120,000 Raped in Tigray War, Survivors Speak Out

Survivors of the Tigray war in Ethiopia have bravely spoken out on the systematic violence perpetrated against civilians by both sides in the conflict, alleging harrowing accounts of gang-rape, torture and mutilation during and after the fighting.

Tseday, a mother-of-two who had been living in the Oromia region with her husband when the war broke out, told French newspaper Le Monde that she was stopped and raped by 'soldiers from the federal army' as they fled into exile in the months following the ceasefire.

'They raped me first, then my two-year-old daughter. After that, they killed my husband and cut up his body in front of us. They forced us to watch,' she recounted in a harrowing testimony published on Wednesday.

Nigist, a 17-year-old, told the outlet that 'armed men', of no stated affiliation, found her during an invasion of her village in the Kafta Humera area of western Tigray at some point before June 2023.

'They told us to undress, but I resisted,' she recalled. 'That's when they started hitting me, tearing off my clothes. I was raped by several of them. Then I fainted.'

Birhan Gebrekristos, an author on the subject, told Le Monde that testimonies from the war described acts of torture including the insertion of sharp objects, screws or pieces of metal into women's wombs.

Eritrean soldiers allegedly stuck needles into the womb of one pregnant woman, forcing an abortion, he said. Her child did not survive, and she later contracted a fatal infection as a result.

Rights groups have documented horrifying accounts of abuse allegedly perpetrated by both allied Ethiopian and Eritrean forces, and the Tigray People's Liberation Front.

Nearly 120,000, or one in ten, women and girls were victims of sexual violence during the conflict, according to Tigrayan regional authorities.

The conflict in northern Ethiopia broke out in 2020 after the Tigray regional government rejected the authority of the federal government to postpone an election.

In November 2020, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed sent troops into the northern region of Tigray, accusing its governing party, the TPLF, of mounting surprise attacks against military bases in the area. The TPLF denied responsibility. Journalists were barred from entering the region, challenging efforts to verify claims.

In February 2021, Amnesty International reported that Eritrean soldiers had killed 'hundreds of civilians' in the city of Axum, Tigray, in November. Reports of mass atrocities began to emerge, with Eritrean forces accused of massacres and systematic rape. The U.S. said violence in Western Tigray was tantamount to 'ethnic cleansing'.

A regional official alleged in April 2021 that Eritrean soldiers were holding Tigrayan women as sex slaves amid a wave of reported gang rapes - an accusation roundly denied by Eritrea.

Tigrayan forces advanced on neighbouring regions the following June and committed atrocities, including extrajudicial killings and sexual violence. Ethiopian government forces were also accused of widespread and systematic atrocities.

A formal peace was agreed on November 2, 2022, but monitoring rights groups continued to report on forcible expulsions of Tigrayans as part of what they called an ethnic cleansing campaign.

Survivors of the conflict, speaking to Le Monde, described alleged abuses by military forces months after the war ended.

Nigist said she had been on the road for 'months' before reaching a Hiwyet (healing) centre in June 2023. She had fled her village in eastern Tigray when armed men invaded, hiding in a small wood with other young girls.

She said she was made to undress and raped by 'several of them' before fainting. She later fled to Mekele, the capital of the Tigray region, before learning of the centre for women who were victims of sexual violence during the war.

Le Monde's moving reporting on the aftermath found that many victims have found no support from the authorities in Ethiopia or Eritrea since the war ended.

Meseret Hadush, the founder of the Hiwyet Charity Association (HCA) told The Reporter Ethiopia earlier this year that 'over the past two years, we have reached nearly six thousand mothers, providing them with essential first aid and psychological treatment'.

The organisation has not received funding from governmental bodies, she said, and relies largely on diaspora donations.

She said that the end of the war had not brought about the end of sexual violence in the region, with widespread 'hardship' perpetuating the abuse of victims.

'I still feel like a sense of siege persists, marked by widespread unemployment, a struggling economy, shortages of essential medicines, and visible food scarcity. Although the active combat in Tigray has ceased, the effects of the war still persist.'

She observed that female victims are still often burdened by social stigma, and the issue is often concealed 'in an effort to preserve family reputation and honour'.

'Many survivors have lost their marriages, particularly those who became pregnant as a result of sexual violence,' she said.

Tseday, who has been seeking help as a survivor of sexual violence, recalled to Le Monde how she fled the Oromia region with her husband when the war broke out.

'As Tigrayans, it was impossible to keep living there,' she explained.

The mother-of-two left with her family in June 2023 and journeyed into the Afar region before being stopped by 'soldiers from the federal army'.

She said that she and her two-year-old daughter were raped before soldiers 'forced us to watch' them kill and 'cut up' her husband.

They were taken to a 'cell' near the town of Samara where she said they stayed for a year. Every day, she said, a soldier abused her until the Tigrayan army liberated them.

Human Rights Watch reported in June 2023 that they had spoken to 35 people between September 2022 and April 2023 who alleged more than 1,000 Tigrayans had been held in detention across several towns on the basis of their identity before being expelled.

One 28-year-old who was detained in Bet Hintset prison in Humera said that there was 'no medical treatment' at their unofficial detention site. 'If people got sick, they remained there until they die.'

'Many' displaced people told Human Rights Watch after the conflict ended that they did not feel safe to return so long as abusive officials and security forces remained. In October 2022, nearing the end of the conflict, the UN refugee agency had registered 47,000 Ethiopian refugees in eastern Sudan.

More than two million people were forced to flee their homes over the course of the conflict. Civilian structures in Tigray, including hospitals and schools, were shelled, looted and destroyed by Ethopian federal forces and regional militias, and by Eritrean armed forces.

The war broke out in November 2020 after Ethiopian prime minister Abiy Ahmed sent troops to the Tigray Region, accusing the regional Tigray government, the TPLF, of attacking federal army camps in Tigray.

The TPLF denied responsibility and said the reported attack was pretext for an 'invasion'.

The TPLF was incensed that Ahmed had postponed a regional election set for August 2020. Ahmed cited the pandemic. Ahmed responded by restricting federal funding to Tigray, inflaming tensions.

Ethiopia had only recently emerged from a decades-long war with neighbouring Eritrea. Before its independence, Ethiopia's northern neighbour had been friendly to the TPLF, together overthrowing the despotic Mengistu regime in the late 1980s.

But the 2020-2022 war saw Eritrea and Ethiopia attack Tigray from the north and south respectively, squeezing the civilian population. Ahmed only acknowledged Eritrean soldiers had entered Tigray in March 2021, after months of denials.

Abiy Ahmed was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 after settling the long-standing territorial dispute with Eritrea. He ran on a platform of peace and reconciliation, and faced wide criticism over the conflict in Tigray.

Journalist Lucy Kassa claimed to have been threatened by the federal government over stories investigating alleged abuses by government forces.