Conflict in Tigray: hyenas rummaging through the bodies of victims in the holy city of Axum?

The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission says it is investigating the reports. The conflict began on November 4, 2020, when the Ethiopian government launched an offensive to overthrow the ruling Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TBLF) party in the region after its fighters seized federal military bases in Tigray.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, told parliament on November 30 that “no civilians were killed” during the operation.

But eyewitnesses described how, that day, they began to bury some of the bodies of unarmed civilians who were killed by Eritrean soldiers, many of them boys and men who were shot in the streets or during house-to-house raids in the area.

The Amnesty report contains high-resolution satellite images taken since December 13, showing uneven terrain, corresponding to recently excavated tombs in two churches in Axum, an ancient city considered sacred by Orthodox Christians in Ethiopia.

A communications blackout and restricted access to Tigray have delayed reports of what happened in the conflict.

It was reported that the electrical and telephone networks had stopped working in Axum from the first day of the outbreak of the conflict.

The shelling by Ethiopian and Eritrean forces began in West Axum on Thursday, November 19, according to city residents.

A government employee in Axum told the BBC: “This attack continued for 5 hours without stopping. Those in churches, cafes, hotels and homes were killed. This was not a response to any armed forces in the city, as they literally attack civilian targets. “

Amnesty International collected several similar testimonies describing the continued bombardment of civilians that night.

Once they took control of the city, Amnesty International said, the soldiers, generally identified as Eritreans, searched for TPLF soldiers and militias or “anyone with a weapon”.

“There were a lot of house-to-house killings,” one woman told Amnesty International.

Amnesty International’s Debrose Muchina says there is overwhelming evidence that Ethiopian and Eritrean forces committed “numerous war crimes in their drive to control Axum”.

In the following week, testimonies indicated that the Ethiopian forces were mainly in Axum, while the Eritreans moved to the east of the city of Adwa.

A witness described to the BBC how the Ethiopian army looted banks in the city at the time.

According to the Amnesty report, Eritrean forces returned after a week and clashes broke out on Sunday 28 November following an attack by poorly armed fighters loyal to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front.

That morning, between 50 and 80 men from Axum attacked an Eritrean outpost on a hill overlooking the city.

A 26-year-old man who participated in the attack told Amnesty International: “We wanted to protect our city, so we tried to defend it, especially from the Eritrean soldiers. They knew how to shoot and had communication devices.”

It is unclear how long the fighting lasted, but that afternoon there was an incursion of Eritrean trucks and tanks into Axum, reports Amnesty.

Witnesses said Eritrean soldiers went on a rampage and opened fire on unarmed civilians and children in the streets, and that continued into the evening.

A young man in his 20s told Amnesty International about the killings on the city’s main street: “I was on the second floor of a building and I saw through the window that Eritreans were killing young people in the street.”

The soldiers, who were identified as Eritrean, not only because of their uniforms and vehicle license plates, but also because of the languages ​​they spoke (Arabic and the Eritrean dialect of Tigrinya), began house-to-house searches.

One young man told the BBC: “It was retaliation. They killed all the men they found. If you open the door and they find a man, they kill him, and if you don’t open it, they shoot the door profusely.”

The young man was hiding in a nightclub and saw a man who was found and killed by Eritrean soldiers, begging for his life, and told them: “I am a civilian, I am a banker.”

Another man told Amnesty International that he saw six men killed in front of his house near the Abnit hotel the next day, 29 November.

And he added: “They were ordered to line up and shoot them in the back. I know two of them, they are from the neighborhood where I live. They asked them where their weapons were and they replied: We have no weapons, we are civilians.”

Witnesses say Eritrean soldiers initially did not allow anyone to approach the bodies in the streets and would shoot anyone who did.

One woman, whose two sons, aged 29 and 14, died, said the roads “were littered with corpses.”

Amnesty says that after the intervention of the Ethiopian sheiks and soldiers, the burials began over a period of several days, with most of the funerals taking place on November 30, after people brought the bodies to the churches, already Often 10 bodies were loaded into carts drawn by horses or donkeys.

At the Abnett Hotel, an employee who spoke to the BBC said that some of the bodies had remained in place and had not been removed for four days.

He added: “The bodies that lay around the Abenet Hotel and the Seattle cinema were eaten by hyenas. We only found bones and buried bones, and I can say that about 800 civilians died in Axum.”

This account was repeated by a church deacon who said that hyenas devoured many corpses.

He collected the identity cards of the victims and assisted with mass grave burials and around 800 people are also believed to have died that weekend.

The 41 survivors and witnesses interviewed by Amnesty International provided the names of more than 200 people they knew who had been killed in these events.

Eyewitnesses say Eritrean soldiers participated in the looting operations that continued after the massacre, as many people fled the city.

The university, private homes, hotels, hospitals, grain warehouses, garages, banks, shops, supermarkets and bakeries have been targeted.

A young man described to Amnesty International how Ethiopian soldiers had failed to prevent Eritreans from looting his brother’s home.

He said: “They took the television, a four-wheel drive car, a refrigerator, six mattresses, all the food, cooking oil, butter, flour, kitchen cabinets, clothes, beer that was in the refrigerator, a bomb of water and a laptop. “

The young man who spoke to the BBC said he learned of the theft of 15 cars belonging to businessmen in the city.

Amnesty says this has had a devastating effect on those who remained in Axum, with little food and medicine to survive.

Witnesses say the theft of water pumps forced residents to drink water from the river.

It is said to be the birthplace of the Biblical Queen of Sheba, who traveled to Jerusalem to visit King Solomon.

They had a son, Menelik I, who is said to have brought the ark of the covenant to Axum, and the ark of the covenant is believed to contain the Ten Commandments that God sent to Moses.

The Ark of the Covenant is constantly kept in the Church of Our Lady Mary, Mount Zion in Medina, and no one can see it.

Typically, a large religious ceremony is held at the church on November 30 each year, attracting visitors from all over Ethiopia and the world, but the celebration was canceled last year due to the conflict that plagued the region.

A government employee told the BBC that Eritrean forces arrived at the church on December 3 to “terrorize the priests and force them to give them the gold and silver cross.”

But he said the deacons and other young men went to protect the ark of the covenant.

He added: “The whole city rose up, all the men and women fought them, and the soldiers shot and killed some, but we are happy that we did not fail to protect our treasures.”