Genocide: “the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group.” -Oxford Dictionary

In Ethiopia, there are many national states. One of the national states, called Amhara, has been suffering from a genocide since 1991. It has barely been talked about or brought to attention.

To start from the beginning, a rebel group came into power in 1991 from one of the other national states, Tigray. They were called the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). When I mention this group, I want to acknowledge that this group does not represent every Tegaru (people from Tigray), and others should not be judged for the TPLF’s actions.

TPLF executed a manifesto in 1976 that stated that the Amhara region was the cause of unity and was enemy number one in Ethiopia. They said they needed to kill or take over the Amhara region so they could continue with their political plan, which was to separate Tigray from Ethiopia and become their own country. According to the Ethiopian Census Bureau, this resulted in a decrease of 2.4 million Amharas due to murder and forced sterilization of women in the Amhara region. The motive to murder Amharas was because of an anti-Amhara sentiment and “ethnic cleansing.” Eventually, people of the Amhara region were angry and retaliated by protesting to end TPLF control. In 2018, the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), which was a leading party in Ethiopia for some time, enforced a law after many protests, announcing that measures that picked and killed off specific groups for a political agenda would be gone and there would be fair elections.

During this same year (2018), another political party came into power from the Oromo region. There was a power struggle between the new party and the former TPLF party. This was one of the reasons that the Ethiopian civil war occurred in 2020. In this war, TPLF wanted to be back in power and still continue with their plan to kill and take control of people from the Amhara region. TPLF targeted people from the Amhara region, murdering and raping them. They ended up attacking a town called Mai-Kadra, killing 600 people, and were chanting “We are the winners, we are the winners,” as claimed by amharaamerica.org.

This war continued for two years from 2020 to 2022, during which time many people from Amhara, Tigray, Oromo and many other regions were killed. This still continues; in 2022, Tigrayan forces continued to rape, murder, and rob people in the Amhara region (amnesty.org).

The Oromo liberation front also massacred over 400 Amhara residents, killing kids and torching houses. The war eventually ended in 2022 with a peace treaty being signed between the Ethiopian government and TPLF. Most targeted killings toward Amhara had stopped, but TPLF and OLF (Oromo Liberation Front) continued to have tension with people from the Amhara region. Some of the people in the Ethiopian government had been receiving hate for some time because they agreed with the genocide but still had positions of power.

In 2023, the same people in the government that had agreed to the mass murder of innocent people decided that the Amhara region didn’t need regional special forces, police or national army (reuters.com). This would leave the Amhara region defenseless and open as a target. Thousands of people protested about this. The government told the media that this was misinterpreted, but activists are saying that those are lies.

What has been going on is horrendous, and should have been stopped earlier. If governments and political parties actually have the goal of representing the people, then they should have listened and saw that what was going on was hurting their people. If they had, millions of lives could have been saved. I hope you learned more about the innocent lives taken from the Amhara region, but also across Ethiopia. Things need to be done and people need to start speaking up more and sharing.

Rest in peace to all who were killed.

Sources:

Amhara massacre in Mai-Kadra

Ethiopian Census Bureau

1976 Manifesto

Amhara Genocide 

Protest of disband of forces in Amhara region

“Ethnic Cleansing” in Ethiopia

Peace treaty of Ethiopia and TPLF

OLF massacre people from Amhara 

Tigrayan forces murder, rape and pillage in attacks on civilians in Amhara towns