U.N. Officials Downplayed Sexual Violence in Ethiopia in Leaked Call

"For months earlier this year, the U.N. secretary-general and other top U.N. officials were raising concerns about widespread reports of sexual violence in Ethiopia’s Tigray region. But members of the United Nations’ team on the ground minimized such accounts during a call in March, contending they lacked sufficient evidence to support all claims and suggesting any U.N. report into sexual violence in the conflict would have to be approved and cleared by the Ethiopian government.

During an internal call among United Nations representatives in Ethiopia in March, several U.N. officials downplayed some instances of reports of rape as sensationalized 'media hype' during discussions on how to reduce the risk of sexual violence for women and girls in Tigray. A recording and transcript of the call was first released by Omna Tigray, a website focused on the Tigray conflict, earlier this month. Foreign Policy independently confirmed the authenticity of the transcript with four people familiar with the matter...

During the call in March, some participants also suggested U.N. Commission on Human Rights investigators would have to clear their report’s findings with the Ethiopian government, a key party in the conflict whose military and allied militias were among those accused of perpetrating atrocities against civilians in Tigray...

The call between U.N. representatives in Ethiopia took place just after the OHCHR announced it would launch a probe into allegations of human rights violations carried out by parties involved in the Tigray conflict, in partnership with the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission. It came weeks after U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken assessed that acts of “ethnic cleansing” were committed in western Tigray.

Several outside human rights advocates and other officials in the United Nations, some of whom spoke to Foreign Policy on condition of anonymity, said regardless of the context, U.N. officials should not downplay reports of sexual violence nor seek approval on what they report on the matter from a party in the conflict..."