The gaze is blank and the mouth is open, flies have settled on the lips. The chest barely moves, feverish sweat is seeping from the forehead. Doctors are rushing to attach a drip. It's urgent.
Two weeks earlier, the girl on the cot had been raped in her home in Mali by mercenaries from the Russian Africa Corps, according to her family, the AP news agency reports. The abuse caused an infection that remained untreated while the family fled Russian forces to neighboring Mauritania. When the 14-year-old finally reached the Doctors Without Borders clinic, she was close to death. The infection had sent her body into acute shock.
Thousands of fleeing Malians, mainly women and children, have arrived in Mauritania in recent weeks. Several women told the AP how “armed white men” burned down their houses, killed their husbands and subjected them or their relatives to sexual violence.
Obeys the Kremlin
Doctor Bethsabee Djoman Elidje, who managed to save the 14-year-old's life, has treated three survivors of sexual violence in the past month. But the taboo is strong and the hidden number is likely large, she says.
They only come when the situation becomes serious, like the case we saw today.
The girl's family told the AP that when soldiers from the Africa Corps, which is under the Russian Defense Ministry, arrived in their village, everyone was forced to watch at gunpoint as a relative's throat was cut, after which the 14-year-old was dragged into a tent and raped. When the men were finished, she fainted.
"We were so scared we couldn't even scream," an aunt told AP, describing how her niece later woke up "with the eyes of someone who is no longer there."
Bragging about torture
The Africa Corps' predecessor, the notoriously brutal Wagner Group, has also been accused of gross abuse and sexual violence in Mali.
"The Wagner group burned seven men alive with gasoline in front of our eyes. Then they gathered the women and raped them," a daughter of a victim told the AP.
In one of the most high-profile cases, in March 2022, at least 58 women and children were subjected to rape and other forms of sexual violence in an attack on a village in Mali, according to a UN report. Malian forces and "white men" were then accused of gang rapes that lasted for hours.
In June of this year, The Africa Report claimed to have infiltrated a Wagner-linked Telegram channel where Russian mercenaries boasted of brutal torture, executions and mutilation of corpses, primarily in Mali. Hundreds of images and videos, as well as grossly racist remarks, were shared on the channel.
The Defense Ministry in Moscow has not responded to AP's questions.
The Africa Corps (in Russian, Afrikanskij Korpus) is a paramilitary group led by the Russian regime, tasked with supporting Russian-allied countries in Africa, increasing Russian influence, and safeguarding Russia's economic interests.
The Africa Corps is said to have replaced the Wagner Group, a notorious private mercenary company with a brutal reputation and unofficial connections to the Russian military and the Kremlin.
70–80 percent of the Africa Corps soldiers are estimated to have previously been part of the Wagner Group, which was hired, among other things, to fight jihadists in the Sahel region.
The Africa Corps, like Wagner, has been accused of serious abuses in African countries. However, the crimes largely go under the radar and the perpetrators enjoy widespread impunity.
Source: AP, Timbuktu Institute, OHCHR, CSIS
