Tigray, is in the northernmost region of the vast African country, Ethiopia, bordering Eritrea. On November 2, 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic, a fratricidal war broke out. When the Tplf (Tigray People’s Liberation Front) organised and held an electoral round in the region without Addis Ababa’s permission and took possession of regular army barracks and armaments, manifesting its intention to consider its own region separate from the rest of the country, it was thought that Premier Abiy Ahamed, 2019 Nobel laureate “for his efforts for peace and international cooperation,” would, at least initially, choose a path other than military escalation. In reality, the situation precipitated dramatically and in two years led to the deaths of some 600,000 people and displaced nearly 3 million people. Widespread human rights violations and sexual violence have left deep scars on the population.
The announcement, two years later, of the signing of the Pretoria Agreement ending the conflict and silencing the guns was obviously greeted by the population with joy and relief. But the wounds remained open and raw. Exactly four years after the outbreak of war and two years after the end of the conflict in Tigray, The Irish Catholic spoke with the bishop of the Catholic eparchy (diocese) of Adigrat, Tesfaselassie Medhin, titular of the Catholic diocese encompassing all of Tigray.
Your Excellency, let us begin with a review of these two years of peace….
“The two years prior to the agreement were a horror movie, the kind you see in the cinema. Unfortunately, however, the actors, were men, women, and children who lived the horror in their daily lives. A continuous devastation, night and day, a horrible situation that we still struggle to tell the story today. We had for a long time a total blockade of information, of network connections, our media and outside media could not operate, no real news was coming out about what was going on, while the explosions, the military powers, the drones, continued to work to perfection non-stop. This was a state of siege planned down to the smallest detail, a kind of experiment in communication blockade in the 21st century while all around were massacres, mass rapes, all sorts of cruelties. So the peace signing was a moment of great joy, even though my city continued to be bombed for days after the Pretoria signing, but so many problems remain.”
Which ones?
“Even today, my diocese, which includes the entire region of Tigray and part of Afar, is inaccessible for a third of its extent. It is occupied by Eritrean armed forces that have been present since the beginning of the conflict and never returned to their country, and by forces from the neighbouring Ahmara region. There are still hundreds of thousands of displaced people who, two years later, still cannot return to their homes. To all this must be added the dramatic situation of our children and young people: at the moment there are still 515 schools that have never been reopened, among them our Catholic schools, and I am not saying this, but the official data from the Ministry of Education.
The chain of poverty linked to all this is a curse on humanity that is impoverishing the remaining communities. That is why I do not stop raising my cry”
This means that since the days of Covid our children have not been attending schools, a generation has been growing up for four years without education. In addition to those who are dead or injured, we are losing thousands of young people who are migrating en masse, another of the many disasters created by the war that goes to increase human trafficking. The chain of poverty linked to all this is a curse on humanity that is impoverishing the remaining communities. That is why I do not stop raising my cry: instead of spending money for the management of this phenomenon, nations should work together to revive areas affected by wars or disasters and do everything possible for people to stay in their homes”.
The Catholic Church is certainly a minority, what is its role and radically in society?
“In a region of about 6/7 million people, Catholics represent 1% but the Church is present in every field of society: education, health, social cohesion, environment, water and soil preservation, climate mitigation as well as in the fields of ecumenism and interreligious dialogue. Although we are 1% of the population, we represent 20% of the services and we are particularly concerned with young people, obviously without any denominational bias. Our mission as a church and in agreement with the interfaith council has been and is to continually call for dialogue and to open up access to humanitarian aid (for many months, aid could not even arrive, ed.) and bring people back. Ours is a continuous call to stop demonizing those who are different from you and poisoning our society. We especially ask this of our politicians, the people here live in peace, they do not let ethnicities, differences prevail, they have been used to living together for centuries to discuss and solve problems”
You always stood by the people and the faithful during the war, what was your experience?
“I never moved, I regularly served here, I stood by the faithful as always even though communication was not possible and it was very complicated to move around. Even now, as I told you, a third of my diocese is inaccessible. There are still a lot of tensions, a lot of things are missing, and you can say that many areas are basically still under siege, Many roads are not safe and businesses, of course, are affected.”
What needs to happen to restore hope?
“Our hope is that there will be a process of justice and accountability which means that all the crimes committed must never be repeated. True justice is not kill the killer, that is revenge. And we, as religious leaders, stand to guarantee a process of reconciliation healing and peace.”