“They Have Destroyed Tigray, Literally”: Mulugeta Gebrehiwot speaks from the mountains of Tigray

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Transcript Call between Mulugeta Gebrehiwot and Alex de Waal 27 January 2021

Additional background information and audio are available on the WPF blog, “Reinventing Peace.” For more information: worldpeacefoundation.org

Listen to the interview

[The first minute of the call was not recorded. Mulugeta started by describing the onset of the war.]

Mulugeta: … and the damage it inflicted on the enemies, it’s difficult to express, it was a sort of miracle. Tigray only had 23 battalions, and 42 divisions of Eritrea and twelve divisions of Ethiopia, were all here. This is without including the special forces of the Amhara region, which is beyond, over 10,000, and also special forces of Oromia, Somalia, and other forces as well. The first month’s resistance was with this level of asymmetry.

And then the Emirates came. The Emirates effectively disarmed Tigray. They started killing tanks, then howitzers, then fuel, then ammunition. Then they started hunting small vehicles, targeting leaders, [indistinct] all over. This created [unclear: risk?] and sort of dislocation, and this is part of the weakness of the preparation. So many people moved out of the cities of Tigray towards the rural other areas following the army, some including their families.

So, we were caught in between, you know. Are we going to defend these people who flocked out of the cities with their families or are we going to fight, I mean the army was caught in between. So, the organization has to make a decision. You know, it prioritized continuing the resistance, and then it advised many of us who were not in active duty in the resistance to remain in some remote areas which finally resulted in the type of sad news you heard.

You know, the result became—they have destroyed Tigray, literally, all of them, EPLF, the Eritrean forces and the Ethiopian forces. They literally destroyed all the wealth that it had accumulated for thirty years, and burned schools, clinics, they have ransacked each house. They moved in. They have started looting the produce of the peasants, from all the villages beyond the black road that crosses Tigray towards Eritrea. And they kill whomever they find in whichever village they get in. In the village I was in yesterday—it’s a small village— they killed 21 people, out of which seven of them were priests of that small village.

And that’s what they do, wherever they go. So they literally destroyed the wealth we accumulated for thirty years in Tigray. And, no peasant is staying at home when these forces move around, and therefore we can consider the whole Tigrayan peasantry as dislocated.

It’s an effective destruction of Tigray but that’s not the only thing. It’s also an effective destruction of Ethiopian defense forces. Ethiopia has remained without an army now. Our evaluation initially reduced the Ethiopian army by [to?] about 85 percent. Seventeen percent of the army was immediately reduced by Abiy because 17 percent of them were Tigrayans.

They were torn out of their ranks, put in camps like Dedessa [etc.] under custody 17,000 Tigrayans. So, that was literally approximately 20 percent. And this is not only numbers, but its also critically—a critical part of the army, mid-level commanders, most of the technicians, and also, you know, skilled people who used to work in artillery, engineering, and all sorts of departments. And they literally lost something like 60 percent of [indistinct, call breaks] …they sent the commanders of the Eritrean forces, which they were just using as cannon fodders, you know, they send them first, and then once they’re finished, they start sending their army. So, Ethiopia is effectively without an army now. If the Eritrean forces left Tigray…

[BREAK IN CALL]

[The call resumed with Mulugeta saying that if the Eritrean forces left Tigray, the Ethiopian army would not be able to stay there, even for a few days. The recording resumes:]

Alex: Tell me, what is the condition of the people? Are you able to eat? Do you have any medical facilities? What are the essentials of life?

Mulugeta: Not much. You know, there has been this locust infestation, and the harvest also much interrupted because of the war. The crisis started at the beginning of the harvest period, and particularly, the Eritrean forces have deliberately burned crops while they are on the ground or before the harvesting is completed. So there is a reduction of produce as well. The [aid] logistics that was prepared initially by the government was disrupted, so there are drops, these problems of supplies, food, medicine, and so forth. Hunger, among peasantry, is crippling [indistinct] in those remote areas, bordering areas Eritrea. They are massively, massively ransacked by the Eritrean army. Whatever produce they have is taken by them. So, it’s tight. Soon, we might see a serious humanitarian crisis.

Alex: The government is saying it controls 85 percent of the access, and that it can provide humanitarian access to the great majority of people. Is that correct, do you think?

Mulugeta: The great majority of people. Even the government, even the humanitarian organizations, are estimating the people who need food to around 4.5 million. That’s even conservative.

Alex: And how many of those people can be accessed from the government’s side, and how many of them are in areas that are controlled by Tigray forces?

Mulugeta: Literally people on the towns of the main road. Because there is conflict all over. You know, a certain part of people, or the southern part of Tigray, around Maychew or Alamata… the rest of it is not accessible for humanitarian aid, unless some arrangement can be made. [Until] some sort of preliminary agreement to allow humanitarian assistance to [indistinct] has been reached, I don’t think a majority of Tigray is accessible to any humanitarian aid that comes through the government.

Alex: But we are not hearing anything—we have heard nothing from the TPLF leadership about what—

Mulugeta: I know, that’s a major problem we have. They’re just dislocated, and [sighs], that’s a critical impediment, we know that.

Alex: Because—as you might have heard today, well yesterday—the [U.S.] State Department demanded, first of all the withdrawal of Eritrean forces, but then also said there needed to be talks towards a political resolution. But how can any talks be conducted under the current circumstances?

Mulugeta: I think they’re in contact through telephone with some people there, but I don’t really understand why they shy away from coming public and talking publicly. I know there is a limitation of communication. They have lost their V-SATs, they only have these Thurayas, and they’ve really been without any radio transmitter. They brought a television station, which was not possible to run it without having a permanent base. I know that there is this limitation of communication, but the problem they have is more than that. I am telling them, people are telling them, we hope that they will soon come out and start being public. It’s even a problem here in Tigray.

Alex: Because also we are not hearing anything about any political demands. I mean, what is the agenda, what is the political program? I mean if there were to be negotiations, where would be the starting point? We don’t know any of this at the moment.

Mulugeta: Yeah. I know.

Alex: Anyway, just the news we get every day is so desperately sad. I think many people were shocked, especially by the news of the deaths of Seyoum and Abay and Asmalesh. I think that touched a lot of people around the world. As you may know, I wrote a tribute to Seyoum, which was widely circulated, but we still don’t know anything about the circumstances. Did you learn anything about that incident— ?

Mulugeta: They just found them in a village. They were staying in a village, and they didn’t have an army. They were just in a secluded area. They caught and killed them. It was the EPLF that killed them.

Alex: So, this story about a shootout, et cetera, is not—

Mulugeta: No, no, no. It’s completely rubbish. You know, they, the TPLF could have done so many things had they forecasted that level of violence which was not difficult to forecast. You know, it was very obvious that this war would be a war against Tigray, which Abiy is going to run alongside Isaias. And once you expect Isaias, you shouldn’t expect it to come less than any devastating force it could mobilize. Therefore, for those who will not have participated in active resistance in the field on the military side, there were lots of options. You know, moving them to Sudan or somewhere else. So many things could have been done, but there were no preparations at all.

Alex: It seems there was just a terrible miscalculation about this, and no political strategy, no communications strategy, no protection strategy.

Mulugeta: Not at all, yeah, not at all. Extremely poor. People were begging them. They didn’t have any [indistinct]. People were literally coming up with plans and asking them do this, do that. But they brought Tigray to their size anyway, what can we say.

Alex: The mood of the people now must be desperate, angry.

Mulugeta: Angry, angry, extremely angry, extremely angry. They are left with one option: just fighting. And the war is only beginning. It’s the same in the urban centers, and much worse in the rural areas. Wherever you go, you get dozens of youngsters asking you to be mobilized, to be trained and armed. The TPLF doesn’t have any shortage of manpower when it wants to mobilize. So it’s anger, and they’re left without option, with that option only, they don’t have an option.

