Ethiopia said on Monday that the "
vast majority
" of those killed in the Axum massacre at the end of November in the Tigray region (North) were combatants and not civilians, contradicting several independent reports to this effect. .
Read also: Dam on the Nile: Ethiopia's flagship project worries its neighbors
The authorities have presented their first official findings on the massacre in which, according to Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, Eritrean soldiers killed hundreds of people, mostly civilians. In this sense, the Aksum massacre is one of the worst atrocities recorded during the war in Tigray, a region in the north of the country which has been plagued by war for six months. Amnesty claimed that the Eritreans "
went on a rampage and methodically killed hundreds of civilians in cold blood
".
But at a press conference on Monday, Deputy Attorney General Fikadu Tsega said the Eritreans have killed 93 people in "
intense fighting
" against forces loyal to the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF). who until recently ruled the region. "
It has been established that the vast majority of those killed in said incident, although they were not in uniform, were members of the TPLF forces which were fighting the Eritrean forces
" and the Ethiopian army, said Fikadu Tsega. .
More than 1,500 young inhabitants of Aksum, a city classified as World Heritage by Unesco, received training in the handling of weapons from the TPLF in the days leading up to the incident in order to “
carry out urban battles
”, a- he added. The fighting began after pro-TPLF forces "
attacked Eritrean soldiers who had settled in the mountainous part of town,
" he said.
Fikadu Tsega's claim that most of the victims were combatants also appears to contradict findings released in late March by the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC), an independent body.
According to the EHRC, "
more than a hundred
" civilians died in Axum and Eritrean soldiers there, according to witnesses, executed unarmed residents in front of their families.
Rapes
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed launched on November 4, 2020 a military operation against the Tigray authorities, from the TPLF, whom he accuses of having attacked two federal army bases in the region.
Read also: Ethiopia: the head of the interim government of Tigray replaced
Abiy Ahmed had promised that the fighting would be short, but it continues and many voices have been raised to alarm over the humanitarian situation in Tigray. After months of denial, the government acknowledged the presence there, alongside the army, of Eritrean troops and then appeared to admit that they were involved in atrocities - which Asmara denies.
Fikadu Tsega also said that his team was also investigating rapes in Tigray, for which 116 testimonies from victims were collected.
Ethiopian police officers and soldiers are "
implicated in these crimes,
" he added.
However, “
tens of thousands of notorious criminals
” were released at the start of the conflict, some of whom donned Ethiopian or Eritrean uniforms, making it “
extremely difficult
” to identify the culprits.
Several investigations are "
still ongoing,
" he also said.
On Monday, Fikadu Tsega said Ethiopia would be able to investigate and prosecute any crime committed by Eritreans on its soil.
