meaning attacks could continue with impunity.

South Sudan’s government has condemned sexual assaults, promising that “the government is moving swiftly to protect civilians from such behaviour by educating all armed forces and holding perpetrators accountable,” acting government spokesman Choul Laam told the AP.

Victims who have reported their attackers to authorities say they’ve seen little justice.

Batista reported his rape to local police, who arrested the perpetrator — only to set the man free a few days later.

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