Current Affairs Exhibits spotlight Czech charities at work in the Heart of Darkness

Photo: Lenka Klicperová In the last twenty years organisations like People in Need have been helping to deal with humanitarian crises in some of the most remote parts of the world. One of those places is Eastern Congo, where the Rwandan war that grabbed such attention in the 1990s quietly rages on today. If you ever wondered where the most unspeakable atrocities are taking place in today’s world, a look at the exhibition in Prague’s Archa Theatre leaves little room for debate. “The Women of Bunyakiri” offers a series of large and intimate portraits of Congolese women with descriptions of who they are and what they have endured. Markéta Kutilová of People in Need, is the founder of the organisation’s Congolese mission and one of the creators of the exhibit.

"Among our beneficiaries there are many women who have been the victims of extremely brutal rape and who have been held as sexual slaves by Rwandan Hutu rebels. The raping is not just a sexual matter, the rebels often want to destroy the women, so they destroy their genitals by putting rifles, knives, and sticks in them. So apart from the psychological trauma many women suffer from serious physical and gynaecological problems such as fistula or prolapsus. Moreover, many women are rejected by their husbands after they’ve been raped. But I have to say we have also registered many cases of children and men who have been raped as well."

Markéta Kutilová, photo: www.peopleinneed.cz The photos taken by journalist Lenka Klicperová, do a commendable job of taking the atrocities of the war to the very most personal level. They capture the hard looks in the eyes of women who have undergone the most unthinkable suffering and humiliation amid one of the least noted crises of the present day. Another row of snapshots details what the Czech charity can and is doing to alleviate their suffering. Markéta Kutilová again:

"We are trying to help the victims of sexual violence first with medical assistance and then we try to help them get back to life. Life will never be completely normal for them. But we are building houses for women who are rejected by their husbands. We provide them with livestock and we try to give them work. We now have soap production and sewing workshops where the women can get some basic income."

Photo: Lenka Klicperová The second exhibit, which opened in the Senate building on Tuesday, deals with the lives of children in the Congo and the work of the Archdiocese Charity of Prague and other Czech missions in the region. The country’s protracted wars and the plundering of its bounteous natural resources has brought about a generation of Congolese that are growing up on the streets. Many have been abandoned by parents who could no longer support them, others have fled from their homes themselves and others still have fallen victim to ingrained taboos.

"There are tens of thousands of children living in the streets of Congolese towns and cities. So-called “witch children” is a huge phenomenon here – children are often being accused of being evil and as such they are rejected by the families and communities. Sometimes the family really believes that the child has some evil power inside, but often the reasons are more or less economical. The worst for me was to see that the children really believe that they are evil, and kids as little as three years old are being kicked out."

The exhibitions currently underway in Prague draw attention to the provision of immediate aid. The People in Need Foundation however has many more plans for the Congo, including an education programme involving building and equipping schools, training teachers, and publishing textbooks.