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Tuesday, November 20, 2007
Angelina Jolie's adopted Ethiopian daughter was conceived after her mother was raped as she walked home from work, it has been reported.wo-year-old Zahara was born after her mother, Mentwabe Dawit, was assaulted in the darkness by a man who trapped her on a path outside the southern Ethiopian town of Awasa in 2004.
“He pulled a dagger, put one hand on my mouth, so that I could not scream. He then raped me and disappeared,” Mentwabe told Reuters in Awasa, 170 miles south of Addis Ababa.
The 24-year-old decided to keep the assault a secret.
Her attacker has not been traced.
“I feared the consequences of being raped in a community where rape is considered a taboo, even if what happened happened forcibly,” she said, tears streaming down her face.
Despite her fears, her own mother was supportive and helped her give birth in the family’s earth-floored house.
She named the child Yemsrach, meaning good news in Ethiopia’s Amharic language, but soon found that she could not care for the baby and fled the family home in shame.
“I was desperate and decided to run away, rather than see my child dying,” she said.
Mentwabe’s distraught mother eventually put Yemsrach up for adoption, in the belief her own daughter had died.
Her adoptive parents, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, changed the baby’s name to Zahara.
Now reunited with her mother, Miss Dawit said that she was very happy that her daughter is now a part of one of Hollywood’s most famous families.
“I think [she] is a very fortunate human being to be adopted by a world famous lady. I wish them both all the success they deserve,” she said.
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