Ethnic targeting turns deadly in Ethiopia
NAIROBI, Kenya — Ethnic Amharas killed. Ethnic Tigrayans arrested, in hiding or cut off from the world. Ethiopia’s deadly conflict is spilling beyond its northern Tigray region and turning identity into a mortal threat.
A report that scores, perhaps hundreds, of civilians were “hacked to death” in the streets of a single town on Monday night has sent already dangerous tensions soaring. Amnesty International confirmed the killings via images and witnesses, and the United Nations warns of possible war crimes. Most of the dead were ethnic Amharas, according to a man who helped clear the bodies away and looked at identity cards.
“The killing reflects the ongoing ethnic divisions in the country,” Amnesty researcher Fisseha Tekle said.
While the Amnesty report late Thursday said it had not confirmed who carried out the killings, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed is blaming the massacre on forces loyal to the Tigray region’s government, which his administration regards as illegal after a months-long falling-out. The federal government seeks to arrest and replace its leaders.
Abiy, last year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner, accuses the regional government of “unceasing hate and fear propaganda.” On Friday, speaking in the Tigrinya language, he urged its forces to surrender “in the next two to three days.”
The allegations, combined with the severing of communications with the Tigray region and growing reports of targeting of ethnic Tigrayans, are raising widespread alarm as Abiy rejects calls for dialogue and de-escalation and the United Nations says more than14,000 “exhausted and scared” refugees have fled the Tigray region to Sudan.
The U.N. office on genocide prevention in a sharply worded statement has condemned reports of “targeted attacks against civilians based on their ethnicity or religion” in Ethiopia, including hate speech and incitement to violence. It warned that ethnic violence in Ethiopia “has reached an alarming level over the past two years,” and the new rhetoric sets a “dangerous trajectory that heightens the risk of genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.”
The Tigray region’s communication and transport links remain almost completely cut off, making it difficult to verify each side’s allegations. The federal government has warned journalists about reporting events “properly,” and human rights and media rights groups have expressed alarm about the arrests of journalists.
Fears have spread in the Ethiopian diaspora. From his home in Belgium, university researcher Mekonnen Gebreslasie Gebrehiwot described his attempts to speak with family members in Addis Ababa and reach his mother and others in the Tigray region.
“They don’t want to pick their phones up,” he said of his relatives in the capital. “I try to talk to them about the situation, they think their phones are being monitored. They say, ‘We are fine, we are fine, call us later,’” and then message him separately, saying they are scared.
“I’m really afraid this might lead to ethnic attacks on Tigrayans,” said Mekonnen, who leads an association of ethnic Tigrayans. “It’s really frightening.”