They [i.e. Ethiopian and Eritrean forces] are not even [indistinct] they’re not trying to appease them, they’re not trying to get the buy-in of the people. They’re not attempting anything. They’re just out here, and it’s literally genocide by decree. Wherever they’re moving, whomever they find, they kill him or her. [It’s] an old man, a child, a nursing woman, or anything.

Alex: The stories we’ve been hearing most recently are especially that it’s the Eritreans. Is it everybody, or is particularly the Eritrean forces?

Mulugeta: It’s everybody, but the worst ones are the Eritrean forces.

Alex: So tell us, are you able to remain abreast of how this has been covered by the rest of the world? Are you able to pick up anything from the news, from the radio, from internet sites or anything?

Mulugeta: Yeah, I have an old radio transistor which I bought it from a militia [laughs]. That’s what connects me to the rest of the world.

Alex: It’s back to those old days.

Mulugeta: It’s extremely difficult. Sometimes the battery gets, you run out of battery and therefore run out of communication for two, three days. It’s difficult.

Alex: So, we have been doing our best to just draw attention to what’s been going on, because as you know, there was an attempt to have this war conducted in conditions of total secrecy, and even to pretend that it was not a war. There was the U.S. administration, the last one, was very much complicit in that. The African Union completely failed. But the news is now coming out.

Mulugeta: Everything is fine. But one thing is you could push more on this humanitarian intervention. There has to be either some sort of monitoring.

And the Eritrean forces will remain here. They had a meeting last week, it’s some information we got from them, among the senior commanders of the army. There was a request from some of the army commanders on how long they are going to stay in Tigray. The response they gave them was, “Once we leave Tigray, PP [Prosperity Party] will not stay for one week in Tigray, and therefore we will leave Tigray to Woyene [TPLF] again and it will revive. And therefore, we have to remain there up until PP can pick it up which might take several months to come back.” That’s the answer that they gave them.

And therefore, this declaration from State Department—it might even come later from the UN Security Council—might not force the Eritreans to leave Tigray, unless it is supported, either with some humanitarian intervention, as much as they did in Kosovo, some armed intervention that reinforces things, or at least some sort of monitoring on the ground.

Alex: What about the Emirates? You mentioned the Emirates. Presumably, you meant the drones?

Mulugeta: Yeah. Now we don’t have any targets. We don’t have tanks. We don’t have [indistinct]. We are not big targets. We are just human beings moving around. I think that’s the only thing that brought it [i.e. the recent decline in drone attacks]. Otherwise, they have been here in full force, in just full force. They deployed their drones with their operators, and they’re the ones who effectively disarmed us.

Alex: There was one thing that I didn’t quite catch earlier on. You said the Eritreans would stay until something had been achieved. What is the Eritrean war aim, as you see it?

Mulugeta: They don’t know when PP will stand on its foot to fight against Tigray. That’s what they’re saying. They’re saying we have to stay there until PP comes up in a position to fight against the Woyenes. That’s what they’re saying. They don’t know when it will happen. It will never happen, actually. They way I see it, it will not happen here. It might not even happen in the rest of Eritrea. We’re seeing them in the field. Wherever confronted…

You might have heard of a small operation that happened two weeks ago around Edaga Harbi. There was a full brigade, support brigade of the 33rd division, which was fully mechanized, a support brigade is a mechanized support to the rest of the division. It only took 15 minutes to destroy it. In 15 minutes, six 107mm rocket launchers were taken, six 120mm mortars were taken, four 122 howitzers were taken, several vehicles were taken, and 167 of them were taken prisoners, in just 15 minutes.

Alex: What is happening to these prisoners of war? Where are they being kept? How are they being kept?

Mulugeta: We sent them back. We can not carry them around. What we did was, we gave them a sort of political education for two, three days, and then we sent them back to Mekelle and Adigrat. It’s only the commanders—one colonel, one lieutenant colonel—who declined to return back. They said, “they will kill us, so we will remain with you.” We told them, “you cannot be our soldiers, and that’s not what you are asking us, and we shall not provide you shelter, but you can remain in the liberated areas.”

So, they are just moving around. So that’s where we are Alex.

Somali men ‘forced into Eritrean army’ under impression they were signing up for security jobs in Qatar

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The Telegraph | The men are thought to be being sent to Tigray to fight in Ethiopia’s civil war.

Anger is mounting in Somalia over allegations young men are being secretly recruited and sent to Eritrea to fight in Ethiopia’s civil war.

Three families told Reuters their young sons had officially been recruited by Somalia’s government to work in Qatar, only to later find out they had been sent to Eritrea and forced to serve as soldiers.

Ali Jamac Dhoodi, 48, told the news agency he thought his son was working as a security guard in Qatar to help prepare for next year’s football World Cup. But he said he was later told by Somalia’s National Intelligence Agency that his son had died in Eritrea.

“They showed me a picture from their WhatsApp and asked me, ‘do you know this picture and his full name?’ I said, ‘yes he is my son,'” Dhoodi, 48, said. “They said to me ‘your son died’. I cried.”

Others said their sons, who had originally been sent to Eritrea for military training, were sent to fight in the Ethiopian civil war. Mothers have led rare protests in the capital Mogadishu demanding to know where their children had been sent, and some lawmakers have written to Somali president Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo asking for information.

“I heard that our children who were sent to Eritrea for military training have been taken and their responsibility was turned over to [Ethiopian Prime Minister] Abiy Ahmed to fight for him,” Fatuma Moallim Abdulle, the mother of 20-year-old soldier Ahmed Ibrahim Jumaleh, told The Associated Press.

“According to the information I gathered, our children were taken straight to Mekele city,” the capital of the Tigray region, she said. “You may understand how I feel, I am a mother who carried her child for nine months in my belly, that’s my blood and flesh.”

Eritrea is accused of involvement in the conflict pitting its neighbour Ethiopia’s federal government against the rebellious leaders of the northern Tigray region. Witnesses have accused Eritrean forces of massacring civilians and pillaging villages in the embattled region.

The United States on Thursday said it had pressed Eritrea’s government to immediately withdraw its troops from Ethiopia.

Somalian and Ethiopian authorities have denied Somali troops are being deployed in Tigray. Ethiopia and Eritrea have consistently denied reports of Eritrean troops fighting in the conflict, despite extensive Telegraph reporting and the video of an Ethiopian general pointing to the contrary.

The Qatari government responded on Friday by saying it condemned any false recruitment initiatives and urging relevant governments to investigate any abuses.

“The State of Qatar reiterates that any genuine offers of employment in Qatar will always come through official channels and approved recruitment agencies or Qatar Visa Centres,” it said in a statement to The Telegraph.

“We urge all individuals seeking employment in Qatar to confirm any offers they receive with these official channels or the embassy, prior to acceptance.”

Etiopiere i Norge forteller: Fedrene våre ble drept av eritreiske soldater

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©Bistandsaktuelt | I over en måned levde Sahle Semere og Hailay Berhe i uvisshet om hva som skjedde med familiemedlemmer i Tigray. Begge er etiopiere og bosatt i Norge. Familiene deres befant seg på landsbygda i regionen som havnet i krig med den etiopiske regjeringshæren og dens allierte.

Av Jan Speed 

Da regjeringsstyrker innledet invasjonen av Tigray-provinsen i begynnelsen av november i fjor ble alle nett- og telefonforbindelser kuttet. En lokal TV-stasjon i Tigray kringkastet i noen uker før det var slutt, mens noe informasjon ble sendt ut gjennom sosiale medier av personer med utenlandske mobiltelefoner.

