Violence against Reproductive Rights in Tigray
The Tigray conflict in Ethiopia, which took place from 2020 to 2022, saw thousands of Tigrayan women and girls suffer extreme reproductive violence, a distinct form of gender-based violence used as a weapon of war. Despite comprehensive evidence documenting systematic, deliberate, and ongoing sexual and reproductive violence, including mass rape, sexual slavery, forced pregnancy, and sexual torture, primarily perpetrated by Ethiopian National Defense Forces (ENDF), Eritrean troops, and allied militias, justice and accountability measures have been largely absent, according to a July 2025 investigative report by Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) and Peoples’ Journey for Justice and Accountability in the Horn of Africa (OJAH).
The report, titled "Bearing the Brunt: Reproductive Violence as a Weapon of War in Tigray," highlights the governments of Ethiopia and Eritrea's failure to respond to inquiries regarding accountability efforts, reinforcing a climate of impunity. The premature shutdown of the UN’s justice mechanism under pressure from the Ethiopian government further emboldened perpetrators.
Sexual and reproductive violence has persisted even after the 2022 Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (CoHA), with nearly as many incidents recorded post-ceasefire as during active conflict. Harrowing details include gang rapes, sexual mutilation, forced pregnancies, and violence against women and girls ranging from ages eight to 69, with the use of ethnic slurs and death threats.
The reproductive violence documented constitutes war crimes, breaches of international humanitarian law, and violations of human rights treaties such as the African Charter and the Maputo Protocol regarding women’s rights and reproductive health. A coalition of NGOs has lodged a formal complaint at the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights accusing Ethiopia of violating its obligations to prevent and punish sexual and reproductive violence.
The report also reveals that the violence was systematically targeted, with survivors identifying perpetrators largely as military and paramilitary actors from all sides, including the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), Ethiopian federal forces, Eritrean troops, and Amhara militias, with ethnic and retaliatory motivations noted. Eritrean actors are implicated heavily in the violence but are not party to Ethiopia’s transitional justice processes, making official accountability nearly impossible under current frameworks.
The Maputo Protocol requires states to prevent and condemn gender-based violence against women in war and to ensure such acts are prosecuted as serious international crimes. However, Ethiopia has failed to bring perpetrators of sexual and reproductive violence to justice, with only a few soldiers convicted of rape and murder out of thousands of alleged perpetrators. Tigrayan survivors have received neither adequate justice nor reparations.
Calls from humanitarian and human rights organizations emphasize the urgent need for revived international justice mechanisms and political commitment to reparations and healing for survivors before these crimes escalate further. The UN's International Commission of Human Rights Experts on Ethiopia (ICHREE) has found that rape, sexual slavery, and sexual torture were committed as part of a large-scale attack on the Tigrayan civilian population, constituting crimes against humanity. Rape and other forms of gender-based violence are universally recognized as war crimes in internal conflicts.
