Ethiopia: 16 UN employees detained by authorities

Published on : 11/09/2021 – 19:13

Concerns within the UN. A dozen Ethiopians working for the United Nations were arrested in Addis Ababa during operations targeting Tigrayans as part of the state of emergency in force in the country, sources told AFP on Tuesday (November 9th). United Nations and humanitarian organizations. “Some of them were arrested at their homes,” said one of these sources.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s government last week declared a six-month state of emergency amid the growing risk of fighters from the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and Oromo Liberation Army (OLA ) walk on the capital.

NGOs on the bridge

Human rights groups, including Amnesty International, denounced these emergency measures and accused the government of increasing arbitrary arrests on the basis of ethnicity. Thousands of people have been detained since last week.

UN security officials “visited fellow detainees,” a spokesperson for the organization in Geneva told AFP on Tuesday.

“Notes verbales were also sent to the Minister of Foreign Affairs to request the immediate release of the detained personnel,” she said.

A UN spokesperson in Ethiopia told him that the UN was “verifying and following up on allegations of arrests concerning its employees.”

“The safety and security of UN personnel remains the top priority for the UN in Ethiopia,” the spokesperson said.

Recurring tensions oppose the government of Abiy and the United Nations. At the end of September, the Ethiopian foreign ministry thus expelled seven senior UN officials for “interference”.

Emergency state

Marked by atrocities and famine, the conflict between the federal army and the Tigrayan rebels has left several thousand dead and more than two million displaced.

In November 2020, the Prime Minister sent the army to Tigray to dismiss the regional authorities from the TPLF, who challenged his authority and whom he accused of having attacked military bases. Since then, Tigray has been subjected to what the UN describes as a de facto blockade of humanitarian aid.

The TPLF fighters took back most of Tigray in June and then advanced into the neighboring regions of Afar and Amhara, without ruling out marching on the capital.

The government says the rebels are exaggerating their progress, but it has declared a state of emergency nonetheless.

With AFP