DAKAR, Senegal, Oct. 22 (UPI) -- The Ivory Coast is preoccupied with political developments while hundreds of women are gang-raped in the country, Human Rights Watch said.
The rights group in a 72-page report on the Ivory Coast accused authorities of failing to respond, prosecute and punish parties responsible for mass rapes in the country.
Human Rights Watch said its investigations in the Ivory Coast found at least 20 women and girls were raped by bandits in one day in January 2009.
The group said that while it documented 109 case of rape in the west of the country since then, the number is likely much higher because of the stigma associated with reporting sexual violence.
Bandits, the report said, "routinely" set up checkpoints, pulled women from their vehicles and raped them while others stood guard.
The report comes as Ivorians received modest praise from the United Nations for its preparations ahead of a long-delayed presidential election at the end of the month.
"While politicians and foreign diplomats have wrangled over election preparations, residents in western Ivory Coast are consumed by fear of violent robbery or of being pulled from a bus and raped," said Corinne Dufka, senior West Africa researcher for Human Rights Watch, in a statement.
