Africa's Dirty Little Secret

For most of the past decade, Marcus Bleasdale (left) has been the very picture of a dedicated photojournalist on a mission. The Oslo-based VII Agency photographer's steady, piercing visual reportage of the ongoing war in the Democratic Republic of Congo has garnered accolades and helped to trigger human-rights reforms — but has too often been ignored in the West. Now it may find a new audience, however, as a moving multimedia feature on MediaStorm.org.

American Photo featured Bleasdale and his remarkable black-and-white Congo images in November/December 2005, as part of a package called "Five Stories You've Never Seen," meant to bring attention to international events underreported in the United States. "The statistics [in the DRC] are just staggering," Bleasdale told me at the time. "In fact, 3.5 million people died there within a period of five years, the largest number of deaths in one country since World War II."

The complex reasons for the war carnage and poverty in the DRC — which ironically is greatly blessed with natural mineral resources — are explored in the MediaStorm feature, called "Rape of a Nation."

"The Congolese have this history of being led by dictators who look out for only themselves," says Bleasdale in the podcast, which blends together his still photos, video footage shot in the DRC, and interviews with the photographer. "The Congolese people see their leaders as thieves, and that filters down through every level of society." The piece traces the region's history of infighting between tribes and warlords, the exploitation of workers and young soldiers, and the devastating effects of poverty and disease that make the DRC one of Africa's most troubled countries.

Reports on the crisis there have attracted some international attention and aid efforts — in fact, Bleasdale's images spearheaded an Open Society Institute and Human Rights Watch report called The Curse of Gold that helped trigger human-rights reforms and boycotts against "tainted gold," as we reported in the May/June 2007 issue of American Photo.

But the horrific crisis continues nonetheless. "The displaced in Congo number in the millions," Bleasdale says in the MediaStorm story. And he's here to bear witness.   — Jack Crager