Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the progress of the Ethiopian Government’s Inter-Ministerial Task Force in addressing the human rights violations and abuses documented in the joint report published by the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on 3 November 2021.

We have welcomed the establishment of the Inter-Ministerial Task Force by the Government of Ethiopia to respond to the findings of the Joint Investigation by the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) and the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Earlier this year, our Embassy in Addis Ababa provided technical support to Inter-Ministerial Task Force investigators and prosecutors from Addis Ababa, Amhara, and Afar on the Murad Code to support safe and ethical investigations of Conflict Related Sexual Violence. Our Embassy in Addis Ababa will continue to work with the Inter-Ministerial Taskforce to encourage effective action to provide accountability and justice for human rights violations in Ethiopia.