A Humanitarian Crisis Engulfed with War Crimes & Crimes Against Humanity
Almost a year of civil war has left the northern part of Ethiopia, Tigray region, in a humanitarian crisis that is still unfolding. A quick look at the numbers will be more than sufficient to ground us in the reality of the situation. According to the UN, at least 400,000 people are facing famine, 80% of essential medications aren’t available and more than two million people have been forced from their homes to either be internally displaced or even cross borders to neighboring countries. This crisis is deliberately caused by the federal government by preventing aid from reaching Tigray. Of course, the government is denying, but it is becoming more and more evident that it is using food and other supply lines as a weapon. In addition to this humanitarian crisis, there are many evidences of what amounts to war crimes and crimes against humanity. There are documented accounts of unlawful killings, torture and sexual violence and rape committed by both sides (Tigray People’s Liberation Front and the federal government), according to a joint investigation by the UN and the country’s human rights commission.
This investigation is the most comprehensive report yet into the conflict, and while the report says that both sides were involved in war crimes, it also says that “the majority of the violations” documented between November 2020 and June 2021 – the initial phases of the conflict –were committed by Ethiopian army.
Beginnings of a Genocide?
The very most basic and universally accepted definition of genocide is the systematic killing of a group of people based on their ethnic identity. While some mix it with ethnic cleansing, the two terms are just so different, and not in terms of scale, rather they are qualitatively different. Ethnic cleansing is the systematic deportation or forcible displacement of a particular ethnic group, and not killing. Moreover, the mixing isn’t a coincidence it is rather politically motivated by the international governance as the tendency is to always to label situations as ‘ethnic cleansing’ to avoid being under the obligation to mobilize resources and act on the ‘responsibility to protect’ principle of the international humanitarian law in case it’s a genocide.
In Tigray, the situation is very quickly resembling that of genocidal violence, albeit in its very beginnings. Thousands of civilian Ethiopians belonging to the Tigrayan ethnic group who are suspected of supporting the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) have been arrested by the government. Also, many Tigrayan-owned shops closed down in Addis Ababa in fear of killings or arrests. Most alarmingly, many arrests in Addis Ababa were the result of “tips” from other members of the community. Now, this is a marker hallmark of how genocides start. This ethnically motivated persecution comes amid a significant rise in online hate speech. Government-allied journalists and politicians are currently using social media platforms, mainly Facebook and Twitter, to call ethnic Tigrayans “traitors”, and demand the authorities to place them in “concentration camps”. Moreover, some Tigrayans are staying with non-Tigrayan friends to evade arrest, and others said they had stopped speaking the Tigrinya language in public spaces.
As reality is swiftly moving in the direction of a genocide, the Ethiopian government communication office said that the arrests were not based on the ethnic identities of individuals, but on their roles in undermining the federal government control.
What is the Origin of the War?
At the root of the war is a classic and text-book case of a power struggle between Prime Minister Abiy and the (TPLF) which for almost 27 years dominated the whole country, not just Tigray. Their rule was against the wish of the Oromos – Ethiopia’s largest group. Mr. Abiy, himself an Oromo, came to power in 2018 on the back of a wave of protests by members of the Oromo ethnic group. Shortly after, the (TPLF) was sidelined and the simmering dispute between the (TPLF) and Mr Abiy erupted into war when Tigrayan forces were accused of attacking army bases to steal weapons and the federal government responded by waging a brutal military campaign in Tigray and imposing a humanitarian blockade of the region that has most of inhabitants facing famine. The official Ethiopian narrative is based on the claim that the (TPLF) are seeking to advance on the capital to force the prime minister to step down, while the (TPLF) has said that it just wants to enable aid supplies to get to Tigray.
Why this isn’t Catching Enough International Attention?
There are concerns that if violence increases millions of people will be forced to flee to neighbor countries and these already in trouble countries would find it difficult to cope. Ethiopia borders six countries, three of which are already experiencing some sort of turbulence or conflict – South Sudan, Somalia and Sudan. Chances are high that such development will in fact cause widespread instability in the very vital horn of Africa. Despite the high stakes, we are seeing a relatively reluctant west to intervene beyond voicing concerns and worries. The only concrete step was when Biden administration suspended Ethiopia from duty-free access to the U.S. market and imposed sanctions on Eretria, the Ethiopian government’s military former foe and current ally. The question that begs an answer is why the US isn’t going soft on Ethiopia. Well, the answer is straight and short. It is because Ethiopia is a very strategic asset for the US in its so-called war on terror, and this value is especially relevant now as the US is relatively dis-engaging from the MEA and prioritizing China on its agenda. Ethiopia fought against Islamist militants in Somalia on the frontline of that conflict, gave the US access to its airspace during the Iraq war. That’s why the US has backed it up financially by $4.2bn in aid between 2016 and 2020.
What’s the Outlook?
Firstly, the US is getting angrier, and there is a roughening of tone. The US envoy to the region, Jeffrey Feltman, has recently criticized the federal government saying that its policies have resulted in mass starvation (without mentioning the in the same sentence the (TPLF), and even compared it to the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. Secondly, few weeks ago Mr Abiy imposed the state of emergency and urged civilians to take up arms to defend the nation. This means that there will be an unimaginable uptake in violence. Suffice it to say that the report mentioned previously was before the emergency state was announced. Thirdly, probably there will be lots of debate around Mr. prime minister retaining his Nobel peace pize. Honestly, it will be just so bizarre to speak of a Nobel prize laureate with a record of war crimes.
