Authorities in Ethiopia are carrying out mass arrests of hundreds, even thousands, of people in the capital after deadly unrest in the country’s Amhara region, lawyers and witnesses said.
Ethiopia’s Cabinet declared a state of emergency earlier this month in Amhara after local militia fighters known as Fano seized control of several major towns, which the military has since retaken by force. The Fano, who fought alongside Ethiopian military forces in a two-year conflict in the neighboring Tigray region, have resisted being disbanded after a peace deal last November.
Ethiopia’s parliament is to vote Monday on giving formal approval to extraordinary measures which allow authorities to arrest suspects without a warrant, conduct searches and impose curfews. Under the previous state of emergency imposed during the Tigray conflict, tens of thousands of ethnic Tigrayans were rounded up across the country.
This time, “there has been widespread arrest of civilians who are of ethnic Amhara origin,” the state-appointed Ethiopian Human Rights Commission said Monday, calling on the federal authorities to cease the detentions.