GENEVA, March 4 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The UN Human Rights Council has appointed former International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, to head a team that will probe alleged violations during the conflict in Ethiopia.
The team will have two other international experts; Kenyan lawyer Kaari Betty Murungi and Steven Ratner of the United States.
They will serve on the newly-created International Commission of Human Rights Experts on Ethiopia.
The UN rights body agreed last December to send international investigators to Ethiopia where the federal troops and rebels have been fighting.
The commission was handed a one-year renewable mandate to impartially investigate allegations of violations and abuses committed by all sides in the conflict.
Fatou Bensouda was the ICC’s chief prosecutor from June 2012 to June 2021.
Since its outbreak in November 2020, the war, which began in Tigray (northern Ethiopia) and then spread to the neighbouring regions of Amhara and Afar, has been marked by numerous allegations of abuses on both sides.
Last November, a joint report by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, and the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission documented possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in the conflict.
The three UN-appointed experts are mandated to investigate and gather evidence on human rights violations committed since Nov 3, 2020 by all parties to the conflict in Ethiopia. The aim is to identify, to the extent possible, those responsible for the violations with a possibility of prosecution.
The resolution establishing the commission was tabled by the European Union and adopted by 21 votes in favour out of 47 states in the Council, against 15 votes against (including China and many African countries) and 11 abstentions, during a special session of the Council.
The Commission will be required to provide an oral update on its work during the fiftieth session of the Human Rights Council in June 2022 and a written report at the following session in September.
The conflict between Ethiopian government forces and rebels in Tigray has left thousands dead, more than two million displaced and hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians in near-starvation conditions, according to the UN. — NNN-AGENCIES