Sexual violence in the Tigray war

"[8] In April 2021, Mark Lowcock, the head of OCHA, told the United Nations Security Council that "sexual violence is being used as a weapon of war in Ethiopia's Tigray region, where girls as young as eight are being targeted and some women have reported being gang-raped over several days.

"[14] In November 2021, The Globe and Mail reported that evidence gathered suggests that the Tigray Defense Forces (TDF) were using rape as a weapon of war during its occupation of the Amhara Region.

"[9] In March 2022, the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission published a report stating that the TDF committed widespread and systematic acts of sexual violence against women and girls in the Afar and Amhara regions.

[15] In September 2022, the International Commission of Human Rights Experts on Ethiopia published a report stating that sexual violence has been perpetrated "on a staggering scale" since the onset of the hostilities in November 2020.

[2] On 23 January, Reuters published an interview with a Tigrayan refugee who claimed that she had been raped at gunpoint by a soldier dressed in an ENDF uniform who stated that a condom was unnecessary.

Aid workers and doctors described multiple reports of rape by Amhara and EDF security forces in towns including Rawyan, Wukro, Adigrat and Mekelle.

[21] On 15 February, BBC News reported a doctor and a women's rights activist together having registered 200 girls under the age of 18 testifying as rape victims at Mekelle health centres and hospitals.

An 18-year old schoolgirl interviewed by BBC News described how she had survived a rape attempt, but the assaulter shot her hand three times, forcing a doctor to amputate it when she later arrived at a hospital in Mekelle.

[22] Individual incidents reported in early March include a 15-year-old raped by the ENDF in Shire in front of forced witnesses including her brother; a woman in Kerseber (north of Adigrat) who was gang-raped twice and unable to walk when she arrived at a hospital; women in the outer parts of Mekelle were kidnapped for several weeks by soldiers, serving as forced domestic workers and sex slaves; a woman in outer Mekelle was raped nightly by the ENDF for a week before obtaining medical treatment.

One of the six women stated to Channel 4 that the Eritrean soldiers joked, took photos, "injected her with a drug, tied her to a rock, stripped, stabbed and [repeatedly raped] her."

[9] In late March 2021, the total number of rapes recorded for the Tigray War at five medical facilities in Mekelle, Adigrat, Wukro, Shire and Aksum was 512–516.

[26] In July 2021, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) estimated that 26,000 women in the 15–49 years age range would need services for sexual and gender based violence in the Tigray War.

[5] According to the International Commission of Human Rights Experts on Ethiopia, the number of Tigrayan victims of sexual violence could be much higher than the reported figure of "more than 1,000 women and girls.

[27] A task force from MoWCY, together with the Attorney General Adanech Abebe and defence personnel, was set up to investigate sexual violence in the Tigray War.