{"id":12633,"date":"2021-10-26T08:21:53","date_gmt":"2021-10-26T08:21:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/?p=12633"},"modified":"2021-10-26T08:21:55","modified_gmt":"2021-10-26T08:21:55","slug":"we-thought-he-was-dead-tigrayans-speak-of-torture-in-detention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/?p=12633","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWe thought he was dead\u201d: Tigrayans speak of torture in detention"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Many Tigrayans have been forcibly disappeared in recent months. Now some who have been released tell their stories.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Source: African Arguments<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

October 25, 2021<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tigrayans recently released from a military camp in the Afar region of Ethiopia<\/a> say they faced torture and inhumane conditions. After the Tigray Defence Forces, led by the Tigray People\u2019s Liberation Front (TPLF), retook the regional capital Mekelle in late-June, hundreds if not thousands of ethnic Tigrayans were arbitrarily detained<\/a> by Ethiopian authorities across the country and transferred to undisclosed locations. Many were said to have been sent to Awash Arba, a military camp located in the northern Afar region, which borders Tigray to the east.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ethiopia\u2019s nearly year-long civil war has devastated the Tigray region. Thousands have been killed. There are reports<\/a> of famine as the region remains under a government-imposed siege. And there have been widespread allegations of gruesome sexual violence, torture, and mass executions of Tigrayans, which observers say amounts to ethnic cleansing. The TPLF has also been accused <\/a>of revenge killings and carrying out ethnically motivated massacres as their forces push through the neighbouring Amhara and Afar states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Human rights abuses have long been reported <\/a>at Awash Arba, which is also used as an army training facility. Witnesses held at the camp say that hundreds of Tigrayan civilians are being detained there, facing routine beatings and torture, with limited access to food and water. According to Tigrayans in Addis Ababa, arbitrary roundups have resumed over the last two weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese enforced disappearances deny people access to lawyers, and make people more vulnerable to mistreatment including torture, and other abuses,\u201d Laetitia Bader, Horn of Africa director at Human Rights Watch (HRW), told African Arguments. \u201cDisconnecting detainees from their families also causes mental suffering, and in Ethiopia it also cuts detainees off from key supplies that relatives normally provide them with.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe government needs to account for all the Tigrayans\u2019 forcibly disappeared, and release those being held without credible evidence of a crime,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, some of these Tigrayans detained at Awash Arba have been released and are telling their stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey are making it into some kind of business\u201d<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Eyob*, 32, a father-of-two he was detained by police on the streets of Addis Ababa in September as he spoke Tigrinya on the phone. He was held at a police station for two days before being transferred to Awash Arba, where he stayed for a week. \u201cIt was very hard there. They tortured a lot of people,\u201d Eyob told African Arguments. \u201cThere was not enough food or water. It was very hard.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eyob and other released Tigrayans say they were provided with at most one cup of water a day and fed just one or two pieces of bread for each meal, and sometimes not even that. They describe being kept with dozens of other Tigrayans in \u201clarge halls\u201d with thin \u201cblanket-like\u201d mattresses to sleep on. Eyob, however, says those in his room were not even given blankets and were forced to sleep on the ground. Some were allowed outside their rooms once a day for fresh air, but others said they weren\u2019t allowed outside at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Throughout the day, various Tigrayans would be called for interrogations with the soldiers. Eyob said soldiers punched and slapped him, leaving him in pain for several days, but claimed he was relatively lucky. \u201cMy interrogations were quite simple because they couldn\u2019t get information on me,\u201d he explained. \u201cThey take your phone and go through all of your social media, looking for any mention of Tigray. But they didn\u2019t find anything on me. [The interrogations] lasted only 15-20 minutes. But others would be taken for more than an hour.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some people \u201ccame back bleeding or had their legs and hands broken,\u201d said Eyob. \u201cSeveral times the guys didn\u2019t come back at all. I don\u2019t know if they were taken somewhere else \u2013 or maybe something worse.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a week, Eyob was able to pay the Ethiopian soldiers 15,000 birr ($318) to get released. He says others were paying up to 200,000 birr ($4,238) and that some of his fellow inmates, all from Addis Ababa, had already been in Awash Arba for five months. \u201cThey are making it into some kind of business,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m not scared anymore\u201d<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Gebre*, 31, moved to Addis Ababa five months ago, leaving his wife and ten-month-old child in Mekelle, after his tourism business collapsed amid the pandemic and the war. \u201cI came here just to survive,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was detained in mid-August while speaking Tigrinya at a cafeteria. At the police station, his hair was cut before he was put on a bus that drove for ten hours. \u201cWe didn\u2019t know we were going to Awash Arba,\u201d he told African Arguments. \u201cWe only found out after a few days of being there because the other prisoners told us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gebre said that the detainees were only permitted to shower with a jerry can once every ten days and were only allowed access to a toilet at 6am and 6pm each day. \u201cEveryone in there was getting very sick,\u201d he said. \u201cThere were a lot of people suffering from malaria and stomach problems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gebre says he was called for interrogations four times as soldiers accused him of delivering messages for the TPLF. \u201cThey hit me on my back and on my legs with sticks,\u201d he said. \u201cSometimes they smashed and hit my face. I was really wounded. But after several weeks I started to feel better. Now my injuries are mostly healed and I\u2019m just dealing with the psychological injury.