Men fortsatt er det ingen journalister eller uavhengige menneskerettighetsgranskere som har fått reise fritt i Tigray. Av samme grunn har det vært vanskelig å kunne verifisere de mange historier som fortelles om drap og overgrep utført av partene i konflikten.

Både Sahle og Hailay hadde familier som bodde på landsbygda øst i Tigray. Statsminister og fredsprisvinner Abiy Ahmed nedtonet alvoret i krigen og kalte militæraksjonen «en politi-aksjon». Målet, ifølge Abiy, var å arrestere lederne i Tigrayfolkets frigjøringsfront (TPLF), den tidligere regionledelsen i provinsen. TPLF-styret hadde, i likhet med flere andre delstatsregjeringer i Etiopia, egne væpnede styrker, og gjorde sterk motstand.

Det ble tidlig klart at regjeringshæren allierte seg med de væpnede styrkene til Amhara-regionen. Etter hvert kom det også meldinger om at eritreiske styrker hadde rykket inn i Tigray. Dette er offisielt avvist av sentralregjeringen, men indirekte innrømmet av en etiopisk general og av andre i administrasjonen.

Da regjeringsstyrkene etter en måned erobret provinshovedstaden Mekelle ble telefonforbindelsen gjenopprettet. Tigrayere i utlandet ventet spent på nytt om familiene sine.

– Han bodde øst i landet og var 82 år gammel. De kom til huset hans, stjal kveget hans og ødela alt på gården. Etterpå ble han drept rett foran huset, bare fordi han var tigrayer, sier Sahle til Bistandsaktuelt.

Slektninger som oppsøkte gården i midten av desember fortalte at både etiopiske og eritreiske soldater hadde vært tilstede da det skjedde, men at det var eritreerne som gjorde det. De snakket tigrinja.

– De truet også med å drepe svigermoren min da hun begynte å rope høyt. Soldatene sa at ingen fikk begrave min far.

Liket ble liggende utenfor huset i to dager, ifølge det Sahle har fått vite av slektningene.

Stilte spørsmål

Hailay Berhe deltar i en demonstrasjon utenfor Utenriksdepartementet i Oslo og bærer på et bilde. Det er av faren – han ble bare 65 år gammel.

– Eritreiske soldater kom og begynte å plyndre alt han hadde. De tok kveg og solcellepanelene hans. Han spurte ‘hvorfor tar du mine eiendeler, jeg er bare en bonde’. Og derfor drepte de han, sier Hailay.

– Jeg får ikke sove. Jeg tenker stadig på dette og er redd for resten av familien som er i Tigray. Vi vet at mange sulter.

Han fikk beskjed om farens død av en slektning som klarte å komme seg til regionhovedstaden Mekelle.

Ifølge FN er situasjonen i store deler av Tigray fortsatt «ustabil og uforutsigbar». Det er aktive kamphandlinger i flere deler av provinsen.

En Facebook-video som Bistandsaktuelt har fått tilgang til viser angivelig eritreiske tropper i byen Wukro. Den er angivelig er filmet i smug med mobiltelefon og viser minst to stridsvogner, flere lastebiler og flere titalls soldater som beveger seg oppover en av hovedgatene.

Det er ingen uavhengig verifisering av filmen, og ikke opplysninger om når den ble tatt opp.

Krav fra USA

Det nye styret i USA ba onsdag om at alle soldater fra Eritrea umiddelbart måtte forlate den konfliktherjede Tigray-regionen i Etiopia, melder NTB.

En talsperson for USAs utenriksdepartement viser til rapporter om plyndring, seksualisert vold, angrep i flyktningleirer og andre menneskerettsbrudd i Tigray.

– Det finnes også bevis for at eritreiske soldater tvinger eritreiske flyktninger til å returnere fra Tigray til Eritrea, skriver talspersonen i en epost til nyhetsbyrået AP.

Chinese ambassador, Ethiopia capital mayor agree to enhance economic partnership

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ADDIS ABABA, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) — Chinese ambassador to Ethiopia Zhao Zhiyuan and Mayor of Ethiopia’s capital city Adanech Abiebie agreed on Friday to enhance the economic partnership between the two countries.

In a press statement, Abiebie said she has reached an agreement with the Chinese ambassador to Ethiopia on the need to add new Chinese built projects that improve the economic and social lives of Addis Ababa city residents.

Abiebie also said her office discussed with the Chinese ambassador to Ethiopia on the need to further enhance cooperation in road projects in Ethiopia’s capital city.

Addis Ababa, a city of an estimated five million-plus population is Ethiopia’s main social, economic and political hub.

Chinese firms are engaged in various infrastructure projects in the city aimed at meeting the social and economic needs of Addis Ababa’s big population.

These include the multimillion U.S. dollars expansion infrastructure in the Addis Ababa Bole International Airport and the landmark “Beautifying Sheger” project.

“Beautifying Sheger” is a personal initiative of Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed who envisions creating a clean, livable environment for the residents of Addis Ababa.

Were Orthodox Christians massacred in Ethiopia?

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American Magazine | The Jesuit Review | Kevin Clarke

With journalists, aid workers and U.N. officials largely cut off and local internet and mobile services blocked, much remains unknown about what has been happening in Ethiopia’s Tigray region over the last three months, but accounts emerging from farmers and villagers escaping the fighting between Tigrayan militia and central government forces are not encouraging.

U.N. officials have received multiple reports of sexual assaults and the executions of unarmed men and boys, and they report the discovery of at least 300 unaccompanied or separated children among the more than 57,000 people who have fled into neighboring Sudan. They believe hundreds more will be found among the hundreds of thousands of people displaced by fighting in the Tigray, Amhara and Afar regions.

John Shumlansky, the country representative for Catholic Relief Services, returned to Addis Ababa in mid-January after visiting the capital of Tigray, Mekele. He found thousands there who had fled the fighting with little more than what they could carry and the clothes on their backs, but he said some normalcy was at least returning to the city itself as banks and shops reopened.

Violence is continuing in Ethiopia’s Tigray state. Can Catholic Church officials bring their diplomatic skills to bear to promote a peaceful resolution to the conflict?

“But clearly people are a bit traumatized by what happened,” he said, “and they’re trying to get their lives back…living with host communities at the moment, trying to figure things out until they can feel safe to go back to their homes.

“A lot of the big needs now are food, making sure they have shelter and that there is clean, safe water for people, hygiene.” Complicating the immediate relief effort, he added, is “the Covid issue.”

“People are still separating and trying to socially distance,” but that “isn’t always possible in these kinds of situations.” Tigray, a largely agricultural region, was already a hunger hot spot before fighting broke out between government troops and Tigrayan militia in November. The region has been afflicted by the worst outbreak of locust swarms in more than two decades, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization. Officials worry that millions in Tigray now face food insecurity and hundreds of thousands could be at risk of starvation. C.R.S. will be part of a consortium of relief agencies charged with feeding as many as 1.5 million in Tigray over the coming months, Mr. Shumlansky reported.

There have been allegations of massacres of civilians by all sides in an escalating conflict that has included the Ethiopian and Eritrean forces joined against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front. Among the most shocking are still unconfirmed reports of a slaughter of as many as 750 to 1,000 people on the grounds of the Cathedral of Our Lady Mary of Zion in Axum.

Laurie Nathan, the director of the mediation program at the University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, describes the report of a massacre in Axum as credible, though unverified. Accounts of the killing of noncombatants on the compound around the cathedral were first reported by the Europe External Programme with Africa, a Belgium-based peace building and refugee protection advocacy, on Jan. 9. The reported attack took place on Dec. 15.

