Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has published its findings regarding the deaths of its three deceased staff, María Hernández Matas, Tedros Gebremariam Gebremichael, and Yohannes Halefom Reda.
The three aid workers were reportedly detained and killed on June 24, 2021, while enroute to a village near Abi Adi town in central Tigray, Ethiopia.
According to the MSF report, the attack on these humanitarian workers was deliberate and carried out in the presence of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces (ENDF).
“The review confirmed that the attack was an intentional and targeted killing of three clearly identified aid workers. It also established that a convoy of Ethiopian National Defense Forces (ENDF) was present at the time of the incident, on the same road where the MSF personnel were killed,” read the press release published by MSF.
Paula Gil, the President of MSF Spain, mentions that the Ethiopian government has yet to disclose tangible findings from the investigations it pledged four years after the deaths of the aid workers.
“Despite repeated promises from the Ethiopian authorities that an investigation was in progress, four years later, neither MSF nor the families of the victims have received any credible information,” remarks Paula Gil, President of MSF Spain. “We can only infer that there is a lack of political will to publicly share the results of a completed investigation.”
The government of the Federal Republic of Ethiopia has yet to address the claims made by MSF and why it is yet to disclose the outcome of its investigations.
In June 2021, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the event, deeming it utterly unacceptable and a breach of International Humanitarian Law.
“I express my solidarity with our humanitarian partners who are putting their lives at risk to provide protection and assistance to the people in Tigray,” stated the UN Chief.
Tensions arose between the Ethiopian government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) in 2020, sparked by delays in elections and the extension of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s first term in June 2020.
In 2021 alone, at least 5.1 million Ethiopians were displaced within the country. The Pretoria Agreement was signed in 2022 to bring an end to the Tigray conflict, which had resulted in approximately 600,000 fatalities.
