Thread by @althecat

The death toll of children in the Tigray Wars was in all likelihood higher in both 2021 and 2022. But the UNHRC & OHCHR did not investigate this in their reports for either year.

Most of the deaths in these wars were were of child soldiers forcibly recruited into the Tigrayan Defence Forces.

https://twitter.com/battleforeurope/status/1730996255508045968

This is not to detract from the horror of the war in Gaza. But rather to highlight an injustice against the children of Tigray which for reasons unfathomable was monumentally mismanaged by the peak bodies of the UN. And about which the truth is overdue in being investigated, revealed or even acknowledged by Western news media.

The word “Ethiopia” does not even appear in the official report into “Children in Armed Conflict for the 2021 year.

During Operation Mothers of Tigray - the bulk of which took place in Amhara Region (which has a far higher population than Afar region) - Western Media at times cheer-leaded thé TPLF’s attacks during which 1000s of hospitals and health facilities were looted and destroyed by the marauding TPLF forces.

The TPLF mounted its “revenge” war, cynically named “operation mothers of Tigray” was undertaken against the peoples of the Amhara and Afar regions of Tigray. There is ample photographic evidence of the brutality of that war which raged from June 13th 2021 to December 21st 2021.

The war took a turn for the worse shortly before it’s end in late 2021 when Tigray Forces got close to Addis Ababa - this phase of the war took place during COP26 in a Glasgow and was memorably propagandised by CNN and the US called for evacuation of all its citizens from Ethiopia.

And the war finally ended after fighting raged through till the end of December.

Ethiopian forces took the upper hand after Ethiopian PM @AbiyAhmedAli took personal command of the Ethiopian Defence Forces which had experienced a rash of treachery by senior officers enabling the advance on Addis.

During this final and nearly decisive phase of the Tigrayan wars, Ethiopia received support from China and the UAE in the form of drones which were used towards the end of the conflict to maraud retreating Tigrayan forces from the skies.

At around this time United States threatened to impose sanctions on the Ethiopian Government, pressure which led to the Ethiopian Govt announcing a second unilateral ceasefire, allowing remaining Tigray forces to retreat into Tigray.

Fighting however did not end. But reporting on the conflict largely did.

Fighting continued in North Gondar following the ceasefire - where Amhara Fano fought and repelled remaining Tigrayan forces.

And soon after Tigray forces once again invaded Afar region displacing 100s of thousands of people and advanced a new offensive in January down the main UN aid route into Afar region towards the Afderra salt mines.

This largely unreported - forgotten phase - of the Tigrayan wars was reported on on the ground by a single French ARTE documentary team who were present when the population of Ab’ala came under artillery fire and fled into the desert.

Over the next 3-4 months 1000s of Afaris mounted a valiant counter attack eventually driving the armoured Tigrayan forces back into Tigray.

@AbiyAhmedAli The Afar offensive also ended in a Ethiopian government unilateral ceasefire.

@AbiyAhmedAli The contrast in the global media coverage - minimal and mostly inaccurate - of another war on children and mothers - but this time in the forgotten continent of Africa and that in Gaza is startling.

Both are symptoms of a “rules based order” which seems to have no rules.

@AbiyAhmedAli /ends @threadreaderapp unroll