Our Lady Mary of Zion is an especially sacred site to Tigrayans. According to local tradition, its Chapel of the Tablet is believed to house the biblical Ark of the Covenant. Accounts from witnesses report that community members went to the compound concerned that an approaching armed group intended to loot the chapel and remove the ark. After a confrontation, scores of these unarmed people were fired on by that armed group, composed, according to survivors, of Ethiopian federal troops and Amhara militia.

“It really does look like there was an atrocity and a massacre, but precisely the motivation and the details, I think we need to suspend judgment at the moment,” Mr. Nathan said.

There have been allegations of massacres of civilians by all sides in an escalating conflict that has included the Ethiopian and Eritrean forces joined against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front.

“We’re not going to know” what happened in Axum, he said, “until it’s the United Nations or reputable human rights groups that are doing a proper investigation.”

Though other African states have experienced such violence as a result of tension between Christian and Muslim communal groups, Mr. Nathan believes the killings in Axum are the result not of interreligious strife but of the ethnic and political crisis that has engulfed Tigray.

Ethiopia is about 62 percent Christian, mostly members of the Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church, and 33 percent Muslim, but “it’s not likely at all” that Our Lady Mary of Zion “was targeted because of its Christian orientation,” Mr. Nathan said. “What you’re seeing with this church massacre is a reflection of the armed conflict between the Ethiopian government and ruling party on the one hand and the people of Tigray and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front on the other.”

C.R.S.: “A lot of the big needs now are food, making sure they have shelter and that there is clean, safe water for people, hygiene.” Complicating the immediate relief effort is “the Covid issue.”

Violence broke out in Tigray in November, when government forces sought to suppress the T.P.L.F. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed moved against the militia and the governing class in Tigray after local officials there went ahead with a popular vote in contravention of the central government’s decision to postpone national elections because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The prime minister justified the incursion as a response to an alleged T.P.L.F. attack on an Ethiopian army installation. According to Mr. Nathan, the eruption between government forces and the T.P.L.F. is a reflection of growing tensions within Ethiopia between the central government and ethnic and regional power centers seeking greater autonomy. The T.P.L.F. is the military wing of a political bloc that had wielded considerable power in Ethiopia for decades, part of the reason Eritrea was eager to join forces with Mr. Abiy to take on its former adversaries in the border region.

Since Eritrea joined the offensive, its troops and associated militia have been accused of summary execution, rape and looting. Among the issues that remain to be sorted out when humanitarian access to the region is restored is the fate of thousands of Eritrean refugees in Tigray who were among the targets of the Eritrean incursion.

“It really does look like there was an atrocity and a massacre” in Tigray, “but precisely the motivation and the details, I think we need to suspend judgment at the moment.”

U.S. State Department officials told The Associated Press that they have directly “pressed senior levels” of Eritrea’s government to immediately withdraw from the embattled region. There were no details on how officials in Eritrea, one of the world’s most secretive countries, responded to the Biden administration demand.

If a massacre is confirmed at Our Lady Mary of Zion, Mr. Nathan believes that Ethiopian government forces remain the likeliest suspect. “The attackers want to destroy Tigrayan culture,” said Mr. Nathan, “and to pick on such a high-profile religious and spiritual target sends the message of terror, which is what was intended here.”

Based on his experience during similar armed conflicts, militias “don’t conduct themselves in this way without the consent of whoever provides [them] with weaponry.”

Mr. Nathan advises the United Nations on conflict resolution and previously worked as the director of the Centre for Mediation in Africa at the University of Pretoria in South Africa.

“It’s possible that you have completely criminal bands that act as militia that have no motive other than pillage and profit, but that is not what’s going on in Tigray right now,” he said. “A militia that attacks a church in Tigray is doing so in alliance with the government or Ethiopian Defense Force.”

Ironies abound in the apparent eagerness of the prime minister to press the fight against the T.P.L.F. Mr. Abiy won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 because of his successful efforts to bring years of conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea to an end. By most accounts, he is a devout Christian, and he was awarded a doctorate by the Institute for Peace and Security Studies at Addis Ababa University.

But he seems to have forgotten whatever he learned about conflict resolution the closer he has come to achieving the goal of suppressing Tigrayan autonomy. The prime minister has brushed aside offers to negotiate an end to the fighting. The once imposing T.P.L.F. militia—with as many 250,000 members it had been considered one of Africa’s most formidable forces—has been dealt a serious blow by the central government’s campaign; and members of the region’s ruling class have been killed, arrested or thrown into flight, Mr. Nathan said.

“The attackers want to destroy Tigrayan culture and to pick on such a high-profile religious and spiritual target sends the message of terror, which is what was intended here.”

Despite those apparent government successes, Mr. Nathan worries the struggle in Tigray may be nearer to its beginning than to its end.

“The Ethiopian defense has prevailed; they have effectively suppressed the revolt. They have decimated the Tigrayan forces,” Mr. Nathan said. “But that’s not to say that they’ve won the peace because the people of Tigray supported what their political party was doing. I think their level of hatred now towards the Ethiopian government is vastly greater than it was previously.”

Even if the fighting can be quickly brought to a halt, he describes the conflict as “a manifestation of the deep crisis of the Ethiopian state,” a struggle to achieve a “balance between central control and regional autonomy [that] has not been resolved adequately.”

Now local and regional leaders call for a national dialogue to rethink the Ethiopian Constitution, according to Mr. Nathan, but “you can’t have a national dialogue in a situation of acute instability, and certainly you can’t in one of violence.”

“For a national dialogue to proceed,” he said, “individuals, groups, political parties need to be free to move, to assemble, to speak without fear of intimidation or repression or violence, and they’re not close to that.”

He worries that the violence in Tigray could be a harbinger of more to come.

Mr. Nathan suggested that as the international community presses for a cease-fire and the creation of humanitarian corridors to reach displaced Tigrayans and refugees, regional and international religious leaders should step up to take the lead in seeking a long-term solution. Even the Catholic Church, which has a small but vibrant footprint in Ethiopia, could make a stronger effort to promote peace beyond the usual issuing of appeals for calm and security, Mr. Nathan said.

He urged Vatican diplomats to reach out to contacts in the Orthodox Church and within the Eritrean and Ethiopian diplomatic corps. Christian groups have been historically perceived as dependably neutral in mediating such conflicts, and the Catholic Church in particular has had past successes in Africa, he said, noting its role in bringing an end to years of civil conflict in Mozambique.

“When a country is gripped in conflict and there are deep divisions, the church is one of the institutions that is capable of transcending those divisions,” Mr. Nathan said. “The church is always able to say, ‘We speak on behalf of all humankind, or at least all our constituents, regardless of their ethnicity.’”

As for immediate humanitarian aid, Mr. Shumlansky is confident that once the security conditions improve, C.R.S. will be able to tap into a reliable network of Catholic parishes and health services to distribute food and other emergency aid to help Tigrayans survive this catastrophe. “It’s really a good network of people that we can work through,” he said.

Striden om Nilen – spillet bak spenninga mellom Etiopia og Sudan

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Proletären | Afrikas største damkonstruksjon kaster sine skygge over grensekonfliktene mellom Etiopia og Sudan, som risikerer å føre til vannkrig i det nordøstlige Afrika, skriver Marcus Jönsson for den svenske avisa Proletären.

De senaste veckorna har flera incidenter på gränsen mellan Etiopien och Sudan ökat spänningarna i regionen betydligt, till den punkt att det finns risk för att ett krig bryter ut mellan de båda länderna. I söndags skedde den senaste skottväxlingen mellan etiopiska och sudanesiska trupper, dock utan några bekräftade döda.

Den 11 januari dödades fem kvinnor och ett barn av regeringsstödd etiopisk milis, enligt Sudans regerande övergångsråd (Transitional Sovereign Council, TSC).

