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We agree with the UN Secretary-General and African Union leaders: there is no military solution to the conflict in northern Ethiopia, and a durable political solution must be found. We urge the Ethiopian government and TPLF to enter at once into negotiations without preconditions toward a sustainable ceasefire.
The mounting reports of human rights abuses underscore the urgency of independent and credible international investigations. It is essential that the Ethiopian government and all other parties to the conflict provide and facilitate the access necessary for such investigations.We look forward to an update from the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights at the forty-eighth session of the Human Rights Council on the human rights situation in Tigray and to the release of the joint investigation report of the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights at the earliest possible opportunity. We also urge full cooperation with the Commission of Inquiry of the AU Commission on Human and People’s Rights. Establishing transparent, independent mechanisms to hold those responsible for human rights abuses to account is critical to political reconciliation and peace in Ethiopia.
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of U.S. Embassy Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.