Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Getty
EBAM, Cameroon—At first Florencia Pirioua thought the Russian mercenaries she saw approaching her compound in Boko-Boudeye, just outside the western Central African Republic (CAR) town of Bouar, were in the community in search of rebels who had consistently targeted the area in the first four months of the year. But she says these paramilitaries from the infamous Wagner Group had an ulterior motive—to snatch children from their families.
Pirioua—a 33-year-old mother of two kids—said “six well-armed white soldiers” forced their way into her single-room home at the start of May and took away her 13-year-old son, leaving her 10-year-old daughter behind. She said the Russians then went from house to house seizing little boys and beating up family members who tried to stop them.
“If you don’t let go, they’ll break your hands,” said Pirioua, who had a bandage tied round her left elbow after it was hit with a gun by a Wagner fighter. She was talking to The Daily Beast in the southwest Cameroonian town of Ebam, where she now lives. “At first they said he was not my child and that I stole him. Later they said they were taking him away for my own good.”