Congo

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A mass rape victim comforts her son in the town of Fizi, Congo. (Washington Times File)

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A mass rape victim comforts her son in the town of Fizi, Congo. She was among nearly 50 women who were raped during a campaign by Congolese soldiers on the night of Jan. 1.A mass rape victim comforts her son in the town of Fizi, Congo. She was among nearly 50 women who were raped during a campaign by Congolese soldiers on the night of Jan. 1.AUBREY GRAHAM/SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES Mama Lubero is one of the many women raped in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. She sits through an interview about her ordeal at HEAL Africa, an aid organization in Goma trying to help some of the thousands of victims every year.

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Children rioted in the streets of Goma demanding the promised free education from the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Whether or not they escaped the pull of militias that followed the official end of Second Congo War, they have grown up seeing violence as the solution to unmet demands. (Lindsay Branham/Special to The Washington Times)

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Lt. Col. Mutuare Daniel Kibibi exits a mobile military tribunal after being convicted of crimes against humanity in the town of Baraka, Congo, on Monday. (Associated Press)

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Congo's former vice president Jean-Pierre Bemba, stands trial in the courtroom of the International Criminal Court in The Hague on Monday. (Associated Press)

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In May 1997, a Hutu refugee with his hands bound pleads for his life to two soldiers, whom the photographer identified as Rwandan Tutsis, about 30 miles south of Kisangani in Congo, then known as Zaire. The photographer said the soldiers killed him moments later. (Associated Press)

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A cross marks graves near a refugee camp, about 25 miles south of Kisangani, Congo, in May 1997. The discovery of mass graves spurred probes that led to a U.N. report, which accuses invading Rwandan troops of killing tens of thousands of Hutus in 1996 and 1997. (Associated Press)

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Congolese soldiers sit in the back of a truck en route to their post in Walikale, Congo. The Congolese government welcomed a new U.N. report's suggestion that a tribunal be set up to prosecute those responsible for mass killings between 1993 and 2003. (Associated Press)

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** FILE ** In this Oct. 2, 2009, file photo, a Congolese girl walks past a Uruguayan United Nations peacekeeper as he stands watch on a hill near a peacekeeper encampment in Kimua in the heart of territory held by Rwandan Hutu rebels in eastern Congo. Congolese community leaders say they warned local U.N. officials and army commanders of the dangers and begged them to protect villagers days before rebels gang-raped scores of people from a month-old baby boy to a 110-year-old great-great-grandmother. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)

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A Congolese woman laden with baggage and a young child walks past U.N. troops in Sake, Congo. (Associated Press)

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A Rwandan Hutu rebel gropes a woman on a mountain path near Kimua in eastern Congo. Congolese community leaders say they begged local U.N. officials and army commanders to protect villagers days before rebels gang-raped scores of people in late July and early August. (Associated Press)

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Locals wait out a storm in Goma, where the main thoroughfare is choked with potholes that fill with rainwater. Hunger and disease have killed an estimated 5 million people in Congo since 1998. "By any yardstick, [Congo] has been a humanitarian disaster, and one the world has ignored," says John Holmes, undersecretary-general of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. (Mary F. Calvert/The Washington Times)