A Plea for Peace in Ethiopia's Tigray Region

A Plea for Peace in Ethiopia's Tigray Region

by Tigray community in Victoria

 

December 10, 2020

 

We are Ethiopian- Tigrayans families living in Victoria BC, writing this email to voice our pain and concern of our people in Tigray. We are asking you to be a voice to the voiceless. 

 

The War in Tigray is killing our family. We are around 20 families here in Victoria with close families in Tigray. We have been disconnected from our families and we do not know if our families are alive or dead. This stress is affecting us all. 

 

Please help us stop the WAR against the Tigray people. Please help us reach the Ethiopian Government to stop the war, maintain Stop Ethnic profiling Tigrayans all over Ethiopia. Please help us reach the government of Ethiopian to stop the war in Tigray, stop killing civilians, open the telecom and internet and allow us to reach out to our families.

Most of our family in Tigray are farmers depending on their land to survive. This year the Tigray region had the worst locust invasion in 25 years that destroyed approximately 490,000 acres of agricultural land. In addition, COVID-19 has been spreading fast in that region. To top it off, November 4, 2020, the Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Abiy Ahmed, declared war on his own people in Tigray region. 

 

The Ethiopian government ordered airstrike on civilians and destroyed the region infrastructure, shut off the power grid, internet, fresh water supply, disabled the banking system, and closed borders not allowing crucial aid in or residents out of the region. There is a growing human catastrophe and refugee crisis is happening in this region. Tigray has truly become one of the worst humanitarian crises. 

 

Children, women and elders are facing an unimaginable tragedy, combining the deadly war with the horrors of poverty, disease and near-starvation. As bombs fall from the sky, medical facilities are closing and supplies that could save young lives are simply not available. This war has been killing thousands of innocent civilians and people to flee to Sudan and has closed off all humanitarian access to the region, ringing alarm bells of human rights organization and genocide watch group.

The people in Tigray are seeking refuge in Sudan travelling more than 800 km by foot and crossing the Tekeze river to escape the war. Pregnant women and children are travelling by foot to reach a safe place to survive. UN reported more then 50 thousand people have arrived in Al Qadarif and Kassala, a town at the border of Sudan and Ethiopia. There are more than 4000 people arriving daily to escape the war. And this number is expected to increase sharply. 

 

As overwhelming number of people arriving every day from Tigray. The United nation fears the spread of communicable diseases among the refugee and the general safety and well-being of the people in the refugee camps.

 

The Tigray community in Victoria have many family members in Tigray. Since there is no phone or internet connection in the region currently, none of us know if our families are alive, dead or on their way to Sudan. We have protested for Peace and wrote letters to the international community to push for ceasefire. 

 

However, the Tigray community in Canada is losing hope. The Ethiopian Government is killing Tigrayans and ethnically profiling Tigrayns. please help us and be a voice to these people


Thank you

Tigray community in Victoria.