Dancing in the Glory of Monsters

This volume presents an account of the wars in the African nation of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) from 1996-2003. This conflict devastated the country and is sometimes referred to as the "African world war" because it involved nine African nations and twenty armed groups. Despite the signing of peace accords in 2003, fighting continued in the east of the country in 2007. There, the prevalence of rape and other sexual violence has been described as the worst in the world. The war is the world's deadliest conflict since the Chinese Civil War, killing 5.4 million people since 1998. More than 90% were not killed in combat, dying instead from malaria, diarrhea, pneumonia and malnutrition, aggravated by displaced populations living in unsanitary and over-crowded conditions that lacked access to shelter, water, food and medicine. Forty seven percent of those deaths were children under five. Until today the ongoing conflicts exacerbate the exhaustion of the country's great agricultural potential. Conflict for control of the mineral wealth is behind some of the most violent atrocities.