Ethiopia issued an incensed and lengthy statement on Tuesday condemning the U.S. State Department for determining that it had committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during its recent civil war.
The Ethiopian Foreign Affairs Ministry declared the State Department’s declaration “inflammatory,” “unilateral and adversarial,” noting that Blinken had just visited the country last week and indicated that Washington sought cooperation with a government it now branded a war criminal. Addis Ababa also complained that the declaration undermined the “hope” that Blinken’s visit last week had brought for a resolution to the conflict.
The Ethiopian government complained that the State Department declaration “unfairly apportions blame among different parties in the conflict” by accusing Ethiopian troops of crimes in a way that it deemed more severe than the accusations towards the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), a Marxist political party and the other major party in the civil war.
People walk from a rural area towards a nearby town where a food distribution operated by the Relief Society of Tigray was taking place, near the town of Agula, in the Tigray region of northern Ethiopia on May 8, 2021. Ethiopia’s lead negotiator in ongoing peace talks asserted Friday, Nov. 11, 2022 that 70% of the Tigray region is now under military control and aid deliveries have resumed to the area, but there is no immediate confirmation from aid workers or Tigray spokesmen. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis, File)
The outrage appears to erode the goal that Blinken laid out during his time in Ethiopia last week of all sides to admit their “atrocities and their devastating consequences” in the civil war. Blinken underlined the point with an apparent apology that Washington had been “insufficiently vocal about” decades of human rights abuses in the country.
The Ethiopian Civil War began in November 2022 when TPLF forces attacked Ethiopian military positions. In response, the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, effectively blockaded the entire civilian population of the northern region of Tigray, depriving residents of food and basic medicines and earning global accusations of ethnic cleansing. Outside of Tigray, TPLF forces were accused of a variety of human rights atrocities, including the mass rape of civilians.
The Tigray people are a minority ethnic group who live in the northern Tigray region; while a minority, the TPLF dominated national politics for years before Abiy, an ethnic Oromo, rose to power.
The conflict has largely concluded, with some minor hostilities still raging, after the signing of a peace deal in November 2022.
“After careful review of the law and the facts, I have determined that members of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces (ENDF), Eritrean Defense Forces (EDF), Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) forces, and Amhara forces committed war crimes during the conflict in northern Ethiopia,” Blinken said in remarks to the press on Monday. “Members of the ENDF, EDF, and Amhara forces also committed crimes against humanity, including murder, rape and other forms of sexual violence, and persecution.”
“Formally recognizing the atrocities committed by all parties is an essential step to achieving a sustainable peace. Those most responsible for atrocities, including those in positions of command, must be held accountable,” Blinken asserted.
Ethiopians protest against what they say is interference by outsiders in the country’s internal affairs and against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the party of Tigray’s fugitive leaders, at a rally organized by the city administration in the capital Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Saturday, Oct. 22, 2022. The demonstrations were staged ahead of the expected start of peace talks in South Africa next week between the warring parties, with the U.S. saying Friday it supports the African Union’s efforts to mediate talks to stop fighting in Tigray. Writing in Amharic on placard reads “You suffer in the hands of the enemy for me.” (AP Photo)
In the State Department’s annual global human rights report for 2022, released this week, the U.S. government accused Ethiopia of a litany of human rights atrocities:
Significant human rights issues included credible reports of: unlawful or arbitrary killings, including extrajudicial killings by the government; enforced disappearance by the government; torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment by the government; harsh and life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrary arrest and detention; political prisoners or detainees; serious abuses in a conflict, including unlawful or widespread civilian harm; unlawful recruitment or use of child soldiers by government forces and militia groups; serious restrictions on freedom of expression, including violence or threats of violence against journalists, unjustified arrests of journalists, censorship, and the existence of criminal libel and slander laws; serious restrictions on internet freedom; interference with the freedom of peaceful assembly; government corruption; lack of investigation of and accountability for gender-based violence including rape and conflict-related sexual violence; trafficking in persons; crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting members of racial or ethnic minority groups; and existence or use of laws criminalizing same-sex sexual conduct.
“There were reports of killings of civilians, rape, and other forms of gender-based violence, forced displacement, and looting and destruction of property by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, Amhara regional militias, and other armed groups,” the report additionally noted.
The Ethiopian Foreign Affairs Ministry issued its response on Tuesday, which began by dismissing the State Department report for not containing “new findings” – as a review of the events of 2022, it is not supposed to – but later condemned Washington and Blinken for allegedly condemning the government more than the TPLF.
“The Government of Ethiopia does not accept the blanket condemnations contained in the statement and does not see any value in such a unilateral and adversarial approach,” the statement read. “The statement is selective as it unfairly apportions blame among different parties in the conflict.”
“For no apparent reason, the statement appears to exonerate one party from certain allegations of human rights violations such as rape and other forms of sexual violence despite the clear and overwhelming evidence about its culpability,” it continued. “The U.S. statement is inflammatory. Whatever the intentions of the U.S. State Department, this statement will be used to advance highly polarized campaigns pitting one community against others in the country.”
“The visit of the U.S. Secretary of State gave hope that the two countries are poised to mend their bilateral relations,” it concluded. “The Government of Ethiopia hopes that despite the U.S.’s statement, the frank discussions held and understanding reached during the Secretary of State’s visit to Ethiopia will help restore the strategic relations between Ethiopia and the United States.”
The statement did not address the fact that Blinken had accused TPLF and other militias of crimes against humanity alongside the government. It also did not address the fact that Blinken had also appeared to take some blame for the conflict for the United States during his visit last week.
“For our part, the United States acknowledges the human rights violations and repression committed during the past three decades – actions which sowed the seeds of future conflict,” Blinken said at the time. “We and others were insufficiently vocal about those abuses in the past.”