Yolande is an ex-child soldier in the Democratic Republic of Congo. "This monster who stole my life should be jailed", she says. The trial of ex-Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga resumes today at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. He is accused of enroling children in his militia and forcing them to take part in combat.

It is 5pm when I enter the compound: dozens of radiant young girls, gathered with their toddlers, are ready to return home after a day at school. Most of them are single mothers, ex-child soldiers in the bloody war in Ituri district at the turn of the century.

Forced to shoot or be killed
In a small office nearby, Yolande (not her real name) tells me how she became a soldier against her will at age 13. While attempting to flee the advancing militias with her parents, she was raped by a soldier who then took her as his 'wife'. He taught her how to wield all types of weapons and took her out to pillage in neighbouring villages. She was forced to shoot people, she said with a nervous laugh, "otherwise he would kill me." The drugs she was forced to take "caused disturbance in the head, just like going crazy." Around 13,500 children were enrolled in the Ituri militias. Among the 5,500 girls, 70 percent are now child mothers.

The interview continues in the dark, there is a power cut. The darkness helps Yolande tell her story with defiance. "They accuse us of everything bad that happens. When there's pillaging in the villages and neighborhoods, it is us. Anything bad is us."

Project supported by the ICC
The girls are unaware that the school rehabilitation program in which they take part is supported by the International Criminal Court. "Until all the damages sustained by the victims are made good, the justice we seek to achieve is just half done," explains ICC President, Judge Sang-Hyun Song. The ICC's Trust Fund for Victims finances 16 projects in the DRC.

Yolande says the militia robbed her of her childhood during her three years in capitivity. "They have destroyed the children because they taught them to do adult things. Who can imagine a child who rapes an old lady, who rapes his mother?"

Traumatised
In the house where they lived with the soldiers, the girls often revolted against the rape of adult women, the 'mothers'. Many fights broke out as a result. When she became pregnant at age 14, her 'husband' gave her a choice: "Either you put on your uniform and come and fight, or you go home." Yolande returned home.

Yolande's parents expressed animosity towards their grandchild. In their culture, babies born out of rape are considered a curse to the family. Since Yolande is back in school, her parents' attitude has improved. Now 19, Yolande hopes to pursue her studies and dreams of becoming a mathematician.

At peace
The leaders who are being tried in The Hague, she says "should be jailed, once in prison they can't fight anymore." And the man who took her as his 'wife'? Even he must be imprisoned, "because it was he who destroyed my life."

"Salam," she replies in Swahili when I ask how she feels after having told her story for the first time. "She feels at peace in her heart," says the interpreter.