Thousands of Tigrayans were forcefully arrested and held at detention centres for months

Tigray – Thousands of Ethiopians belonging to the Tigrayan ethnic group were forcefully arrested and kept in the detention centres in the capital for months.

Some Tigrayans in and outside Addis Ababa said they remained with non-Tigrayan companions to sidestep capture. 

Since 2020, Ethiopia Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has pursued a grisly war conflict against Tigrayan rebels in the northernmost country. Tigrayans had overwhelmed the Ethiopian government and armed force for quite a long time until Abiy took power in 2018 and sidelined their leaders. 

However, since the fight started, the Tigrayans have directed the Ethiopian armed forces in Tigray, cleared south, seized two vital towns and threatened to capture the capital as well.

The arrests were aimed at ethnic groups and cleared people in cities across the nation, as indicated by figures given by the police, opposition groups and rights activists.

The forced detention comes amid a massive increase in online hate speech, which fuels the conflict destroying Africa’s second-most crowded country. 

Reports of ethnic cleansing, killing and rape by all sides in the contention had subverted the vision of Ethiopian solidarity that Abiy, the state leader, guaranteed when he came to power three years ago. 

Cops barged into peoples home without a warrant, scouring the drawing-room and searching under the beds. They arrested people of ethnic groups and put them in detention centres.

On 2 November, the authority pronounced a state of emergency, and the police cleared up anybody of Tigrayan descent, a significant number of whom had no connections to the protester. 

Not just young people, but also the elderly, a mother with kids was arrested as indicated by human rights freedoms activists and detained interviews.