Dådet skedde i den omstridda gränsregionen al-Fashqa, på den sudanesiska sidan gränsen, men där etiopiska bönder i skydd av miliser odlat mark i åratal, vilket Sudans förre president Omar al-Bashirs styre tolererade.

Men de senaste månaderna har temperaturen höjts rejält i dispyten om gränsområdet, och på det förra årets sista dag tog sudanesisk militär kontroll över en del av al-Fahsqa. Sudan anklagar den etiopiska regeringen för att stödja miliserna som tidigare kontrollerade området, vilket regeringen i Etiopiens huvudstad Addis Abeba tillbakavisar.

Presidenten för övergångsrådet, som styr Sudan sedan störtandet av al-Bashir 2019, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, är också befälhavare för den sudanesiska militären. Dagen efter attacken på kvinnorna besökte al-Burhan delstaten al-Qadarif, där al-Fashqa ligger, och talade till soldaterna som stationerats vid gränsen.

– Hur länge måste vi ha tålamod? Allt har en gräns och den här situationen har överskridit sin. Det här är vårt land och vi är alla villiga att dö för det här landet, till sista man, sa al-Burhan i en video på TSC:s Facebooksida.

Regeringen i Addis Abeba, med premiärminister Abiy Ahmed i spetsen, anklagar å sin sida övergångsrådet i Sudans huvudstad Khartoum för att inte agera självständigt. I ett tal i slutet av december sa Abiy Ahmed att det är andra aktörer som ligger bakom Sudans truppförflyttningar till gränsen.

Utan att säga det rakt ut syftade han på Egypten – som i november höll militära flygövningar med Sudan och som i december uttalade sitt fulla stöd till Sudan efter en etiopisk attack vid gränsen i al-Qadarif.

Anledningen är att Egypten är låst i en hård diplomatisk strid med Etiopien om den enorma damm som sedan tio år tillbaka byggs i landet, bara två mil från gränsen mot Sudan. Dammen, med det ståtliga namnet Stora etiopiska renässansdammen (GERD, efter sina initialer på engelska), byggs på Blå Nilen som rinner från Tanasjön i Etiopien, och vattenkraftanläggningen kommer att bli Afrikas största.

Blå Nilen står för mer än 80 procent av vattenflödet i Nilen. Den löper från Etiopien genom Sudan, flyter samman med Vita Nilen i Khartoum och rinner ut i Medelhavet vid egyptiska Alexandria.

Egypten, vars vattentillförsel till 90 procent kommer från Nilen, ser dammen som ett existentiellt hot, fruktar att den kommer att strypa landets vattenförsörjning och har under hela bygget motsatt sig att Etiopien ska kunna kontrollera vattenflödet i floden.

Sudan delar i viss mån Egyptens oro, men har tidigare under bygget haft större förståelse för Etiopiens position. Sudan vill också ta del av elektriciteten som dammen kommer generera, och som både Sudans och Etiopiens miljoner fattiga behöver. I Sudan har omkring 60 procent av de närmare 45 miljoner invånarna tillgång till el, i Etiopien mindre än 45 procent av de cirka 115 miljoner invånarna, enligt Världsbanken.

I slutet av oktober förra året fick USA:s dåvarande president Donald Trump Sudan att upprätta diplomatiska relationer med Israel, i utbyte mot att USA tog bort Sudan från listan över länder som sponsrar terrorism. I samband med det uttalade sig Trump – nära allierad med Egyptens president Sisi – om Egyptens syn på bygget.

– De kommer spränga dammen till slut. Jag sa det högt och tydligt, de kommer att spränga den där dammen. Och de måste göra någonting, sa Donald Trump.

Då hade USA en månad tidigare dragit in biståndspengar till Etiopien för att bygget inte stoppats.

Ytterligare ett år tillbaka i tiden, i september 2019, bad Sisi Trump om hjälp med att få till stånd en överenskommelse mellan länderna. Trumps finansminister Steven Mnuchin förhandlade fram ett avtal mellan Egypten, Sudan, Etiopien och Världsbanken, men som Etiopien aldrig undertecknade.

I somras fyllde Etiopien GERD:s nedersta del för första gången. Förhandlingarna om den två kilometer långa och 145 meter höga dammen har sedan dess förts i Afrikanska Unionens regi, men strandade återigen för två veckor sedan. Och förra veckan sa USA:s tillträdande utrikesminister Antony Blinken att situationen på gränsen mellan Sudan och Etiopien riskerar att ”koka över”.

USA är inte den enda stormakten med politiska och ekonomiska intressen i regionen. Kina investerar stort i alla de tre berörda länderna, inom ramen för jätteprojektet Belt and Road Initiative (BRI, ”den nya sidenvägen”). Kina är Etiopiens största handelspartner och beräknas ha bidragit med mer än en tredjedel av kostnaderna för dammbygget, som totalt uppgår till 5 miljarder dollar.

Elektriciteten från dammen ska också hjälpa till att driva den kinesiskbyggda järnväg som går från Addis Abeba till det lilla kustlandet Djibouti i norr, vars huvudstad och hamn har ett mycket strategiskt läge mellan Röda havet och Adenviken.

Även Suezkanalen i Egypten, mellan Röda havet och Medelhavet, är ett viktigt nav för Kinas BRI-planer. Kinas ambassadör i Addis Abeba har också uttryckt att Kina hoppas att meningsskiljaktigheterna mellan Etiopien och Egypten ska lösas genom dialog och fredliga förhandlingar.

Sammanstötningarna mellan Etiopien och Sudan kommer när det redan finns en växande humanitär kris i området, två månader efter att etiopiska regeringsstyrkor intog regionen Tigrays huvudstad Mekelle.

Den etiopiska centralregeringens krig mot TPLF (Tigreanska folkets befrielsefront) har lett till att fler än två miljoner människor i Tigray tvingats lämna sina hem. Enligt FN:s flyktingorgan UNHCR har fler än 60.000 tigreanska flyktingar tagit sig över gränsen till Sudan från Tigray, längst uppe i Etiopiens nordvästra hörn.

I måndags rapporterade FN:s kontor för samordning av humanitär hjälp, UNOCHA, att de har börjat flytta de tigreanska flyktingar som tagit sig till Sudan, bort från områdena vid gränsen där stridigheter skett. Samtidigt riskerar hundratusentals människor som fortfarande befinner sig inne i Tigray att svälta, enligt FN och en rad humanitära organisationer, eftersom det mesta av regionen fortfarande är avskuret från omvärlden sedan november.

Etiopiens premiärminister Abiy Ahmed fick Nobels fredspris 2019 för fredsavtalet mellan Etiopien och Eritrea. Många tigreaner som gått över gränsen till Sudan har vittnat om att soldater från Eritrea i norr också befinner sig i Tigray, där tigreanerna och TPLF är fast mellan tre antagonister: etiopiska regeringsstyrkor, eritreanska soldater och amhariska miliser. Amhara är regionen söder om Tigray i Etiopen.

Det kommer dessutom uppgifter om att även somaliska soldater, som skickats till Eritrea för militär träning, ska ha använts i Tigray.

Det finns också mängder av vittnesmål från flyktingar om etniskt motiverat våld mot tigreaner, och FN:s särskilda representant i frågor som rör sexuellt våld i konflikt, Pramila Patten, varnade förra veckan för ”seriösa anklagelser om sexuellt våld” i Tigray, inklusive rapporter om individer som under vapenhot tvingats våldta familjemedlemmar.

Enligt ett uttalande från Abiy Ahmeds regering i december dödades inga civila under offensiven i Tigray över huvud taget, men det handlar snarare om tusentals döda – inklusive amhariska migrantarbetare som mördades i en av flera massakrer som begicks i Tigray i november.

