Young people in the Republic of Congo formed the shock troops in the country's wars of the 1990s and they still bear the psychological scars of that experience.

"Violence is a recurring phenomenon which, with regard to the young people, has became more pronounced since the end of the civil wars," said Vianney Ngoulou, information officer at ACOLVF, the Congolese association against sexual violence towards women and girls (l'Association congolaise de lutte contre les violences à l'égard des femmes et des filles), said.

Children aged between three and 17 suffered the most, he said, as they experienced sexual violence ranging from incest to rape. This is just one of the social disorders caused by war, Congolese psychologist Buambo-Bamanga said.

During and after the wars, rape was and still is an expression of domination of the strong over the weak, NGOs say. In the RoC, this assumed staggering proportions as illustrated in a survey by the Ministry for the Advancement of Women conducted between July 1999 and June 2001. At least 3,917 females had been raped, of whom 1,507 were younger than 18. ACOLVF said this only provided a partial picture of the scale of the problem, because many girls probably kept quiet about their ordeals.

Another dimension of rape seems to be the class character of the victims. A study of 102 victims of violence at the University of Brazzaville Teaching Hospital by Buambo-Bamanga, head of the obstetric department, found that between 1998 and 2003, most cases of sexual violence were low income earners.

Even after the war sexual violence is rampant. ACOLVF has set up an information bureau in the capital and discovered that from December 2005 to June 2006, 284 acts of violence were perpetrated on female victims, from primary school to university students. Most of the attackers were unknown to their victims and aged between 21 and 35.