Rape as a weapon of war: World cried out for Bosnia, why not Haiti? WHY NOT SRI LANKA?

Rape as weapon of war: World cried out for Bosnia, why not Haiti? Why not Sri Lanka by Wilma Eugene as told to Lyn Duff.

My name is Wilma. I am 28 years old. I am a university student, and I live in one of the popular zones in Port-au-Prince, the capital city of Haiti. I have message for the people of the United States and Canada, for the people of Brazil whose troops now occupy our country and for all of the Haitian people living in the Diaspora.

I want to know: Who is listening to the women who have been sexually violated by the police and the government attach s? Who is listening to our voices?

Not too long ago the world was outraged by the rape of white women in Bosnia. The world was horrified by reports that soldiers and paramilitary attach s were raping women as a form of ethnic cleansing, as an act of genocide.

The horrors of Bosnia were called out by the United Nations and others the leaders were tried for their crimes against humanity in an international criminal tribunal. The world said, ?This will never happen again.?

But, it is happening. For the past two years, just a few minutes from Miami, thousands of women and girls have been raped by police, foreign soldiers and members of armed groups. Myself, I was also a victim. I was raped by armed masked men who came to my home, accompanied by two policemen in uniform. They raped me, my mother, my grandmother and my cousin, who is just 11 years old.

I have spoken about this crime to the police, to the United Nations, to the human rights organizations and to anyone else who will listen. I spoke about this crime to the media and went on the radio telling everyone about how I was violated.

Other victims too are speaking out. They are saying, ?Listen, rape is being used as a weapon of war, as a type of terrorism against the population and especially against the people who live in the popular zones and those who support Lavalas.?

I want to know, no, I demand to know: When will the world start to listen to us?

I implore women around the world to hear our voices and know that the rapes of women in the popular zones are continuing. You need to speak up about what is happening in Haiti. You need to have solidarity with the Haitian women who are suffering from rape in ways that you could not imagine.

I will give you an example. In my zone there was a young girl who was walking in the street on her way home from school. Some foreign soldiers stopped her and said that they needed to search her because they did not know if she had weapons.

This search was unnecessary because the girl was young, only a child of maybe 12 years. While they were searching her, they touched her in ways that were wrong, but only on the outside of her school uniform.

Some police, who were not working but were in their uniforms, came by while this was happening and saw how she was being touched. The police took the child from the Jordanian soldiers and went to the corridor between the houses. They forced her to take them in her mouth. She was made to do this for all three of the men.

All the people in the houses heard the child crying and could see what was happening if they looked, but no one in the area did anything to stop the attack on this girl because they were afraid. The police had weapons and even though they were off duty they could still arrest anyone who tried to stop them.

In the past two years, we have learned that when you intervene, you are also attacked or arrested. So no one wanted to get involved.

This makes me angry. But I am just as angry about the women of the world who also stay silently in their homes while a young girl is sexually violated. Where are all the women who were angry about the rape of the women of Bosnia? Where are they now, and why are they so silent?

Lyn Duff is a reporter who first traveled to Haiti in 1995 to help establish a children?s radio station and has since covered Haiti extensively for the Bay View, Pacifica Radio's Flashpoints, heard on KPFA 94.1 FM weekdays at 5 p.m., and other local and national media.

We have to ask ourselves what LTTE has earned for us for our massive human sufferings in last 3 decades. We look like the most cursed bunch of people of the world.

Thivya,
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