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Zecharias Zelalem

THREAD: My visual investigation of a drone massacre of 30+ people in Ethiopia is the cover story for today's @thecontinent digital paper. In this thread, I'll outline how we determined the precise location of a drone strike that happened in a war torn area cut off from the outside world.

The illustration by the amazing Wynona Mutisi (yay for commissioning artists, nay for soulless AI!) depicts the final moments as described by survivors, who were riding aboard an Isuzu truck when it was hit.

24 comments
Zecharias Zelalem

As I explained yesterday, documenting atrocities in Ethiopia's war in Amhara is extremely complex, because journalists are banned from any sort of critical reporting, and the war torn areas where atrocities take place are often cut off from the outside world, with the government cutting off communications to conceal its abuses. As such, news of this specific atrocity, which took place in February 2024, took a few days to emerge.

dair-community.social/@ZekuZel

Zecharias Zelalem

The drone massacre took place on February 19th. A few days later, the Ethiopian military, confident that none of the survivors were able to communicate with the outside world, issued a statement claiming that its forces carried out an operation that captured and killed "many" rebel forces.

But days later, news reports based on eyewitness testimony began to emerge. The BBC and Reuters were among those who published initial reports, citing eyewitness accounts.

Zecharias Zelalem

To make matters worse for the Ethiopian army, a week or so after the drone strike, a 60 second video clip emerged on the web, depicting the aftermath of the the drone strike. Its contents are too gruesome to describe here without a content warning. Undated, unverified, it still went viral and provoked outrage.

Zecharias Zelalem

The problem with this atrocity, despite the emergence of a video, it was impossible to know for certain even where it took place.

A few eyewitnesses described the approximate location. Journalists listed 3 or 4 different towns within a 30km radius where they suspected the massacre took place. With no concrete verification, as the months went by government supporters began denouncing the video as faked or old, and others simply declared news of an atrocity as a fabrication.

Zecharias Zelalem

In March, a contact of a contact managed to smuggle additional video and photographic evidence of the drone massacre out of the region. The individual used a flash disk hidden in his sock, and traveled to the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa.

The additional footage is also gruesome, the photographs are not. The new footage shows the surrounding area, and makes it easier to locate.

The videos are horrible, but I have heavily censored versions on Telegram at this link
t.me/ZekuZelalem/48

In March, a contact of a contact managed to smuggle additional video and photographic evidence of the drone massacre out of the region. The individual used a flash disk hidden in his sock, and traveled to the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa.

The additional footage is also gruesome, the photographs are not. The new footage shows the surrounding area, and makes it easier to locate.

Zecharias Zelalem

A network of activists got the footage to me, but the person who captured it disappeared back into the region, and became unreachable by phone/internet.

However, the photographs revealed details that were difficult to see in the blurry videos. Including that there were powerlines and electricity transmission towers parallel from where the truck was hit.

Zecharias Zelalem

I learned the identities of some of the doctors who were on the scene first. Most health centers have some satellite phone access, and their doctors are permitted to move around the region. When I contacted two of them, they made it clear that they were afraid to speak to me after receiving threats from the army.

Later, we learned from @humanrightswatch of an army campaign to silence and intimidate doctors, many of whom provided info on casualties to journalists.
hrw.org/report/2024/07/03/if-s

I learned the identities of some of the doctors who were on the scene first. Most health centers have some satellite phone access, and their doctors are permitted to move around the region. When I contacted two of them, they made it clear that they were afraid to speak to me after receiving threats from the army.

Zecharias Zelalem

Nevertheless, a doctor did confirm to me the hospital that they, the first only first responders to assist the victims, was located. They were staff of the Gawuna Hospital. This narrowed the search down considerably.

The village of Gawuna isn't identifiable on most maps, the hospital for some reason, is. Here is where the hospital is located, in rural Amhara country. It serves all of the nearby villages.

maps.app.goo.gl/28Tm33bhbWs7YX

Zecharias Zelalem

Eventually, I did manage to speak to eyewitnesses who described the site as a four way intersection near Gawuna. They said it was "near the village of Fela" or at the "Fela Turnabout." Problem is this is an informal name unavailable on any maps. But at least with the description, we could rule out many areas and narrow down the search even more.

Zecharias Zelalem

In this corner of rural Ethiopia, there aren't that many four way intersections. So with a bit of studying of the footage and of satellite imagery...voila, found a match!

