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'Choose - I Kill You or Rape You': Abuse Accusations Surge in Ethiopia's War

Reuters

   HAMDAYET, SUDAN - The young coffee seller said she was split from
   family and friends by an Ethiopian soldier at the Tekeze River, taken
   down a path, and given a harrowing choice.

   "He said: 'Choose, either I kill you or rape you'," the 25-year-old
   told Reuters at the Hamdayet refugee camp in Sudan where she had fled
   from conflict in Ethiopia's Tigray region.

   The doctor who treated her when she arrived at the camp in December,
   Tewadrous Tefera Limeuh, confirmed to Reuters that he provided pills to
   stop pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, and guided her to a
   psychotherapist.

   "The soldier ... forced a gun on her and raped her," Tewadrous, who was
   volunteering with the Sudanese Red Crescent, said the woman told him.
   "She asked him if he had a condom and he said, 'why would I need a
   condom?'"

   Five aid workers for international and Ethiopian aid groups said they
   had received multiple similar reports of abuse in Tigray. The United
   Nations appealed this week for an end to sexual assaults in the region.

   Among a "high number" of allegations, particularly disturbing reports
   have emerged of people being forced to rape relatives or have sex in
   exchange for basic supplies, the U.N. Office of the Special
   Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict said in a statement
   Thursday.

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