Mapping Report > Section II. Inventory of Specific Acts of Violence > CHAPTER II. Acts of violence committed against children > B. Specific case of children associated with armed groups and forces (CAAFAG) > 3. Acts of violence committed against CAAFAG

As previously noted, many battles were won in the DRC simply on the basis of a superiority of numbers. The armed groups therefore often recruited children to serve as cannon fodder.¹²⁸⁶ Some were even sent into combat without any arms. Their commanding officers would order them to create a loud diversion, using wooden sticks and branches, in order to act as a human shield, thus protecting the adult soldiers from enemy troops.¹²⁸⁷ When they did not die in combat, the CAAFAG were often forced to commit crimes during or after an attack. In order to force them to overcome their sensitivities and unwillingness to kill, they were brutalised by their superiors and forced to commit particularly horrific crimes. If they refused, they would be executed. On capturing an area, girls would sometimes be taken to child soldiers for them to rape in front of the villagers and adult soldiers.¹²⁸⁸ This strategy of “toughening them up” was also used in training camps, where children were forced to kill and commit atrocities in public.

Even the children’s military training – along with its inherent indoctrination – was dominated by suffering and violations. The CAAFAG were ill-treated, tortured and executed if they resisted or failed to perform. Being particularly vulnerable, the children were also more prone to disease and malnutrition. In 1996, for example, in the AFDL/APR’s Matabe camp near Rutshuru town, CAAFAG were being subjected to torture and other inhuman treatment and were receiving very little food. They were sent to the front without any real military training.¹²⁸⁹ After the AFDL/APR’s entry into Kisangani on 15 March 1997, around a thousand Kadogo and Mayi-Mayi were stationed in the Kapalata training camp when an epidemic of diarrhoea broke out, causing around 400 deaths among them. The 200 to 300 child survivors, transferred to an orphanage in Kisangani in 1998 following pressure from the international community, were abducted in June 1998 by Congolese soldiers and have not been seen since.¹²⁹⁰

During the first war, those CAAFAG recruited – generally forcibly – by the Mayi-Mayi were subjected to secret initiation ceremonies and tattooed in order to perpetuate their association with the group. Their living conditions were largely deplorable and they were subjected to a regime of terror.¹²⁹¹ In 2000, in North Kivu, the ADF/NALU forces allegedly abducted children to carry pillaged goods over long distances. Many died from exhaustion or were executed during these forced marches, some of which lasted several weeks. The survivors suffered from malnutrition and received inhuman treatment, and many of them died in detention.¹²⁹²

Armed groups also committed serious violations of international humanitarian law against CAAFAG from opposing camps, such as, for example, after the battles around Isiro in Orientale Province between 31 July and 2 August 2002, when elements of the ALC mutilated and tortured CAAFAG from the APC.¹²⁹³

Even outside of combat, the mortality rate was very high among both male and female CAAFAG, as they were pushed to the limits of their physical and emotional endurance.

Sexual violence committed against CAAFAG ¹²⁹⁴

Nearly all female CAAFAG were raped, often gang raped, or sexually exploited by the officers and soldiers of all the previously mentioned armed groups. Some male CAAFAG also told of similar experiences.

The Ituri militia allegedly committed acts of sexual violence against the girls associated with their group, both abducted and enlisted.¹²⁹⁵ The few witness statements given since the start of the hearings in the Lubanga trial are representative of the sexual violence committed against female CAAFAG. The enslavement of female CAAFAG by commanding officers was common practice. In the UPC camps, commanding officers would force young pregnant girls to abort their babies.¹²⁹⁶

The different Mayi-Mayi groups also reportedly abducted and used girls, some as young as eight years of age, as sex slaves. By day, the young girls would be forced to help the Mayi-Mayi carry their pillaged goods, cook and do the housework. By night they would be forced to have sex with several Mayi-Mayi.¹²⁹⁷ In North Kivu, the ADF/NALU apparently used women and girls as a source of labour and as sex slaves. Most of the victims suffered from malnutrition and inhuman treatment. Many died in detention.¹²⁹⁸

The feeling of loss and trauma caused by the violence they suffered, by the crimes to which they were exposed or which they were forced to commit has had a devastating impact on the physical and mental integrity of these children.