Barely a five minute drive from the Gawuna Hospital, this location on a road that cuts through rural Amhara country became the focus of our efforts.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

The electricity transmission towers seen in the footage appeared to be a match with what is seen at this location on Google Earth.

The grass going green and brown at different times is simply due to the seasons. The atrocity took place in February, smack in the middle of Ethiopia's dry season. The Google Earth imagery was snapped in October, during Ethiopia's rainy season. There are noticeable differences every year that we are accustomed to seeing.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

I had done a bit of digging and came across some openly sourced documents, including an IOM village assessment done in 2022, likely to facilitate humanitarian aid deliveries to the region. I was lucky...it contained a list of informal village names in the region, and their coordinates. I found a village named Fela, which was a name used by survivors I interviewed. The IOM listed these coordinates: 9.9448132 39.4190002

view.officeapps.live.com/op/vi

I had done a bit of digging and came across some openly sourced documents, including an IOM village assessment done in 2022, likely to facilitate humanitarian aid deliveries to the region. I was lucky...it contained a list of informal village names in the region, and their coordinates. I found a village named Fela, which was a name used by survivors I interviewed. The IOM listed these coordinates: 9.9448132 39.4190002

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

Those coordinates placed the village precisely parallel to the four way intersection that we had identified earlier. For vehicles driving from west to east, the road to Fela village was literally a sharp turn right, meaning "Fela Turnabout," the description given to us, was pretty consistent with this location.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

Comparison of Google Earth imagery with photographs, and screengrabs from the video (considerably cropped to conceal graphic content) shows consistency, two transmission towers, dirt road leading to the village of Fela, which can be seen in the distance.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

This closeup of the spot at the intersection seen on Google Earth from October 3rd 2023, appears to show parked vehicles. It would be consistent with descriptions that survivors gave me of the location: as being a truck or bus stop for passengers to get off and walk to nearby villages.

At this point, the evidence is overwhelming. This is where an Ethiopian air force drone cut down 30+ people on February 19th 2024.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

Why go to these lengths? For much of the past 8 months, victims have been told they are lying, or that their dead loved ones were armed fighters who got what was coming. That atrocity won't be erased from history.

One day, when independent investigators are allowed to work freely, we can tell them where to begin their probe. Archiving atrocities today could enable justice tomorrow. This goes for Ethiopia, just as it does for Gaza, Syria, Lebanon, Sudan, Ukraine and elsewhere.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

The only thing we were unable to do this time was humanize the victims by adding names & faces with their stories. They live in the warzone. Putting their names and faces out would have invited instant retaliation by a brutal government. Doing so was impossible this time, perhaps in the future.

FYI...it's the second time I feature testimony from this massacre's survivors. Two of them were featured in a story earlier this year I did for Canadian newspaper Globe and Mail.

theglobeandmail.com/world/arti

The only thing we were unable to do this time was humanize the victims by adding names & faces with their stories. They live in the warzone. Putting their names and faces out would have invited instant retaliation by a brutal government. Doing so was impossible this time, perhaps in the future.

FYI...it's the second time I feature testimony from this massacre's survivors. Two of them were featured in a story earlier this year I did for Canadian newspaper Globe and Mail.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

So yeah, that's the story of the cover:
"A war crime happened here." Really didn't need much explaining. The people in the picture, are dressed in traditional Ethiopian attire, white shawls. That's what we wear at celebrations. The dead were returning from a baby's baptism, and were all from two or three families. The picture depicts the moment before their white shawls were soaked in blood.

Zecharias Zelalem replied to Zecharias

Meanwhile, in unrelated news...Ethiopia was elected into the United Nations Human Rights Council this week.

Once again, the impact of the proliferation of cheap drones sold by Iran, China, UAE and Turkey to authoritarian regimes with a promise of swift victory.

Thank you for your time.
-ZZ.

africanews.com/2024/10/10/dr-c

LeuchtturmECK replied to Zecharias

@ZekuZelalem Thank you for your investigative work!

terna replied to Zecharias

thank you for this work, @ZekuZelalem it's vital.

ophiocephalic 🐍

@ZekuZelalem
A horrible story but thank you for telling it. The magazine cover art really brings home the sadness of it

@thecontinent

Zecharias Zelalem

@ophiocephalic @thecontinent thank you! And yes, the picture left me mouth agape when I first saw it. That's the talented Wynona Mutisi....she never fails to deliver with her illustrations!

Michael Grinder

@ZekuZelalem @thecontinent Thanks for sharing this important but difficult work with us.

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