A woman was raped, whipped and beheaded before a cheering mob in the Democratic Republic of Congo — as punishment for dishing up “forbidden fish” to a group of rebels who then drank her blood.
The atrocity in the main square of Luebo, in the province of Kasaï-Occidental, occurred on April 8 and was captured in stomach-churning video that only emerged this week, France 24 reported.
The naked woman is seen being dragged in front of a crowd by members of an armed group claiming allegiance to the Kamuina Nsapu rebel movement.
France 24
“They said she gave them beans that contained pieces of a small, local fish,” a Luebo resident told France 24 about the eatery owner.
“Convinced that she had broken their protection charms, the council of rebels sentenced both the woman and the son of her husband’s second wife to commit incest in public,” the resident said.
In the footage, rebel leader Kalamba Kambangoma holds the victim by her hair and explains in the local Tshiluba language that “she must die” for committing high treason.
He then turns her over to another woman, who is wearing a pink T-shirt and a red bandanna that marks members of the rebel movement.
The woman in pink then takes the victim over to a platform, where she and the young man are forced to have sex in front of the crowd while being whipped for several minutes.
The depraved thugs then executed the woman and the young man by hacking them to death with machetes. Some of the rebels drank their blood, according to witnesses interviewed by France 24.
One resident sent the news outlet a photograph showing several rebels posing with the severed head of the man, who was about 20 years old.
France 24
The victims’ mutilated corpses were left out in the open for two days before finally being buried on the spot. After the village was liberated, the Red Cross helped move the bodies to a cemetery.
The group seized the town of 40,000 on March 31 and maintained a reign of terror for several weeks before they were kicked out by the Congolese army on April 19.
Many people reacted in horror to the video.
“The first time, I had so many tears and so much anger that I couldn’t watch the full video,” Louise Ngandu told France 24. “In the entire crowd, not a single person opposed the act. No one said, ‘No!’”