While the world's attention is upon the war crimes of Russia being committed in Ukraine, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said Tigrayans in Ethiopia are facing a relentless campaign of ethnic cleansing. The report specifically mentioned the local authorities in Amhara region as the main force driving the alleged ethnic cleansing campaign in the Western Tigray region. Some Eritrean forces are also involved in the targeted arrests of the Tigrayan civilians.
Tigrayan civilians in the disputed Western Tigray Zone of the country are allegedly being killed and subjected to various forms of sexual violence and abuses, including rape. Some of these Tigrayans also faced mass detentions and forcible movements, a campaign that — along with the other reported abuses mentioned — "amounts to war crimes and crimes against humanity," said the rights groups in a statement. Newly-appointed officials in Western Tigray and the security forces from the neighboring Amhara region had some support and possible collaborations from the Ethiopian federal forces to carry out the alleged atrocities.
In several towns across Western Tigray, signs were displayed ordering Tigrayans to leave, and locally appointed administrators discussed at open meetings how to remove Tigrayans. The report quoted a Tigrayan woman from Baeker town describing how members of Fanos, an irregular Amhara militia "kept saying every night, 'We will kill you… Go out of the area'." Another Tigrayan woman told researchers that while she was being gang-raped by men, a militia member told her: "You Tigrayans should disappear from the land west of [the Tekeze River]. You are evil and we are purifying your blood."
Amhara militia have also been arresting local residents of the town of Adi Goshu for detention. Members of the Amhara Special Forces are detailed in the report as having rounded up and summarily executed about 60 Tigrayan men by the Tekeze River.
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