Women are being raped by gangs, drugged and held hostage, according to medical records and testimonies of 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 treated women tell similar stories of raped by Ethiopian and Eritrean soldiers. The women said the troops were on a self-proclaimed retribution mission and operated with almost complete impunity in the region.
A CNN team in Hamdayet, a quiet Sudanese town on the border with Ethiopia where thousands of Tigray refugees have gathered in recent months, spoke with several women who described being raped while fleeing the conflict.
“He pushed me and said, ‘You Tigrayans have no history, you have no culture. I can do what I want with you and nobody cares,'” said a woman about her attacker. She told CNN that she is now pregnant.
Many say they were raped by Amhara forces, who told them they intended to clean Tigray ethnically, a doctor who works in the extensive refugee camp in Hamdayet told CNN.
“The women who have been raped say that the things they tell them when they rape them is that they need to change their identity – to yellow them or at least leave their Tigrinya status … and for them to come over there to clean them up. .. to clean the bloodline “, said Dr. Tedros Tefera.
“It was practically a genocide,” he added.
The flood of refugees has become a trickle since Ethiopian forces reinforced the border in recent days, worrying refugees who are still waiting to reunite with their families.
The governments of Ethiopia and Eritrea did not immediately respond to CNN’s request to comment on allegations that their forces are conducting a coordinated campaign of sexual violence against women in Tigray.
The new reports of sexual violence come as US President Joe Biden sends Senator Chris Coons to meet with Abiy and convey to the United States “concerns about the humanitarian crisis and human rights abuses in the region. of Tigray “. The State Department had already called for an independent investigation into the atrocities committed during the war.
The Ethiopian government severely restricted access to journalists until recently, making it difficult to verify survivors’ reports. And an intermittent blackout of communications during the fight effectively blocked the war from the eyes of the world. But in recent weeks, with the entry of foreign journalists, horrific stories of rape and sexual violence are beginning to surface.
One of the survivors told Channel 4 News that she and five other women were raped by 30 Eritrean soldiers who were playing and taking pictures during the attack. She said she knew they were soldiers from Eritrea because of their dialect and uniforms. She said she only managed to get home to be raped again. When she tried to escape, she remembered being captured, injected with a drug, tied to a stone, stripped, stabbed and raped by soldiers for 10 days.
Outside the safe house, many more women and girls are being treated at the Ayder Reference Hospital, the main medical center in the regional capital, Mekelle. Most were referred there by hospitals in rural areas that are not equipped to deal with rape, Channel 4 News reported.
A hospital doctor told CNN that more than 200 women have been hospitalized for sexual violence in the past few months, but many other cases have been reported in rural villages and IDP centers, with limited access to medical care.
Between the lack of access to medical services and the stigma surrounding sexual violence, doctors interviewed by CNN said they suspected that the true number of rape cases was much higher than official reports.
A coordinator at a gender violence crisis center in Tigray told CNN that he used to hear about cases every few days or once a week. Since the start of the conflict, up to 22 women and girls seek treatment for rape every day, she said.
The demand for emergency contraceptives and tests for sexually transmitted infections has also increased in recent months. Many of the raped women contracted sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV, doctors told CNN.
A doctor said that many of the women she treated also suffered physical abuse, with broken bones and injured body parts. She said the youngest girl she treated was 8 years old, while the oldest girl was 60.
The doctor said that many women who introduce themselves share stories of others who did not – mothers, sisters, friends and other acquaintances.
A spokesman for the UN Human Rights Office told CNN that they would conduct a joint investigation with the EHRC on 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.