Since February 2013 Francesca Tosarelli, followed, photographed and interviewed a selection of women fighting in the alphabet-soup of rebellions currently operating in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Their stories reveal not only the significance of their roles within the rebel groups of which they are a part, but also show the striking contrast between the danger of their liberation struggle and the almost mundane reality of daily life in an armed group in eastern DRC.

In contemporary African wars women continue to play a variety of crucial roles, and yet they remain invisible to the world. Only a handful of researchers and journalists have appreciated the importance of women in these conflicts, and the way in which gender stereotypes continue to mask their involvement.

Even today, in mainstream thinking on war and violent conflict, women and men are still often positioned at opposite ends of a moral continuum, where women are considered peaceful and men aggressive, women passive and men active. As war is so often associated with these generalized images of masculinity and femininity, women have become associated with life-giving and men with life-taking. (…) But analytically, in trying to understand the complexities of these experiences, the male-female opposition seems an unnecessary limitation. (…) In modern African wars and violence conflicts women have shown themselves as capable as men of performing violent acts. Fighting women are frequently considered by their very existance to be transgressing accepted female behaviour, and the very act of fighting by definition makes women and girls less feminine and by extension unnatural.

source: Young female fighters in African wars : conflict and its consequences - Chris Coulter, Mariam Persson and Mats Utas / Uppsala : Nordiska Afrikainstitutet, 2008

Major Mathilde Samba, 31 years old. Mathilde has been in the Congolese army for 10 years. She defected in November 2012, joining M23 with her husband and sending her daughters to Kinshasa. M23 compound, Rutshuru, North Kivu, DRC

Captain Liliane Katiwa in front of her hut. She does not declare her age. She was born in Nyamilina. She has joined Mai Mai Shetani/FDP 6 months because there is not job, but life conditions are very hard. They eat the food that the population is forced to give them. Her main dream is to have a normal life and a job in Goma. Buramba military base, Nyamilima, North Kivu, DRC

Major Masika’s bedroom. In the frame is the younger sister Denadine. Masika, 26, has a business and accounting degree. She has fought in the rebel group Mai Mai La Fontaine and then in M23. In October 2012 she was severely beaten by Mai Mai rebels because of her decision to join M23 and now she can’t sleep at night in her house because of the danger of a repeat attack. Kiwanja, North Kivu, DRC

Major Mathilde Samba, 31 years old. Mathilde has been in the Congolese army for 10 years. She defected in November 2012, joining M23 with her husband and sending her daughters to Kinshasa. M23 compound, Rutshuru, North Kivu, DRC

Lieutenant Rehema Rahijya doesn’t know her date of birth. She has malaria at the moment but she is not taking any drugs. She was born in Nyamilima. She joined Mai Mai Shetani/FDP one year ago after some criminals attacked her family: they raped her sister, the goats and then they stole the animals. She doesn’t want to get married and she thinks in the future she won’t find any job because she has been a fighter. Buramba military base, Nyamilima, North Kivu, DRC

Captain Liliane Katiwa during a patrol in the territory controlled by Mai Mai Shetani/FDP. Nyamilima, North Kivu, DRC

Lieutenant Marimakile Kiakimuakisubua is training with her comrades. She does not declare her age. She studied until the second year of the secondary school. The main reason of her decision to join Mai Mai Shetani/FDP has been an attack from FDLR: they raped her mother and sister, she managed to escape. A week later she left school and joined the rebel group. Buramba military base, Nyamilima, North Kivu, DRC

Colonel Fanette Umuraza, 32 years old. Fanette joined M23 having previously fought in the CNDP, M23’s predecessor. She says she chose these two rebel groups because she shares their ideology. Military base of M23, Rumangabo, North Kivu, DRC

Francesca Tosarelli is an independent photographer. She has been publishing in the main international magazines and newspapers; Le Monde, The Guardian, El Pais and GEO among others. She is a member of the multimedia production company Matchbox Media and did the set photography and communication supervisor in ‘Sandgrains’, a crowdfunded documentary film about the local effects of global fishing: http://sandgrains.org/ She is currently following a long term project about female fighters in contemporary conflicts.

Website: https://www.francescatosarelli.com/

FB page: https://www.facebook.com/francescatosarelli

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