MANGAREDJIPA, Congo (Reuters) -Maman Soki is among a small group of Congolese women undertaking heavy mining work for survival after escaping a deadly attack on her village by Islamic State-alligned rebels that killed her daughter and her sister.

In April, the 49-year-old widow left her home in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo with her son, grandson and her sister’s children to flee the jihadists – one of many armed groups in the mineral-rich region.

Soki now works alongside two other women at Pangoyi gold mine, lugging 30 kg sacks of debris up a muddy slope for a few dollars a day to feed the four children in her care.

“Sometimes we want to enter the pits to dig, but we’re told women aren’t allowed,” Soki said in an interview. “That’s why we always carry the already-dug san

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