Nobel Peace laureates demand end to sexual violence in war

Associated Press

OSLO, Norway

Raped after being forced into sexual slavery by the Islamic State group, Nadia Murad did not succumb to shame or despair – the young Iraqi woman spoke out. Surgeon Denis Mukwege treated countless victims of sexual violence in war-torn Congo and told the world of their suffering. Together, they were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for their campaigns to end rape and sexual abuse as weapons of war.

“Dear survivors from all over the world, I would like to tell you that, through this Nobel Prize, the world is listening to you and refusing indifference,” Mukwege, 63, told a news conference outside the hospital he founded in Bukavu in eastern Congo, where he has treated tens of thousands of victims – among them “women, teenage girls, small girls, babies,” he said Friday.

Murad, 25, was one of an estimated 3,000 girls and women from Iraq’s Yazidi minority group who were kidnapped in 2014 by IS militants and sold into sexual slavery. She was raped, beaten and tortured before managing to escape three months later. After getting treatment in Germany, she chose to speak to the world about the horrors faced by Yazidi women.