In War Zones, Rape Is A Powerful Weapon

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been putting women’s issues at the center of her work: speaking out forcefully against recent rapes in Guinea, leading a special U.N. Security Council meeting on women and security, and even visiting eastern Congo, where the use of rape as a weapon of war has affected hundreds of thousands of women.

But, as Clinton is discovering, highlighting these issues is one thing — and getting the international community to do something about them is quite another.

Sexual violence against women has been a feature in most recent conflicts — from the Balkans to Myanmar, Sri Lanka to Guinea.