Women fleeing Mali’s conflict say they were sexually assaulted but silence hides many more

DOUANKARA, Mauritania (AP) — The girl lay in a makeshift medical clinic; His eyes were misty, his mouth was open, flies were crawling on his lips. His chest was barely moving. Beads of feverish sweat trickled down his forehead as medical workers rushed around him, inserting IVs.

As the heart monitor beeped rapidly, women’s health director Bethsabee Djoman Elidje, who oversees the clinic’s efforts, said it was the last moment to save her life. Elidje said the girl contracted an infection after the sexual assault and remained in shock for days without treatment.

Her family said the 14-year-old boy was raped by Russian fighters who entered their tent in Mali two weeks ago. The Russians were members of the Afrika Corps, a new military unit under the Russian defense ministry that replaced the Wagner mercenary group six months ago.

UN and aid workers say men, women and children have been sexually assaulted on all sides during the decade-long conflict in Mali, with reports of gang rape and sexual slavery. But the real cost is hidden under a veil of shame that makes it difficult for women in conservative, patriarchal societies to seek help.

The silence that nearly killed the 14-year-old also undermines efforts to hold perpetrators accountable.

While interviewing dozens of refugees at the border, the AP learned of rape and four other cases of sexual violence allegedly blamed on African Corps fighters, often described by Malians as “white men.” Other abuses such as beheadings and kidnappings.

Other fighters in Mali have also been accused of sexual assaults. The head of a women’s health clinic in the Mopti region told the AP that he had treated 28 women in the past six months who said they had been attacked by militants affiliated with the Al Qaeda-linked JNIM, Mali’s most powerful armed group.

The silence among Malian refugees is striking.

“We didn’t need to look for people,” said Mirjam Molenaar, medical team leader in the border region of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), who worked there last year in Eastern Congo, which has been subjected to violence by dozens of armed groups for decades. Women “came in large numbers.”

It’s different here, he said: “People are exposed to these things and live with them, and it manifests itself in post-traumatic stress.”

Speechless after the attack

The 14-year-old girl’s aunt said African Corps fighters marched everyone out at gunpoint. The family couldn’t understand what he wanted. The men made them watch as they tied up the girl’s uncle and cut off his head.

Later, two men took the 14-year-old boy, who was trying to defend himself, into the tent and raped him. The family waited outside, unable to move.

“We were so scared we couldn’t even scream anymore,” the aunt recalled as her mother cried silently next to her. She, like the other women, spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, and the AP does not name rape victims unless they agree to be named.

The girl appeared half an hour later, looking terrified. He then saw his uncle’s body and screamed. He fainted. The aunt said that when she woke up, she saw the eyes of someone who “wasn’t there anymore.”

The next morning, JNIM militants arrived and ordered the family to leave. They got on a donkey cart and set off towards the border. When any sound was heard, they hid in the bushes, holding their breath.

During the three-day journey, the girl’s condition worsened. He fainted when they arrived in Mauritania.

The AP found him lying on the ground in a local family’s courtyard. His family said they did not take him to the clinic because they had no money.

“How do you take someone to the doctor if you have nothing?” said the girl’s grandmother between sobs. The AP took the family to a free clinic run by MSF. The doctor said there were signs that the girl had been raped.

Director Elidje said the clinic had only been operating for a month and had encountered three survivors of sexual violence.

“We believe there are many cases like this,” he said. “But so far, very few patients have come forward to get treatment because this topic is still taboo. It really takes time and patience for these women to open up and trust someone to get care. They only come when things are already complicated, like the case we saw today.”

While trying to save the girl’s life, Elidje asked the family to explain the incident. He did not know Arabic and asked the local nurse to find out how many people had carried out the attack. But the nurse was too shy to ask.

Scratch marks are part of the story he can’t tell

Thousands of Malian refugees, mostly women and children, have settled in shelters made of fabric and branches deep into Mauritania in recent weeks. The nearest refugee camp is full, complicating efforts to treat and report sexual assaults.

Two recently arrived women cautiously pulled AP journalists aside and adjusted the scarves around their faces. They said they came after armed white men came to their village a week ago.

One of them said, “They took everything from us. They burned our houses. They killed our husbands.” “But that wasn’t all they did. They tried to rape us.”

Explaining that men entered the house where she was staying alone and robbed her, the woman stated that she defended herself “with God’s permission.”

As he spoke, the second woman began to cry and shake. There were scratch marks on his neck. He couldn’t afford to tell his story.

“We are still afraid of what we experienced,” he said.

Separately, a third woman said what white men did to her while she was home alone in Mali last month was “between me and God.”

The fourth said he watched several armed white men drag his 18-year-old daughter into their home. She ran away and never saw her daughter again.

The women rejected offers to speak to aid workers, some of whom were locals. They said they weren’t ready to talk about it with anyone else.

The Russian Defense Ministry did not respond to questions, but an information agency that the US State Department called part of the “Kremlin’s disinformation campaign” said the AP investigation into the African Union was fake news.

Wagner has a legacy of sexual abuse

Allegations of rape and other sexual assault were already emerging before Wagner became the African Union.

One refugee told the AP she witnessed a gang rape in her village in March 2024.

“The Wagner group burned seven people alive with gasoline in front of our eyes.” he said. He said they then rounded up the women and raped them, including his 70-year-old mother.

“My mother could not bear to live after being raped,” she said. A month later, his mother died.

In the most notorious case of sexual assault in Africa involving Russian fighters, the UN said in a 2023 report that at least 58 women and girls were raped or sexually assaulted in an attack on the village of Moura by Malian soldiers and others described by witnesses as “armed white men”.

In response, the Malian government expelled the UN peacekeeping mission. Since then, it has become almost impossible to collect accurate data on conflict-related sexual violence in the field.

The AP interviewed five women from Moura who are currently staying in a displacement camp. They said they were blindfolded and raped for hours by several men.

Three of the women said they had not discussed this issue with anyone other than aid workers. The other two had the courage to tell their husbands months later.

“I kept quiet with my family for fear of being rejected or looked at differently. It’s shameful,” one person said.

A 14-year-old teenager whose family fled to Mauritania is recovering. He said he didn’t remember anything since the attack. His family and MSF said he was seeing a psychiatrist, one of six working in the country.

Aid workers worry about others who say nothing.

“Conflicts seem to be getting worse and worse over the years. There is less respect for human life, be it man, woman or child,” MSF’s Molenaar said, breaking down in tears. “This is a war.”

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