For Darfur Women, Survival Means Leaving Camp, Risking Rape

Aziza tried to run but was caught within seconds and struck in the face. Eisa froze. Quickly and roughly, the men separated the two sisters and their friend, with a man taking each one to a secluded spot.

The tall, light-skinned man was riding a reddish-brown horse, Eisa said. He was clean-shaven and armed with a machine gun. "I will take you," the man told Eisa. "My wife needs a slave."

He then ordered Eisa to lie on her back, but she refused. She knew that if he raped her and the community learned of the attack, she would probably never be able to remarry.

Her defiance enraged the man. He aimed the gun at Eisa and shouted: "I will shoot you! I will shoot you!"

At that moment, a second Janjaweed man stepped in. "Don't waste a bullet on a woman!" he said. "Just throw her."

The tall man hurled Eisa to the dirt and crawled atop her.

A few minutes later, the rapes were over but not the ordeal. The Janjaweed tied the young women together at their wrists and beat them with their fists and the butts of their guns.

Then, the militiamen ordered the women to lead them to a place where they could find some animals to steal. If they found enough, the men said, they might free them.

Terrified, Eisa helped lead their captors to a place where people water their animals. But before they arrived, they came upon two men relaxing with their animals. One mounted his horse and rode off in a panic as the Janjaweed approached, leaving 40 cows behind for them to steal. The second man, having only a donkey, was unable to escape.

The Janjaweed shot him dead, Eisa said, and took his donkey.

As the group approached the watering place, most of the Janjaweed men decided to ride ahead on their horses and camels, leaving the captives in the custody of one man who appeared to be their leader.

The man appeared to know Eisa's friend and fellow captive. He asked about her father, then untied the women and ordered them to flee, she said.

They raced toward safety, sprinting right out of their flip-flops. After 90 minutes, Eisa said, they had arrived at the outskirts of their camp, with thorns embedded in the soles of their feet.

The young women told their friends and relatives about the attack but not about the rapes. But over the next few weeks, gossip began to spread. Neighbors assumed the worst, about the attack, about Eisa, her sister and their friend.

"They scorn you. They laugh at you," Eisa said. "They look at you as if you are strange, as if they haven't seen you before."

The only good news came about two weeks later. After living in fear that the rape might have made her pregnant, Eisa's period arrived. The relief, she said, was overwhelming.

By the time Eisa reached the end of her story, she and her sister had arrived at the spot where they planned to collect firewood. With expert swings of the ax -- so hard Eisa's head scarf fell to her shoulders -- she and Aziza cut the largest branches off two trees, stripped the bark and bundled the still-moist wood.

With their donkeys long gone -- stolen in the Janjaweed attack -- the sisters hoisted the bundles onto their heads and began the long walk back to the camp beneath the relentless Darfur sun.