Proposition 52K0765

Proposition de résolution relative aux viols utilisés comme arme de guerre au Congo.

General information ¶

Authors

MR Daniel Ducarme
Open Vld Hilde Vautmans

Submission date

Feb. 1, 2008

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

Democratic Republic of the Congo peacekeeping resolution of parliament war women's rights sexual violence

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP Open Vld N-VA LDD MR VB

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

July 23, 2008 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

I refer to the written report.

The work carried out in the Parliamentary Committee is of high quality. Everyone has received the report, but I don’t think the House today is willing to have a big debate on this issue.

The essential thing is that this proposal can be voted unanimously in the plenary session, as has been the case in the committee, so that the representatives of our country, both at the governmental and parliamentary level, can follow the dossier on the European and international levels. This will be the case at the level of the Council of Europe, following an initiative I took with Ms. Smet.

I refer to the various parliamentary work I have participated in, and limit my speech to these words only.

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, I apologize, some may be hungry and others may have more important things to do, but I think what we are going to vote on now is very important.

By the way, this is not the first time I stand here before you to advocate global women’s rights. We did that, remember, with the resolution against rape in conflict areas. We did this last week or two weeks ago with a resolution against maternal death. We have done that with the actions against the stripping of the breasts in the world. I must tell you that we have already debated many times here in Parliament on the necessary steps that this Parliament should take, worldwide, for the defense of women’s rights.

Today I would like to ask for your support for this resolution on rape as a weapon of war in Congo. Congo is a country where it is hard to find a woman who has only been raped once. Most girls, young girls, young women are often repeatedly raped by multiple men. They have suffered the most humiliating things. They were abused, tortured, beaten.

Ladies and gentlemen, I want to tell you the following story. During my last mission to the Congo, it was with Minister Charles Michel and Minister De Gucht, I went together with a number of doctors, a number of journalists and also with former presentator Kris Smet, to the rebel area of Cagnola. We visited a hospital there.

I spoke there, along with Kris Smet, for an hour with a 14- or 15-year-old girl who was kidnapped by the rebels. She saw before her eyes, before she was taken away, her father being murdered. It was then taken by the rebels. She was trapped there with three girls of her age. For three months, she was raped several times a day. To ultimate humiliation, she was forced to drink the urine of those soldiers. That was the only moisture that the girls were given. She is, together with one of her peers, able to escape. The other two friends, fateful comrades, unfortunately found death in that camp.

Those horrors happen every day. Mr. De Croo, you were there recently. You will go there again. Just over 6,000 kilometers away from here, these crazy things happen. We are, of course, busy here on a lot of things, but if one looks outside and sees what is happening there, then I really think we should take action. We need to get our feet on the ground. We must realize that there are worse things in life than what we sometimes experience here.

Our country has done a lot. On 24 June, a charity concert “Stop the Sexual Terror” was held in Brussels. Thanks to Walter Zinzen and Kris Smet, many artists have come to perform there. I have seen a few fellow parliamentarians who supported the action. The aim was to raise money, but above all to raise public awareness.

Colleagues, it is our duty – I see on the whisper of many colleagues that you agree with me – to keep this drama on the political agenda. I swear to you: as long as the drama in Congo continues, I will ask for permanent attention here on the floor. I also refer to an event of recent days, namely the extradition of a war criminal, which we have been asking for a very long time. If one continues to insist, something ultimately changes in the heads of the leaders. They realize that it cannot continue like this. That is my drive to go on, to face this evil every week or every month, as a heart under the belt for the victims there, and to hold a plea for punishing the perpetrators.

Colleagues, I hope that soon you will again unanimously approve this resolution, as in my committee, for which I thank you.