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI saw one guy who [the soldiers] beat so badly,\u201d Gebre recounted. \u201cI think he was fighting with them and refusing to cooperate. There were three soldiers beating him and afterwards he was injured so badly that I don\u2019t think it\u2019s possible he survived after that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gebre says women and girls were held in a separate hall and that there were rumours they were being raped. He told African Arguments how the detained Tigrayans were terrified and did not know what their fate would be. \u201cWe were really scared because we believed that the soldiers were going to take us out at some point and shoot us\u2026Every day I am thanking God that I was released.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gebre says that after a month, soldiers called out 25 names including his, and took them on a bus to a town in Afar and released them. \u201cThey told us that they will be watching us and following us wherever we go,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m not scared anymore,\u201d Gebre told African Arguments. \u201cOf course, I don\u2019t speak Tigrinya on the streets and I don\u2019t trust anyone; I won\u2019t give them an excuse to take me again. I am feeling worried even speaking to you because maybe someone can hear me or they put something on my phone to listen to me. But I don\u2019t hide when I see the police anymore. After that experience, I don\u2019t think they can do worse to me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have to be strong for my family,\u201d he continued. \u201cI cannot allow myself to be depressed because I must be ready to reunite with them when this is over.\u201d Both Gebre and Eyob have not been able to communicate with their families since the TPLF retook Tigray.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe thought he was dead\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Hayelom*, 42, was caught up in the mass roundups soon after the war erupted in November 2020 and interrogated for a week. He was detained again after the TPLF took Mekelle and transferred to Awash Arba, where he spent about two months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was in a room with about 50 others and I never saw the light of day the entire time I was there; they never let us outside,\u201d the father-of-three told African Arguments. \u201cThey were just torturing us for no reason.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hayelom says he was interrogated three times and that inmates were beaten with \u201cheavy plastic sticks\u201d and made to crawl on their stomachs along sharp gravel for about an hour. \u201cIf you got tired and you couldn\u2019t do it anymore, the soldiers would start beating you,\u201d he said, explaining how he sustained scratches and bruises along the length of his body and couldn\u2019t move for a day afterwards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The worst injury he experienced, however, was when soldiers beat his legs, which he injured in a car accident three years ago. \u201cThe soldiers beat my legs so badly that they broke them again,\u201d he said. Hayelom continues to need a cane to walk. He also suffers from diabetes and said there was only one pharmacist who would provide pain killers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe whole time we were thinking we were going to die here,\u201d Hayelom added. \u201cEvery morning when they opened the doors we thought this would be our last day. We assumed we were going to be killed. I felt so sad and heartbroken that I didn\u2019t have the chance to say goodbye to my family.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hayelom was eventually released, along with a group of 36 others who were becoming dangerously ill, some of whom were suffering from diabetes, HIV, and high blood pressure. Like the others who spoke to African Arguments, Hayelom is relieved he did not suffer an even worse fate in the camp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere was a man who tried to escape from the camp,\u201d Hayelom recalled. \u201cWhen they caught him, they locked him in a very small room for three days without giving him food or water. And they were beating him every day and every night for three days. As soon as he was let out, he looked like someone else. He was drastically changed and his legs were broken. He was beaten so badly that he couldn\u2019t even speak. We thought he was dead and the soldiers were just bringing his body out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

African Arguments reached out to the Ethiopian government for comment on allegations of torture and abuse at Awash Arba, but the spokesperson did not respond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

*names changed to protect interviewees\u2019 identities<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Many Tigrayans have been forcibly disappeared in recent months. Now some who have been released tell their stories.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12634,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[10,32],"class_list":["post-12633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article","tag-african-arguments","tag-english"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",900,633,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",300,211,false],"medium_large":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",640,450,false],"large":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",640,450,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",900,633,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",900,633,false],"morenews-large":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",818,575,false],"morenews-medium":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",583,410,false],"woocommerce_thumbnail":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531-300x300.jpg",300,300,true],"woocommerce_single":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531.jpg",600,422,false],"woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":["https:\/\/axumawian.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/531-100x100.jpg",100,100,true]},"author_info":{"info":["Axumawian Media"]},"category_info":"Article<\/a>","tag_info":"Article","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12633"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12633\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12635,"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12633\/revisions\/12635"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/axumawian.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}