Innan Abiy Ahmed blev premiärminister 2018 styrde TPLF Etiopien i nästan tre decennier, med en federal modell baserad på etnisk tillhörighet. Abiy Ahmed förespråkar en mycket starkare centralstat och anklagas av TPLF för att ha rensat statsapparaten på tigreaner.

Med våldsamheter inte bara i Tigray och Amhara, utan även i regionen Benishangul-Gumuz söder om Amhara, där flera hundra civila dödats i olika massakrer den senaste månaden, behöver inte fredspristagaren Abiy Ahmed ytterligare ett krig – och förhoppningsvis lugnar situationen vid gränsen ner sig om länderna lyckas nå ett avtal om hur högt Etiopien får fylla sin damm.

Kina, som definitivt inte har något intresse av ett nytt krig i regionen, borde också kunna använda sitt inflytande för att nå en diplomatisk lösning mellan Etiopien, Sudan och Egypten.

Om inte det lyckas, finns det risk för att en gnista för många vid gränsen startar det första vattenkriget i klimatkrisens tid.

Situation Report EEPA HORN No. 71 – 30 January 2021

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Europe External Programme with Africa is a Belgium-based Centre of Expertise with in-depth knowledge, publications, and networks, specialised in issues of peace building, refugee protection and resilience in the Horn of Africa. EEPA has published extensively on issues related to movement and/or human trafficking of refugees in the Horn of Africa and on the Central Mediterranean Route. It cooperates with a wide network of Universities, research organisations, civil society and experts from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya, Djibouti, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Uganda and across Africa. Key in-depth publications can be accessed on the website.

Reported war situation (as confirmed per 29 January)

● A source from Mekelle, Tigray, speaks of the difficulty of speaking about what is happening: “Our problem is that the value of life has become meaningless. When a single person dies, we feel all the pain. For some, it has become a matter of statistics. But here, we don’t know how to mourn and how to speak to a family where they have lost eight relatives.”

● The source describes a very depressing situation in the town due to the complete information shut-down. He has realised that “information is as important as food and water.” He states: “we don’t know who is creating information and it adds to demoralisation and intimidation”.

● The source lives near the Mekelle Ayder referral hospital. He says: I could see the pain in the eyes of the ENDF soldiers who used Ayder hospital as a camp.” Most of them are 18-19 years old. They have no hope. They know they may die soon. It is devastating for all the families of these young people.”

● The source explains that the Ethiopian federal troops were in Ayder hospital in the first week after ENDF had captured Mekelle. I went and saw around 500 ENDF soldiers with machine guns. I thought they came to protect us. But when Eritrean soldiers came they did nothing to protect the property.

● The source states: “Eritrean soldiers came with vehicles to take goods.” The soldiers were few. The source says that the elders asked the ENDF colonel at the hospital campus whether they would prohibit the looting and that they would follow orders from ENDF. The ENDF colonel said they had no mandate to tell Eritrean soldiers what to do. The elders then asked ENDF to give weapons to defend the hospital which is a public property of the Ethiopian government.”

● The source states ENDF could not help to protect the institution from the Ethiopian government. The information that the Eritrean soldiers were on their way to Ayder referral hospital went around very fast through the megaphone system. The elders instructed the community to block the road. “My house is ten minutes away from there and everything was blocked.” He concludes: the community protected Ayder hospital from major looting. They did the same for the Telecom (TV and satellites).

● “When I grew up, my mother never smiled”, says the source. “Now I have had the revelation to understand why. The experiences of war have made her afraid. A lot of pain may have taught her sadness. Now I have a young boy of three. I find that he can differentiate between a gunshot and a bomb and airstrike. We are passing this experience of war through the generations.”

● The source from Mekelle states: “The pain we must see is the bigger picture of all our Eritrean and Ethiopian brothers. The problem is a collective one of the whole region.”

● Eritrean I.D. cards have been distributed to citizens in Irob, Tigray, Ethiopia, confirms a source by phone from Sebe’a in Irob. He confirms that everything has been stolen. People only wear the clothes they wear. Many people have fled to the mountains and are hiding in caves. There is no food, no money. Two grandchildren of the source have been killed.

● Another source says that the Eritrean troops are looting blankets of farmers in rural areas around Tigray. When they do this they say: “you have taken us 20 years back in development. In return, we will take you (Tigrayans) 50 yrs back. You will know in the future that you will never be richer than Eritrea.” The source was in a village near Rama. He left for Addis and spoke by phone from there.

Reported International situation (as confirmed per 29 January)

● A group of “Concerned Eritreans Regarding the Civil War in Ethiopia”, signed by Professor Emeritus Bereket Habte Selassie issues a statement. Dr. Selassie has held high-profile positions within Ethiopia, serving as Attorney General, Associate Justice of Ethiopia’s Supreme Court, Vice Minister of Interior, and Mayor of Harar. He was the Chairman of the Constitutional Commission in Eritrea after its independence in 1993 and the principal author of Eritrea’s constitution, which never came into effect.

● The group of Concerned Eritreans express their “grief over the Ethiopian civil war that on Nov. 4th started” and condemns “in the strongest possible terms the wanton killings, displacement, famine and distress that the Ethiopian Federal Government and its partners have since inflicted upon the civilian population of Tigray.” The Group states that “The Eritrean military is actively involved in the war on orders of President Isaias Afwerki and his close circle.”

● The Group expresses its duty “as citizens and as human beings to take a firm stand against role of the Eritrean military in subjecting the people of Tigray and Eritrean refugees in Tigray to conditions that led to killings, pillaging, sexual violence, destruction of heritage sites displacement.”

● The Groups strongly condemns “President Isaias Afwerki and his close circle for coercing Eritreans into causing death and destruction for the sole purpose of exacting personal vengeance.”

● The Group notes: President Isaias aims “to sow generational feud and hatred between Eritreans and their Tigrayan neighbors. We can only overcome such seeds of hatred with love, compassion and remorse, and hence we express our respect for and solidarity with the people of Tigray.”

● The Group states that “Soldiers of the Eritrean Defense Forces (irrespective of their ethnic roots) who have been designated to waste in this debacle are themselves victims of the repressive regime, and their commanders and the regime in Asmara bear primary responsibility for the violations that they endure and that they inflict. The United States has said that it has communicated directly to senior Eritrean officials that Eritrean soldiers must withdraw immediately from Tigray.”

● The Group strongly condemns “the hypocrisy of enforcing the strictest lockdown since April 2020 while sending citizens to battle. While most governments are working hard to combat the spread of COVID-19, President Isaias Afwerki has created a conducive environment for large-scale deaths by exposing Eritrean soldiers to mass-spread of the virus and battlefield deaths.”

● The Group calls “for the immediate and unconditional withdrawals of the Eritrean military from Tigray and Ethiopian forces from Eritrean territories. We urge the world community and international and regional organizations to pressure the Ethiopian federal government and President Isaias and his associates to end the war.”

● The Group calls “upon the international community to pressure the Ethiopian federal government to grant humanitarian access to Tigrayans and Eritrean refugees in the region, who are in dire need due to war-caused hunger and shortage of other basic necessities.”

● The Group calls upon the United Nations, U.N. Security Council, the African Union, the European Union, President Joe Biden’s administration and other partner countries to appoint an impartial body to investigate and bring the perpetrators to justice. The atrocities that are being committed in Tigray amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity and violate many international treaties and conventions that Eritrea and Ethiopia have signed.”

● The US has ‘directly’ pressured Eritrea to withdraw forces from Tigray.

