Mekelle/Tel Aviv/Nairobi/Pretoria/London
Tigrayan Rights Group Raises Alarm Over Reported Media Freedom Violations
Brussels, 9 November 2025 | Horn News Hub
The Tigrayan Advocacy for Human Rights and Justice in Europe (TAHRJE) has issued an international appeal alleging a growing campaign of intimidation and suppression targeting independent journalists in Tigray, northern Ethiopia. The organization is calling on major international media and human rights bodies to intervene, warning that the reported media repression could undermine post-conflict recovery and accountability in the region.
In a statement distributed to several international organizations including Reporters Without Borders (RSF), the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), UNESCO, and the UN Human Rights Council, TAHRJE accused remnants of the outlawed Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) “core and above-core” militarized faction of orchestrating a deliberate campaign to silence independent journalism in coordination with what it described as the Eritrean authoritarian regime.
The group said journalists who have reported on war crimes, corruption, and internal political divisions in Tigray are facing a pattern of harassment, arbitrary detention, and physical threats. The statement alleged that independent media platforms have been forced to shut down and that some reporters have received death threats or been targeted through online surveillance and smear campaigns.
TAHRJE warned that such actions constitute a breach of the Pretoria Peace Agreement signed in 2022 between the Ethiopian federal government and the TPLF and represent violations of international humanitarian and human rights law.
The group cited several global legal frameworks protecting journalists, including Article 79 of the Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions and UN Security Council Resolution 1738, which condemn violence against media workers in conflict or post-conflict zones.
TAHRJE appealed to international organizations to take specific actions. It called on RSF to send a fact-finding mission to Tigray, CPJ to document and publicize cases of persecution, IMS to provide legal and digital protection for journalists, IPI to mobilize global advocacy, and UNESCO together with OHCHR to jointly investigate and ensure accountability.
“The right to inform is the right to exist,” the statement declared, calling on the global community to defend journalists who, according to the group, risk their lives to uphold truth and justice.
TAHRJE said it is compiling a confidential dossier of verified cases of journalist intimidation and censorship in Tigray to be shared with partner organizations upon request.
The organization concluded its statement with a warning that silence in the face of repression is not neutrality but complicity, urging urgent international action to prevent what it described as a renewed climate of fear in post-war Tigray.
Staff members of Horn News Hub are reportedly among the journalists targeted in this growing campaign of intimidation.
