A committee of experts will be responsible for investigating and gathering evidence on possible crimes against humanity committed in the framework of the Tiger conflict.
Le Monde with AFP
The UN Human Rights Council decided on Friday, December 17, at a special session, to create an international commission of experts responsible for investigating and gathering evidence on the abuses committed in the context of the conflict in Ethiopia.
A resolution in this sense, proposed by the European Union, was adopted by 21 votes on the 47 States currently serving on the Council – 15 voted no, including China and many African countries, and 11 abstained .
For the Ethiopian ambassador Zenebe KEBede to the UN in Geneva, multilateralism has “once again been caught hostage by a neocolonialistic mentality”. “The accusations against my country are not founded,” he said, ensuring that the decision taken would “exacerbate the situation on the ground”. “Ethiopia is targeted and shown to the Human Rights Council for defending a democratically elected government, the peace and the future of its people,” he added.
African countries, by the voice of the representative of Cameroon, Ambassador Solomon Eheth, had brought support to Ethiopia, explaining that such a survey mechanism “is counterproductive and likely to exacerbate tensions. “.
” Threat for the region “
The resolution requires the creation of an “International Commission of Experts on Human Rights”. Three experts will soon be appointed and will then have the heavy task of investigating and gathering evidence on human rights violations in the country at war, with the aim of identifying, as far as possible, those responsible.
In a joint investigation with the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission, created by the Ethiopian Government, the United Nations concluded, in early November, possible crimes against humanity committed by all actors.
According to the Upper Commissioner for Human Rights, Nada Al-Nashif, the UN continues “to receive credible reports of serious violations and human rights violations committed by all parties”. “The danger of a rise in hate, violence and discrimination is very high, and could degenerate into generalized violence. This could have major consequences, not only for millions of people in Ethiopia, but also in any The region, “she added.
“It is essential that the managers answer their actions independently, transparent and impartial,” said the ambassador of the European Union Lotte Knudsen, at the end of the vote.
For his part, the French ambassador Jérôme Bonnafont felt that, “more than a year after the beginning of the conflict in Tiger, the continued degradation of safe and humanitarian situations, which now affects all the northern regions. of Ethiopia, is a threat to the stability of the country and for the region “.
More than two million displaced
The war broke out in November 2020 after the Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, sent the army to the Tiger in order to dismiss the local authorities, from the Popular Front of Tiger Liberation (FPLT), which defied his authority and that he accused of attacking military bases.
Abiy Ahmed had proclaimed the victory three weeks later, after taking the regional capital, Mekélé. But in June, the FPLT resumed most of the Tiger and continued its offensive in the neighboring regions of the Amhara and Afar. After having ruled Ethiopia for nearly thirty years, the FPLT has been gradually dismissed when Abiy Ahmed became prime minister in 2018.
The conflict in Ethiopia has made several thousand deaths, more than two million displaced and plunged hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians under conditions close to famine, according to the UN.
The United Nations also regrets that thousands of people were arrested in the state of emergency, decreed on 2 November by the Government, and request that independent observers be allowed to access all places of detention. According to M me al-Nashif, between 5,000 and 7,000 people are currently held – the majority of Tigperian ethnicity, including 9 UN staff members.