Disclaimer:
All information in this situation report is presented as a fluid update report, as to the best knowledge and understanding of the authors at the moment of publication. EEPA does not claim that the information is correct but verifies to the best of ability within the circumstances. Publication is weighed on the basis of interest to understand potential impacts of events (or perceptions of these) on the situation. Check all information against updates and other media. EEPA does not take responsibility for the use of the information or impact thereof. All information reported originates from third parties and the content of all reported and linked information remains the sole responsibility of these third parties. Report to info@eepa.be any additional information and corrections.

Links of interest

Violence in Tigray causes untold suffering

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MSF | Relief Web | Since early November, a military escalation in the Tigray region of Ethiopia has caused widespread violence and displaced hundreds of thousands of people. Albert Viñas, emergency coordinator for Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), provided the following account today:

Almost three months after the start of the conflict, I am struck by how difficult it has been—and continues to be—to access a community with such acute needs in such a densely populated area. Considering the means and capacity of international organizations and the UN, the fact that this is happening is a failure of the humanitarian world.

Supporting hospitals affected by the violence

After several attempts, I finally entered the capital of Tigray, Mekele, with the first MSF team on December 16, more than a month after the violence started. The city was quiet. There was electricity, but no basic supplies. The local hospital was running at 30 to 40 percent of its capacity, with very little medication [supplies]. Most significantly, there were almost no patients, which is always a very bad sign. We evaluated the hospital, with the idea of referring patients there as soon as possible from Adigrat, 120 kilometers to the north.

We arrived in Adigrat, the second most populous city in Tigray, on December 19. The situation was very tense, and the hospital was in terrible condition. Most of the health staff had left, and there were hardly any medicines. There was no food, no water, and no money. Some patients who had been admitted with traumatic injuries were malnourished.

We supplied the hospital with medicines and bought an emergency supply of food from the markets that were still open. Together with the remaining hospital staff, we cleaned the building and organized the collection of waste. Little by little, we rehabilitated the hospital so that it could function as a medical referral center.

On December 27 we entered the towns of Adwa and Axum, to the west of Adigrat, in central Tigray. There we found a similar situation: no electricity and no water. All the medicines had been stolen from Adwa general hospital, and the hospital furniture and equipment were broken. Fortunately, the Don Bosco institution in Adwa had converted its clinic into an emergency hospital with a small operating theater. In Axum, the 200-bed university hospital had not been attacked, but it was only operating at 10 percent capacity.

On roads where the security situation remained uncertain, we trucked food, medicine, and oxygen to these hospitals and began to support the most essential medical departments, such as the operating theaters, maternity units, and emergency rooms, and to refer critical patients.

Medical needs going unseen and unmet

Beyond the hospitals, around 80 or 90 percent of the health centers that we visited between Mekele and Axum were not functional, either due to a lack of staff or because they had suffered robberies. When primary care services do not exist, people can’t access or be referred to hospitals.

For example, before the crisis, [on average] two appendicitis operations were performed per day at Adigrat hospital. In the past two months, they haven’t done a single one. In every place, we saw patients arriving late. One woman had been in labor for seven days without being able to give birth. Her life was saved because we were able to transport her to Mekele. I saw people arrive at the hospital on bicycles carrying a patient from 30 kilometers away. And those were the ones who managed to get to the hospital.

If women with complicated deliveries, seriously ill patients, and people with appendicitis and trauma injuries can’t get to hospital, you can imagine the consequences. There is a large population suffering, surely with fatal consequences. Adigrat hospital serves an area with more than one million people, and the hospital in Axum serves an area with more than three million people. If these hospitals don’t function properly and can’t be accessed, then people die at home.

When the health system is broken, vaccinations, disease detection, and nutritional programs don’t function either. There have been no vaccinations in almost three months, so we fear there will be epidemics soon.

In recent weeks, our mobile medical teams have started visiting areas outside the main cities, and we are reopening some health centers. We believe our presence brings a certain feeling of protection. We have seen some health staff returning to work. Only five people attended the first meeting we organized in Adwa hospital, but the second was attended by 15, and more than 40 people came to the third. Beyond medical activities, you feel that you offer people some hope: the feeling that things can improve after two months without good news.

People fleeing violence, living in fear

In eastern and central Tigray, we did not see large settlements of displaced people. Instead, most have taken refuge with relatives and friends, so many homes now have 20 or 25 people living together. The impact of the violence is visible in the buildings and in the cars with bullet holes.

Especially at the beginning, we saw a population locked in their homes and living in great fear. Everyone gave us pieces of paper with phone numbers written on them and asked us to convey messages to their families. People don’t even know if their relatives and loved ones are okay, because in many places there are still no telephones or telecommunications.

When we arrived in Adigrat, we saw lines of 500 people next to a water truck waiting to get 20 liters of water per family at most. The telephone line was restored in Adigrat just a few days ago. The situation is improving little by little, but as we moved westward to new places we found the same scenario: fewer services, less transport.

We are very concerned about what may be happening in rural areas. We still haven’t been able to go to many places, either because of insecurity or because it is hard to obtain authorization. But we know, because community elders and traditional authorities have told us, that the situation in these places is very bad.

Large areas of Tigray have very mountainous terrain, with winding roads that climb from 2,000 meters above sea level to 3,000 meters. Cities like Adwa and Axum are built on the fertile highlands, but a large part of the population lives in the mountains. We have heard that there are people who have fled to these more remote areas because of the violence.

Logistical challenges, late response

The efforts of our teams have been enormous at all levels—medical, financial, logistical, and human resources. It’s an incredible challenge without telephone or internet. At first there were no flights to Mekele and we had to move everything nearly 1,000 kilometers by road from the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. You couldn’t make money transfers because the banks were all closed. Yet we managed to start our operations.

Now other aid organizations are beginning to appear, little by little, in some areas. We still don’t know the real impact of this crisis, but we have to keep working to find out as soon as possible.

Other MSF teams are currently delivering medical care in different areas of central, south, and northwestern Tigray. MSF teams are also responding to the health needs of displaced people at the border of the Amhara region and in Sudan.

Exclusive: Ethiopia to seek debt relief under G20 debt framework – ministry

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NAIROBI (Reuters) – Ethiopia plans to seek a restructuring of its sovereign debt under a new G20 common framework and is looking at all the available options, the country’s finance ministry told Reuters on Friday.

Debt

Ethiopia Government Debt as a percent of GDP

Ethiopia’s government bonds saw their biggest ever daily fall on the news and analysts said restructuring concerns could spill over to hit other borrowers.

G20 nations agreed in November for the first time to a common approach for restructuring government debts to help ease the strain on some developing countries driven towards the risk of default by the costs of the coronavirus pandemic.

Chad became on Wednesday the first country to officially request a debt restructuring under the new framework and a French finance ministry told Reuters on Thursday that Zambia and Ethiopia were most likely to follow suit.

Asked if Ethiopia was looking to seek a debt restructuring under the G20 framework, Finance Ministry spokeswoman Semereta Sewasew said: “Yes, Ethiopia will look at all available debt treatment options under the G20 communique issued in November.”

Ethiopia’s government bond due for repayment in 2024, which it issued in late 2014, plunged 8.4 cents on the dollar from roughly par to just under 92 cents.

Ethiopia is already benefiting from a suspension of interest payments to its official sector creditors until the end of June under an initiative between the G20 and the Paris Club of creditor nations.

‘UNCERTAINTY’

Under the new G20 framework, debtor countries are expected to seek an IMF programme to get their economies back onto a firmer footing and negotiate a debt reduction from both public and private creditors.

Ethiopia has a $1 billion dollar bond outstanding, though only $66 million worth of interest payments on the issue are coming due this year.

The news that Ethiopia would seek debt relief left investors wondering whether they would be left to take a hit in the event of a restructuring.

