Patricia, who was displaced by conflict in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, had a hard look in her eye.

Similar to thousands of other women and girls, armed men raped the 15-year-old when she left her displacement camp, near the city of Goma, in search of food.

Hundreds of thousands of people are crammed into miserable displacement camps around the city, hastily erected on fields of mud.

They are victims of a vast humanitarian crisis triggered by M23 rebels, who have captured swathes of North Kivu province since launching an offensive in late 2021.

Rwanda backs the Tutsi-led M23, according to several western countries such as the United States and France, although Kigali denies it.

Most of residents of the displacement camps fled with nothing, and despite humanitarian efforts, food remains scarce.

Patricia and her family fled fighting in North Kivu earlier this year, facing harassment and robbery as they made their way to the relative safety of the Rusayo camp near Goma.

But in late summer, the teenager disappeared.

"I sent her to fetch potatoes in our village, because of hunger," said Patricia's mother, who recounted the story as her daughter used a scarf to hide her face. "I thought she was dead."

Patricia — whose name AFP has changed to protect her identity — turned up again in late September, pregnant.

She said ethnic Hutu fighters had captured her. And one raped her over the course of several weeks. Patricia managed to escape one morning after pretending to fetch water.

Sexual violence has long plagued eastern DRC, where armed groups have sown chaos for 30 years.

'Cycle of misery'
Sandra Kavira, a Congolese social worker with the charity Doctors Without Borders, listened as Patricia's mother told the tale.