ETHIOPIA-TIGRAY-CONFLICT

Rawa, 40, poses for a photograph in an undisclosed location in Shire on October 11, 2024. Rawa, originally from Welkait, told AFP that at the beginning of the conflict in Tigray in November 2020, she has been beaten, tortured and raped by seven men with different military uniforms, Ethiopian and Eritrean.The two-year war in Ethiopia's Tigray region left hundreds of thousands people dead, more than one million still displaced and cost more than $20 billion in damage, until a peace deal in November 2022 ended the bloodshed. Among the many barbaric acts inflicted on civilians during the two-year conflict in Ethiopia's northernmost region of Tigray, rape and sexual violence were "systematic" and used as a weapon of war, according to a study published in 2023 by the scientific journal BMC Women's Health. Estimates of the number of rapes committed vary widely -- up to as many as 120,000 -- according to data compiled by the researchers, with many reluctant to report the attacks. The victims reported that most of the perpetrators were Ethiopian or Eritrean soldiers, but also militiamen from the neighbouring Amhara region. (Photo by Michele Spatari / AFP) (Photo by MICHELE SPATARI/AFP via Getty Images)