“Given the G20 common framework has not been put to the test yet, we hope the G20 will come out with some sort of explanation as this uncertainty can hit the countries’ rating and spill over into other sub-Saharan African credits,” said Simon Quijano-Evans, chief economist at Gemcorp Capital LLP.

ING emerging market sovereign debt strategist Trieu Pham said the fact that Ethiopia has Eurobonds outstanding was a cause for concern as it could have broader implications.

“Should Ethiopia go this way then that could weigh on overall sentiment as people will wonder if there might be others (following),” he said.

Situation Report EEPA HORN No. 70 – 29 January 20

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Europe External Programme with Africa is a Belgium-based Centre of Expertise with in-depth knowledge, publications, and networks, specialised in issues of peace building, refugee protection and resilience in the Horn of Africa. EEPA has published extensively on issues related to movement and/or human trafficking of refugees in the Horn of Africa and on the Central Mediterranean Route. It cooperates with a wide network of Universities, research organisations, civil society and experts from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya, Djibouti, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Uganda and across Africa. Key in-depth publications can be accessed on the website.

Reported war situation (as confirmed per 28 January)

● Asmara is mobilising 200.000 fresh troops, assigned to travel from Eritrea to Tigray to fight, through both the Zalambesa & Rama border, for a “final offensive.” This ‘huge’ number “has been achieved by enlisting several categories of conscripts who might have previously been exempt. This includes women with very young children, retired soldiers and some children as young as 16.”

● It is reported that “the Eritrea plan is to finish off the Tigrayan resistance before international pressure forces the Ethiopian government to give access to Tigray for aid and reporters.”

● The Morning Star reports that a letter signed by a Prosperity Party representative, was leaked to them showing that Ethiopian government forces threatened to kill TPLF members if they refused to join the ruling Prosperity Party. Similar threats were made to journalist Dawit Kebede, just before he was shot.

● Human Rights Concern Eritrea (HRCE) received eye witness accounts of the killing of unarmed civilian refugees at the Eritrean refugee camp in Shimelba, Tigray. in Nov, two senior Eritrean military officers entered the camp and told refugees to return to Eritrea. The refugees refused, fearing for their lives.

● HRCE reports that subsequently eight Tigrayan civilians, suspected of supporting the TPLF, were brought into the camp and that they were executed in front of the refugees, to terrorise them. Four Eritrean refugees, from the Kunama tribe, were also killed by the Eritrean forces.

● As refugees were terrified by the executions, they were removed at gunpoint from the camp and marched to Sheraro, where they were loaded onto trucks and repatriated to Eritrea, states HRCE.

● HRCE reports that on the 23rd Nov armed militia started to shoot at refugees in the Hitsats Eritrean refugee camp in Tigray. Ten refugees died immediately; more than forty were wounded.

● On 5th Jan, Eritrean military forces ordered all refugees in the Hitsats camp to march on foot to Sheraro; pregnant women, children, elderly. There they were loaded on trucks and taken to Eritrea, states HRCE. The information was obtained from refugees who could escape and contacted HRCE.

● Shimelba and Hitsats camps are deserted and there have been fires, confirmed by satellite images.

● Eritrean troops allegedly killed more than 10 civilians in Idagahamus today.

● According to sources, Tigray forces killed more than 2000 ENDF allied forces at May Keyih area.

● Heavy fighting reported around Wukro and also in Tsigereda.

● A fourth video appears of civilians speaking about the atrocities and killing of civilians in Aksum on Nov 28-30th. In the video, some Eritrean soldiers deny the killing of civilians. One Eritrean soldier states that they were in Aksum and other towns and killed those suspected to be enemies.

● EriTV announced the death of senior Eritrean officer Colonel Girmay Gebreyesus.

Reported International situation (as confirmed per 28 January)

● The Stop Slavery in Eritrea Campaign issues a statement against forced conscription in Eritrea, demanding protection of Eritrean refugees in Tigray; demands that Eritrea suspends forced conscripts and suspends all war activity, withdraws Eritrean troops from foreign territory; and asks all Eritrean conscripts to “defy orders to attack innocent civilians.

● Stop Slavery states that the UN Security Council must reinstate sanctions on President Esayas Afwerki and PFDJ officials, stating: “This is Isaias’ war, the same Isaias Afwerki found guilty of crimes against humanity, using forced conscripts under the indefinite national slavery program to wage war on Tigray and commit horrendous crimes – gross human rights violations to which Eritreans have been subjected to for decades – and now he is also allegedly unleashing on civilians in Tigray with impunity.”

● Stop Slavery states: “that many of the forced Eritrean conscripts are underaged girls and boys.”

● Stop Slavery demands an independent investigation in war crimes committed and that Eritrean and Ethiopian forces found guilty of war crimes to be taken to the International Criminal Court.

● Stop Slavery expresses deep concern “about reports of Eritrean refugees forcibly returned to Eritrea by the brutal regime they fled from.” The campaign urges UNHCR “to protect Eritrean refugees.”

● Stop Slavery states that it is inspired by Somali mothers demanding the return of their children, secretly recruited for the war in Tigray: “We are inspired by the courageous Somali mothers demanding the return of their children that have joined the war in Tigray.”

● Reuters has reported that Eritrea has secretly been recruiting Somali men and sending them to fight in TIgray. According to people interviewed, young men were recruited by the Somali Federal Government to work in Qatar, but instead were sent to Eritrea to serve in the military against their will.

● The young men were not told. One called home in November and said: “We were all shocked to land in Eritrea.” and “I have not seen food save a lump or slice of bread since I left Somalia in 2019.”

● Human Rights Concern Eritrea (HRCE) states that Eritrean military forces “consists mostly of young conscripts who have been forced to fight in Tigray against their will.”

● HRCE states that the UN Commission of Inquiry into Human Rights in Eritrea found “evidence of Crimes against Humanity” being committed in Eritrea and that Crimes against Humanity have been committed in Tigray. HRCE calls on the International Criminal Court to investigate these crimes immediately.

● Protests by Somali mothers asking where their children are, in Mogadishu, Guriel, and Galkayo.

● Somalia has admitted that it sent young recruits for training to Eritrea, according to Garowe online.

● The United States demanded that Eritrea leave Tigray immediately. The US calls for an independent and transparent investigation into the abuses in the region. The US Senate Foreign Affairs committee discussed the conflict in the Horn and Sudan.

● In Washington protest held demanding Eritrea leaves Tigray by Tigray and Eritrean protesters.

● In a new statement, UNICEF has said that 10% of the children below five are showing signs of severe malnutrition. This is above the WHO 3% emergency threshold.

● The Washington Post published an opinion asking whether PM Abiy is committing war crimes. The Post points to the many atrocities committed by Eritrean troops in the region. No action has been taken by the Abiy government despite many reports coming out of the region of massacres, rapes and looting.

● The Washington Post states that PM Abiy has been accused of blocking food deliveries to the region, even as soldiers were burning crops and stealing cattle. International officials have warned that millions are at risk of starvation; the Tigray interim government stated that people had died of famine.

● U.N. officials say about 80 aid workers are waiting in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, for permission to travel to Tigray.

● Joint NGO Letter calls for a Special Session on the deteriorating human rights situation in Ethiopia.

Disclaimer:
All information in this situation report is presented as a fluid update report, as to the best knowledge and understanding of the authors at the moment of publication. EEPA does not claim that the information is correct but verifies to the best of ability within the circumstances. Publication is weighed on the basis of interest to understand potential impacts of events (or perceptions of these) on the situation. Check all information against updates and other media. EEPA does not take responsibility for the use of the information or impact thereof. All information reported originates from third parties and the content of all reported and linked information remains the sole responsibility of these third parties. Report to info@eepa.be any additional information and corrections.

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