The female boxers fighting back in the Congo

14 April 2019 11:00
The Democratic Republic of the Congo has been branded the rape capital of the world. Now photographer Alessandro Grassani is documenting the women there who have taken up boxing for self-defenceAn 18-year-old woman stands at the intersection of two featureless grey brick walls in Goma, in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. We can’t see her face, which is concealed by her left hand, but her right arm and neck are exposed and the burns on her skin are clearly visible. One night several years ago, the woman, whose name is Blandini and who lives on the streets of Goma with her two young children, was attacked by four men, who raped her in turn. Afterwards, they doused her with petrol and set her alight – “like a candle,” she recalls.In the portrait of Blandini, taken by the Italian documentary photographer Alessandro Grassani, she sports a pair of cushioned red gloves. After the attack, in a bid to prevent anything like it from happening again, Blandini took up boxing. She joined an unregistered club, run by a former boxing champion of DRC who goes by the nickname Kibomango, and threw herself into training. Continue readingread full article

Source: TheGuardian