1

00:00:16

This is my fourth trip since 2009 to Kimua – a community deep in the remote terrain of Eastern Congo. Like much of the region, there is no electricity or mobile phone reception – it's a four day walk to the nearest road. It's a perfect place to hide. 

2

00:00:41

After the Rwandan genocide in 1994, the perpetrators fled into this forest – they vanished but they never went away. 

3

00:00:53

Reorganised as the FDLR, they have exploited the region's isolation and lack of development to rape, murder and prey on the local population. When I was last here, heavily armed militia were everywhere – they had taken control.

4

00:01:17

Now, armed men still abound – but these are not the FDLR.

5

00:01:25

FRENCH: The FDLR committed acts that were not good. Violence, murder...

In the villages the problem was getting worse.

Why did they commit inhuman acts?

We couldn't tolerate it anymore.

6

00:01:54

The community has been victimised by the FDLR for over a decade – not one family is untouched by FDLR violence.

Faced with extermination and no outside help, the community had run out of options. 

7

00:02:10

FRENCH: Effectively there was a failure. Monusco [the UN mission] didn't succeed.

They failed. So finally it was necessary for the civilian population to take charge. 

8

00:02:23

They formed their own local militia to fight the FDLR – the FDC (Force de la liberation du Congo).

9

00:02:31

FRENCH: Students said, 'I am not going to school. I will pick up a gun.'

Students, children, our little brothers, our big brothers.

There are also the papas, quite old.

Even the women.

The women are there to fight for their country.

10

00:02:57

FRENCH: That is how we organised ourselves to evacuate the FDLR from Congo. 

11

00:03:07

The local population see the FDC as their only hope to reclaim their lives.

12

00:03:13

FRENCH: Everything is going well.

When we began operations, the FDLR occupied this whole area.

Now they are no longer present.

NON-SUBBED FRENCH (shouting).

13

00:03:33

Civilians in the area are now under the protection of the FDC.

The fate of the community rests with their boys in the FDC – everyone believes in them.

People are grateful they have driven the FDLR out of their villages.

Operations are on-going, but the cost of fighting has been high.

14

00:04:10

30 young soldiers from this small community have already been killed in the fighting.

All the homes for 20 kilometres had been burned or abandoned.

Whole communities have simply ceased to exist.

250 families have been forced to seek refuge in makeshift shelters under the local UN base – it's a desperate existence.

This river, 300 metres from the UN camp, is as far as people dare to go.

You might not be able to see the FDLR now, but they are still there.

They've only retreated to the surrounding bush, cutting the population off from their fields – their only source of food. People are starving.

15

00:05:08

FRENCH: No one goes anywhere.

But when you stay in one place, what are you supposed to eat? There is no food.

Everyone is very scared. Why?

Women fear the shame of being raped, raped by the FDLR.

Everyone stays in one place because they're afraid of being massacred on the path.

16

00:05:39

These paths used to be busy thoroughfares – only the desperate search for food brings anyone onto them now.

People only dare venture out if they are accompanied by the FDC.

The threat of attack by the FDLR, concealed in the bush, is constant.

But the forest is a hiding place for locals too.

Two hours off the main path through dense jungle – 1,500 people, mostly children, are living in the bush, guarded by the FDC.

17

00:06:45

FRENCH: We fled into the bush to escape the gunfire.

We know well that the FDLR are still in the bush.

We are always worried, but we are protected (by the FDC).

18

00:06:54

It's easy to see how people can hide here – it's impossible to see how they can live here.

19

00:07:15

FRENCH: The children sleep on the ground. You find grass and you put it on the ground and they sleep on it.

It is always cold.

There are insects, mosquitos bite them, and because of this the children get sick.

We never see medicine.

There is no healthcare. People die. People die like insects.

It feels like we are imprisoned.

Since the war began, we haven't seen a single state authority come to help us.

Not the administrator of the territory, not the president, not the deputy.

There is no help.

17

00:08:12

FRENCH: We are helping the government and the government is giving us nothing.

We are taking the place of the government. It is patriotism. We do everything is place of the government.

The government has done nothing.

If the state existed here – the roads? There are none.

There are none.

Telephone reception? There is none.

It's like we already dead, not part of Congo.

It's like we are corpses.

20

00:08:52

With the community left to fend for itself, boys as young as 13 have swapped schoolbooks for AK47s.

21

00:09:00

FRENCH: My son didn't ask my permission to join the army. He just did it because of the suffering.

I cried (when he joined). It is the war that brings us all of this.

We need the military to get rid of the FDLR. (My son) has to fight until they do.

I really want him to go to school because for my son to go to school is my joy too.

We don't have a choice. It's the only thing we can do.

22

00:09:26

FRENCH: With a gun and a uniform he is no longer the same person. He is someone else.

The soldier who has a gun he's not a friend of the population.

He's 50% for the population and 50%  military.

Even if it's my child, if he has a gun and orders me to sit down when the boy orders the father to sit down, it's very serious.

23

00:09:59

Whatever the misgivings, there is no one else to do the job.

As military operations continue, everyone in the community is painfully aware of the danger to their youth.

But everybody needs to believe the FDC will succeed.

24

00:10:18

FRENCH: You know that we have a power, the power of our ancestors. It is an ancestral power.

You can't touch it, nor can you see it.

25

00:10:34

FRENCH: That's it. The match is over.

4-0 to the military (FDC).

Civilians nil.

Invincible!

26

00:10:44

They see their boys with guns as saviours.

FRENCH: It is a super metaphysical power.

Through this power, nothing can resist us.

Today we know that in time with the force of these young men, we are going to win back our village.