Young female refugees in the Congo who were raped by militiamen are now allegedly being sexually exploited by United Nations peace troops. According to the Independent, UN peacekeepers are giving girls as young as 13 food in exchange for sex.
Testimonies from both aid workers and teenage girls say that young girls in the Internally Displaced People (IDP) camp in northeastern Congo are climbing through a wire fence every night to sell their bodies for food to UN soldiers from Morocco and Uruguay, reports that Independent.
According to UN Wire, some members of the staff that manages the camp stated that they were aware of the sexual exploitation but were afraid to say anything. The United Nations had pledged a zero-tolerance attitude against sexual misconduct in refugee and IDP camps; however, there is concern about how effective the investigations will be.
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