Democratic Republic of Congo: Sexual Offences

Foreign and Commonwealth Office written question – answered at on 9 November 2018.

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Photo of Emily Thornberry Emily Thornberry Shadow Foreign Secretary

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what representations he has made to his counterpart in the Democratic Republic of Congo on (a) changes in the level of documented cases of sexual violence in that country in 2017 and (b) the number of those cases attributed to the Congolese armed forces and police.

Photo of Harriett Baldwin Harriett Baldwin Minister of State (Department for International Development) (Joint with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office), Minister of State (Foreign and Commonwealth Office) (Joint with the Department for International Development)

The British Government is committed to preventing sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The UK is concerned by the number of cases of sexual violence attributed to Congolese state actors. At the June 2018 UN Human Rights Council, we signed a resolution mandating an independent investigation into all human rights abuses in DRC, including sexual violence and those attributed to state actors. We also fund TRIAL International, who fight against impunity from sexual violence crimes, including bringing parliamentarians and those in the security sector to account. TRIAL International played a key role in the Kavumu trial in 2017, where 11 members of a militia were found guilty.

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