The Ethiopian Red Cross Society (ERCS) has «unreservedly condemned» the killing of an ambulance driver and several patients by armed groups in Ethiopia’s Amhara region, one of the epicenters of the war between the government and Tigray rebels in the north of the country.
The Red Cross does not report the date of the incident or how many patients were killed. It has identified the deceased driver as Mengist Minyil, a driver for the North Gonder division, who provided humanitarian services in West Dembiya for the Adi Remets hospital.
According to the Red Cross, at the time of his death he was transporting injured patients from Adwa in Tigray, bordering Amhara.
The Red Cross denounces the appalling situation of humanitarian workers trying to survive in the conflict. Since the outbreak of the war in November 2020, at least 27 aid workers have been killed, the penultimate of them in an attack by the Ethiopian army in Shire earlier this month.
In September last year, the Red Cross also recalls, at least 11 aid workers from the Tigray Support Society, based in the troubled state, were killed in an attack by gunmen.
Mengist’s lifeless body was taken to his hometown of Belessa on Friday. The 40-year-old aid worker, who had two daughters, is described by the organization as a «martyr to humanity, whose extraordinary humanitarian actions will be forever reflected in the memory of the association.»
Finally, the Ethiopian Red Cross calls on all armed groups to «guarantee the safety of humanitarian workers who are trying to carry out their work in the country under the banner of neutrality and non-discrimination,» according to the statement posted late Friday on its Facebook page.
The conflict in Tigray erupted following a TPLF attack on the main army base in Mekelle, after which Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed ordered an offensive against the group following months of tensions at the political and administrative level.
A «humanitarian truce» is currently in force, although both sides have accused each other of impeding aid deliveries and all have been accused by international NGOs of committing atrocities during the conflict.
The TPLF accuses Abiy of whipping up tensions since coming to power in April 2018, when he became the first Oromo to take office. Until then, the TPLF had been the dominant force within Ethiopia’s ruling coalition since 1991, the ethnically-supported Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). The group opposed Abiy’s reforms, which it saw as an attempt to undermine its influence.
