Women are being raped, drugged and held hostage, according to medical records and testimonials from survivors shared with CNN. In one case, a woman’s vagina was filled with stones, nails and plastic, according to a video seen by CNN and testimony from one of the doctors who treated her.
According to doctors, almost all the women they treat tell similar stories of rape by Ethiopian and Eritrean soldiers. The women said the troops were on a self-proclaimed mission of retaliation, operating near total impunity in the region.
A CNN team in Hamdayet, a sleepy Sudanese town on the Ethiopian border where thousands of Tigray refugees have gathered in recent months, spoke to several women who described being raped fleeing the fighting.
‘He pushed me and said,’ You Tigrayans have no history, you have no culture. I can do whatever I want with you and no one cares, ” said one woman of her attacker. She told CNN she is now pregnant.
Many say they were raped by Amhara troops who told them they intended to ethnically cleanse Tigray, a doctor who worked in the sprawling refugee camp in Hamdayet told CNN.
“The raped women say the things they say to them when they rape them is that they have to change their identities – to amharise them or at least leave their Tigrinya status … get there to cleanse them. … to cleanse the bloodline, ”said Dr. Tedros Tefera.
“This has been practically genocide,” he added.
The stream of refugees has turned into a trickle since Ethiopian armed forces fortified the border in recent days, worrying refugees still hoping to be reunited with family members.
The Ethiopian and Eritrean governments did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment on allegations that their troops are conducting a coordinated campaign for sexual violence against women in Tigray.
The new reports of sexual assault come as US President Joe Biden sends Senator Chris Coons to meet Abiy and express US “concerns about the humanitarian crisis and human rights abuses in the Tigray region.” The State Department has previously called for an independent investigation into atrocities committed during the war.
The Ethiopian government has, until recently, severely restricted access to journalists, making it difficult to verify survivors’ accounts. And an intermittent power outage during the fighting has effectively blocked the war from the eyes of the world. But in recent weeks, when foreign journalists have been admitted, gruesome stories of rape and sexual assault have begun to surface.
One of the survivors told Channel 4 News that she and five other women had been raped by 30 Eritrean soldiers who joked and took pictures during the attack. She said she knew they were Eritrean troops because of their dialect and uniforms. She said she could return home and be raped again. When she tried to escape, she recalled having been captured by soldiers for ten days, injected with a drug, tied to a rock, gutted, stabbed, and raped.
Outside the hiding place, many more women and young girls are being treated in the Ayder Referral Hospital, the main medical facility in the regional capital of Mekelle. Most have been referred there by rural hospitals that are not equipped to handle rape cases, Channel 4 News reported.
A doctor at the hospital told CNN that more than 200 women had been admitted for sexual assault in recent months, but many more cases have been reported in rural villages and internally displaced persons centers, with limited or no access to medical care.
Between a lack of access to medical services and the stigma surrounding sexual assault, doctors who interviewed CNN said they suspect the true rape rate is much higher than official reports.
A coordinator of a gender-based violence crisis center in Tigray told CNN they heard about cases every few days or once a week. Since the conflict broke out, up to 22 women and girls are seeking treatment for rape every day, she said.
The demand for emergency contraception and testing for sexually transmitted diseases has also skyrocketed in recent months. Many of the raped women have contracted sexually transmitted infections, including HIV, doctors told CNN.
A doctor said many of the women she treated had also been physically abused, with broken bones and bruised body parts. She said the youngest girl she treated was 8 years old, while the oldest was 60.
The doctor said many women who come forward share stories about others who haven’t: mothers, sisters, friends, and other acquaintances.
A spokesman for the UN Human Rights Agency told CNN they would work with EHRC to investigate allegations of serious human rights violations in Tigray.
CNN’s Nima Elbagir and Barbara Arvanitidis reported from Hamdayet. Eliza Mackintosh wrote and reported from London. Bethlehem Feleke reported from Nairobi. Gianluca Mezzofiore and Katie Polglase reported from London.