Rape still a weapon of war in Tigray months after peace deal

A Tigrayan woman gang-raped by Amhara militia – allies of the Ethiopian army in the two-year civil war – shields her identity in a picture taken in 2021. Photograph: Nariman El-Mofty/AP

Eritrean and Ethiopian soldiers continue a widespread and systematic campaign of rape in Tigray despite the peace agreement signed in November last year, a new report reveals.

In the first report to document sexual violence – using hundreds of medical records from the start of the conflict in November 2020 through to June 2023 – healthcare professionals recount cases of gang-rape, sexual slavery and murder, including the killing of children.