{"id":47097,"date":"2014-09-03T19:55:04","date_gmt":"2014-09-03T19:55:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?guid=ba13bf4c841e5f54be550c2a5bfa1d09"},"modified":"2014-09-03T19:55:04","modified_gmt":"2014-09-03T19:55:04","slug":"press-release-hague-and-jolie-welcome-drc-army-action-plan-on-sexual-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?p=47097","title":{"rendered":"Press release: Hague and Jolie welcome DRC Army Action Plan on Sexual Violence"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"govspeak\">\n<p>The plan aims to strengthen and increase the visibility of military justice, and improve victim and witness protection. It builds on the Democratic Republic of Congo (<abbr title=\"Democratic Republic of Congo\">DRC<\/abbr>)\u2019s commitment to take further urgent action, made at the at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/topical-events\/sexual-violence-in-conflict\">Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict<\/a> in London in June.<\/p>\n<p>Commenting on the announcement, the Prime Minister\u2019s Special Representative for Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict, The Rt Hon William Hague MP, said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>I strongly welcome this historic step by the Congolese government. I look forward to working with the government, non-governmental organisations  and civil society in <abbr title=\"Democratic Republic of Congo\">DRC<\/abbr> to ensure that this vital commitment is implemented.<\/p>\n<p>I welcome the role played by Zainab Bangura, the UN Secretary General\u2019s Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict, in helping to encourage this progress through her many visits to the <abbr title=\"Democratic Republic of Congo\">DRC<\/abbr> and her engagement with the Congolese military.<\/p>\n<p class=\"last-child\">I congratulate the Congolese government for following up on the commitments that they made in June at the Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict, and I look forward to further progress.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Angelina Jolie, Co-founder of the Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative and Special Envoy of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Two years ago I met survivors of rape and sexual violence in <abbr title=\"Democratic Republic of Congo\">DRC<\/abbr>. Their suffering is unimaginable. It is made worse by the near-total culture of impunity which lets those responsible for these crimes go unpunished.<\/p>\n<p>I am very encouraged by this announcement by the <abbr title=\"Democratic Republic of Congo\">DRC<\/abbr> government. There is now a huge mountain to climb to make the Action Plan a reality, so that the people of the <abbr title=\"Democratic Republic of Congo\">DRC<\/abbr> see and feel the benefit.<\/p>\n<p>I call on the international community to help give the authorities, civil society and survivors in the <abbr title=\"Democratic Republic of Congo\">DRC<\/abbr> the support they need, to follow through on this commitment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"last-child\">I hope that other countries facing similar problems will be inspired to take similar steps towards reform and accountability in their own militaries.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Democratic Republic of Congo government has launched the first Action Plan for the Congolese Army on tackling Sexual Violence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47097"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47097\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}