NEW YORK (US) – The United Nations said on Thursday it is “now abundantly clear to all” that Eritrean troops are functioning throughout Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region and “well-corroborated”, as reports suggested that they are responsible for atrocities.
“Eritrean Defence Forces must leave Ethiopia, and they must not be enabled or permitted to continue their campaign of destruction before they do so,” UN aid chief Mark Lowcock told the UN Security Council according to remarks.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also called on Eritrean troops to withdraw from Tigray, spokesman Stephane Dujarric said on Thursday.
Both the Ethiopian and Eritrean governments have refuted that Eritrean troops are in Tigray, in spite of having dozens of eyewitness accounts and admissions reinforcing Eritreans are there from Tigray’s federally-appointed regional administration.
Lowcock said, “It is now abundantly clear to all, and openly acknowledged by officials of the government administration in Tigray, that Eritrean Defence Forces are operating throughout Tigray. Countless well-corroborated reports suggest their culpability for atrocities.”
Lowcock was seen briefing the 15-member Security Council, US Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said the humanitarian and human rights situation in Ethiopia has alarmed Washington.
While referring to troops from Ethiopia’s Amhara region is a neighbour of Tigray, she said, “We urged the Ethiopian government to support an immediate end to the fighting in Tigray, and to that end the prompt withdrawal of Eritrean forces and Amhara regional forces from Tigray are essential steps.”
The UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet asked Ethiopia on Thursday to give approval for monitors into Tigray, which in turn will investigate reports of killings and sexual violence. It had exposed the world to an appalling number of war crimes in the northern region since late 2020.
Lowcock told the council, “Multiple credible and widely corroborated reports from Tigray … speak of widespread atrocities, involving mass killings, rapes and abductions of civilians. In one widely reported and heavily corroborated incident, Eritrean soldiers are alleged to have deliberately killed worshippers inside a historic Christian church in Axum.”
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed had given order for strikes and a ground offensive against Tigray’s former ruling party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), after regional forces levelled their attack on federal army bases in the region on November 4.
Though the TPLF has withdrawn from the regional capital, Mekelle, and major cities, low-level fighting seems to have continued ever since.
