Denis Mukwege

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, militiamen use sexual violence as a tool of war—at the height of the country’s decades-long conflict, 48 Congolese women every hour were raped. Congolese surgeon and gynecologist Denis Mukwege, who founded a hospital in the epicenter of the violence, has treated tens of thousands of victims—some of them children of rape themselves. Despite censorship by the Congolese government, attacks, and an assassination attempt, Mukwege has continually returned to the operating theater, and he has campaigned fiercely worldwide to bring the military use of sexual violence to an end.