permitted to go.378 In November 2020, four employees of NGOs in Tigray were allegedly killed before the capture of Mekelle. The Danish Refugee Council (DRC) confirmed the deaths of three employees in Tigray in November 2020. The International Rescue Committee (IRC) reported the death of an employee in the Hitsats camp.379 The organisations did not mention possible perpetrators. A UN employee is said to have told The Guardian that three guards at the Hitsats camp were murdered while trying to prevent the kidnapping and forced recruitment of Eritrean refugees into the Eritrean army (see also section 3.2.1).380 In addition to the deaths of the four humanitarian employees, an employee of the international NGO ZOA was reportedly killed after federal troops took Mekelle on 28 November 2020. An unknown group of armed men is said to have murdered the employee in the Hitsats refugee camp.381
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exhibited at the start of the reporting period.385 ACLED, when referring to the alleged June 2019 coup attempt in the Amhara region and the violence that followed, wrote that these events contrasted sharply with the decline in political violence and demonstrations since Abiy had taken office in April 2018. The
government's response to these events was also atypical for the Abiy government, according to ACLED. The Internet was shut down for days and mass arrests followed (see also section 1.8.3).386
In order to present a clearer picture, it is important to explain the specific curves in more detail. The way that ‘state violence against civilians’, ‘violence among civilians’
and ‘violence during riots’ developed during the reporting period of this country of origin information report are described below.
State violence against civilians
Figures from ACLED also show a decrease in violence against civilians by
government forces since Abiy took office. This applies to both the number of events and the number of fatalities. In the second quarter of 2018, 63 events of violence by government forces were recorded, with 61 victims. For the third quarter of that year, 44 events with 150 victims were recorded. In 2019 the figures dropped, with two events and one regrettable fatality in the fourth quarter of that year. Since the end of 2019, there has been a slight increase in state violence against civilians:
ACLED recorded 16 cases of violence against civilians for the third quarter of 2020, with 25 deaths.387
Prime Minister Abiy declared that the federal army did not cause any civilian casualties during the Tigray conflict in late 2020. However, this statement is contradicted by those who believe that civilian casualties were indeed caused by violence on the part of the federal army. Eritrean soldiers and Amhara militias are also accused of serious violence in Tigray. At the end of the reporting period, there were no precise figures for civilian casualties as a result of violence by government forces (see also section 1.8.7).388
Violence among citizens
In its 2019 report, Amnesty International wrote that the violence between ethnic groups had resulted in the deaths of thousands of people.389 The figures from ACLED do not display such numbers. Since the third quarter of 2018, when there were 253 fatalities,390 the number of deaths due to violence between civilians has decreased on the whole, with 27 fatalities in the fourth quarter of 2019. However, the second quarter of 2019 peaked with 152 fatalities. This mainly involved inter-ethnic violence in the Benishangul-Gumuz region between the ethnic Gumuz and the ethnic Amhara who are a minority in the region.391 Since the beginning of 2020, the number of victims has increased from 47 in the first quarter to 84 in the third quarter. With the outbreak of the conflict in Tigray, the number of civilian casualties rocketed to 762 in the fourth quarter, with ACLED classifying the massacre in May Kadera as
385 https://acleddata.com/dashboard/#/dashboard (consulted on 3 December 2020).
386 ACLED, BAD BLOOD: VIOLENCE IN ETHIOPIA REVEALS THE STRAIN OF ETHNO-FEDERALISM UNDER PRIME MINISTER ABIY, 15 July 2020.
387 https://acleddata.com/dashboard/#/dashboard (consulted on 3 December 2020): In the fourth quarter of 2020, ACLED recorded a significant increase in fatalities in 'battles'. This involves victims of the conflict between the federal troops and Tigray, mainly military personnel.
388 The Guardian, 'Slaughtered like chickens': Eritrea heavily involved in Tigray conflict, say eyewitnesses, 21 December 2020.
389 AI, Country Profile Ethiopia 2019, 2020.
390 This involved 68 incidents recorded by ACLED that took place in almost all parts of Ethiopia.
391 https://acleddata.com/dashboard/#/dashboard (geraadpleegd op 3 december 2020); ACLED, Data Export Tool (consulted on 3 December 2020).
violence between civilians.392 It cites the Samri Youth Militia (Ethiopia) affiliated with the TPLF as the 'actor' of the violence, while other sources also indicate other actors as ‘perpetrators’ (see also section 1.8.7).393According to a confidential source, violent riots in which dozens of people have been killed, particularly in Oromia and Benishangul Gumuz, have increased due to the conflict in Tigray.394
Violence during riots
In the case of fatalities during riots, it is difficult to speak of a decrease or an increase because the past few years were characterised by particular peaks during which a relatively high number of people were killed in riots. For example, there was a peak in the third quarter of 2019 (30 victims), one in the fourth quarter (85 victims) and one in the third quarter of 2020 (132 victims). The first half of 2020 was characterised by relatively few victims (11 victims in six months). The peaks correspond to certain events: the failed 'coup' in Amhara, the riots following the disarmament of Jawar Mohammed's bodyguard and the riots following the death of the singer Hachalu, respectively.395
1.9.2 Targeted or random
The information in section 1.8 and its subsections points to a particular orientation towards specific groups in the violent incidents that took place during the reporting period. This often involves violence between different ethnic groups. Two sources believe that in the past the violence was mainly vertical but has become increasingly horizontal in nature since Abiy took office. In other words, most of the incidents of violence used to be between government security forces and Ethiopian civilians, but now most of them are between civilians, especially between different ethnic
groups.396 In July 2020, Deutsche Welle (DW) described the inter-ethnic violence as the biggest blot on the reputation of Abiy, who likes to profile himself as a reformer and as open to new ideas.397
392 https://acleddata.com/dashboard/#/dashboard (geraadpleegd op 3 december 2020); ACLED, Data Export Tool (consulted on 3 December 2020).
393 ACLED, Data Export Tool (consulted on 3 December 2020).
394 Confidential source, 16 December 2020
395 The aim of this section is to express the violence in numbers. It should be noted that it is difficult to place specific perpetrators in clear frameworks. Are the victims of the violence after the murder of the singer Hachalu the result of riots or the result of ethnic violence or a combination of both? The context must be sought in the various subsections of section 1.8.
396 Confidential source, 17 September 2020; confidential source, 19 November 2020.
397 Deutsche Welle, Ethiopia's ethnic violence shows Abiy's vulnerability, 1 July 2020.
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2 Identity, nationality and documents
2.1 Identity, nationality and documents