Solomon was a medical doctor in a town in West Gojjam Zone in Ethiopia’s northwestern Amhara region when armed conflict broke out in August 2023 between the Ethiopian federal government and an Amhara militia known as Fano.

Like many other medical professionals working in towns experiencing heavy fighting, he focused on treating all categories of patients, including those wounded in the fighting and those with non-trauma needs, despite the hospital’s decreasing resources and the very real risks health workers faced, including attacks from warring parties.

By early November 2023, the Ethiopian military had taken control of the town. Soldiers seized the hospital’s ambulance, accusing doctors of using it to provide treatment to Fano fighters. They also began regularly harassing staff, including Solomon, threatening them and repeatedly searching the hospital as well as the residences of hospital staff. Despite this, he and his colleagues continued to treat patients. In December, Solomon began receiving threatening phone calls from unknown callers whom he believed were government soldiers, questioning his relationship with Fano. He later found out the military had placed his name on a list of individuals suspected of giving treatment to Fano fighters. Fearing for his life, he fled the town, adding to the growing number of healthcare professionals who have stopped medical practice in the region or relocated beyond the front lines.

Many doctors, nurses and other health workers in the Amhara region have had similar experiences. For the past three years, since the start of northern Ethiopia’s armed conflict in November 2020, both Ethiopian government forces and non-state armed groups have repeatedly targeted medical professionals, others in the health sector as well as medical facilities.

This report documents the devastation of the healthcare system in 13 towns in the Awi, North Gojjam, West Gojjam, North Gonder, South Gonder, and South Wollo Zones of Amhara since the onset of conflict in region’s in August 2023. Human Rights Watch found that the Ethiopian military has committed serious violations of international humanitarian law—the laws of war—which may amount to war crimes.

Report by the Human Rights Watch