Despite the peace agreement Eritrean soldiers.
In an effort to put an end to a devastating two-year civil conflict, Ethiopia’s government signed a peace agreement with forces from the northern Tigray area last November. However, locals and humanitarian organisations have informed the BBC that attacks on civilians, particularly sexual assaults against women, have persisted.
This article includes graphic sexual violence that some readers may find upsetting.
Letay spent the night cowering under a bridge as mortar rounds fell and exploded all around her on the day that representatives of the Ethiopian government clasped hands with their adversaries from Tigray to make peace. Both sides grinned as cameras captured the moment.
She had just escaped an Eritrean soldier’s rape while she was by herself in a remote area of north-east Tigray.
I was unconscious for a long time after it happened before I came to. I had to hide till they had gone.
To prevent stigmatisation and retaliation, we changed Letay’s name as well as the names of the other rape survivors who told their stories to the BBC.
The systematic rape of Tigrayan women by Ethiopian military, as well as by their allies from neighbouring Eritrea and militia groups, has been reported during the two-year battle in northern Ethiopia by the United Nations, human rights organisations, and journalists.
Beginning in November 2020, Tigray was the object of a two-year civil war between two opposing parties. The number of fatalities may reach the hundreds of thousands.
After the peace accord was struck in November, there was optimism that the attacks on people would end.
According to women, health professionals, and humanitarian organisations that spoke to the BBC, they did not.
On a shaky phone line, I spoke with Letay, who informed me that the government.
