DRC: Three Child Survivors of Abduction

In Faradje, Haut-Uélé region, northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) opened a project in 2009 for children who were abducted by armed groups. In the first five months, MSF staff assisted 114 children. Here are three of them.

In May, in their village north of Niangara, 16-year-old Antoine was kidnapped. “Around nine o’clock in the morning, armed men burst into our home,” says his father, Louis, 54. “They made us all get down on the ground. They took my clothes and my radio. Then they took two of my children, and led them away.”

DRC 2009 © Julie Remy

“They made us sit on the ground, says Antoine. “They gave me work to do. I had to clean their clothes and do other jobs during the day. We weren’t allowed to talk. If we talked, they hit us. They hit us a lot.” Antoine has wounds from whippings and beatings with a machete. “We only ate in the evenings. And we walked all day, every day. I was barefoot.”

DRC 2009 © Julie Remy

Antoine’s family believed that he was dead. “I became so thin. I thought of my child night and day,” Louis says. Now he hopes that somehow his second missing child will also return.

DRC 2009 © Julie Remy

Pierrette was held in captivity for two months in the forest, surrounded by the fighting. “We walked a lot during the day. We carried rice, peanuts, salt. I slept with a man at night. It was always the same one. During the day, others would hit me, and he would act as if he didn’t know me. He spent his days with another woman, a mother with children. And at night, he slept with me.”

DRC 2009 © Julie Remy

Pierrette has scars criss-crossing her back and feet. “These men killed people next to me. I was scared, but we weren’t allowed to cry. If we cried, they hit us on the back. There were other people who cried with me. They spoke zande, like me, so we could talk, even if we didn’t know each other.”

DRC 2009 © Julie Remy

After two months, she escaped and came to a health center. She was referred to the hospital, where she received medicine and food and saw an MSF psychologist. “I try not to think about it all anymore,” she says. “I don’t talk about it to anyone. But when my mother asked me questions, I told her everything. When I described everything that had happened, my mother and father cried.”

DRC 2009 © Julie Remy

Michel was sleeping at home alongside his little brothers and his older sister. Four men came – all armed, but dressed as civilians. They tied Michel’s and his sister’s hands and took them into the bush. “We found ourselves with around 20 other children. These men whipped us and forced us to work. Every time we talked among ourselves, they hit us with a machete. In the evenings, when we needed to go to the toilet, they thought we would try and escape. We were always tied up at night.”

One day, Michel says, “They had gone to loot a village. On their way back they came across a man working in his field. They grabbed him and took him further into the bush and killed him. Then they gave me a machete and ordered me to chop him up into little bits. I only did it once. My heart was beating so fast. They told me to chop him up and if I didn’t do it they would kill me too. I still relive that moment in my dreams…”

He had seen two men killed while trying to escape. But one day, taking advantage of a skirmish between his kidnappers and the army, Michel managed to get away. “I lay down on the ground. When the soldiers came, I came out of my hiding place and followed them to the village. When I came out of the bush, people were scared of me. I told them not to be afraid and finally they took me in.”

Michel found his family. His parents decided to leave him at MSF’s center for child survivors for a while. Here, he receives psychological support and spends his days with other children who were once kidnapped. He needs time to readjust to living back in the community, and to try and make a fresh start at 13 years old.

DRC: Three Child Survivors of Abduction

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DRC: Three Child Survivors of Abduction

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