Right now, across Tigray, young people are being hunted in their own communities. Armed forces are setting up checkpoints, going door to door, raiding funerals, bars, and gold-mining sites — seizing youth by force and transporting them to military training camps against their will. Families are locking their children indoors. Young men are in hiding. This campaign of forced conscription, known locally as ግፋ (Giffa), is being carried out by the TPLF and its armed wing.

This is not mobilization. It is abduction. And it is a crime.

The facts are documented. Human Rights Watch reports that since May 5, 2026, authorities have carried out door-to-door sweeps and mass forced round-ups — including of children — and are punishing the parents and young children of those who evade: https://www.hrw.org/news/2026/06/23/ethiopia-tigray-authorities-should-withdraw-abusive-law

A June 2026 proclamation imposes long prison terms and even the death penalty on those who resist conscription. Human Rights First–Ethiopia, after interviewing more than 27 witnesses, documented youth abducted from football viewing halls during the Champions League final, gold miners rounded up near Bizet, and a father of four beaten and dragged from his shop in Enticho: https://www.hrfe.org/a-brief-investigative-report-on-forced-military-recruitment-in-the-tigray-region/

AFP documented regional forces storming a funeral and bundling young mourners into vans bound for training camps: https://www.gulf-times.com/article/727831/international/africa/forced-conscription-returns-as-war-looms-in-ethiopias-tigray

On July 3, 2026, the people of Tigray answered. Protests erupted in Mekelle as residents confronted vehicles carrying newly conscripted youth: https://kulu-media.com/tplf-armed-forces-resume-mekelle-youth-conscription/

Throughout Tigray's modern history, its youth took up arms voluntarily — during the seventeen-year struggle, and again during the genocidal war on Tigray. The resort to forced round-ups today is not a sign of strength. It is a confession of illegitimacy. When leadership commands genuine trust, forced conscription is unnecessary.

Tigray has already paid an unbearable price — as many as 600,000 lives lost by African Union estimates. Its youth are not raw material for commanders who have lost the consent of the people they claim to lead. They are the future of Tigray, and they deserve education, employment, and the chance to rebuild — not a war they did not choose, for a cause they do not believe in, under leaders they do not trust.

WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, DEMAND:

An immediate, unconditional halt to all forced conscription, round-ups (Giffa), checkpoints, and door-to-door sweeps across Tigray.
The immediate release of everyone — especially minors — conscripted against their will.
Withdrawal of the June 2026 mobilization law, including its prison and death-penalty provisions against evaders.
An end to reprisals against families of evaders and against mothers, youth, journalists, and civil society who speak out.
Independent investigation by the UN and African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights into the forced recruitment campaign, including the conscription of children.
Pressure from the guarantors of the Pretoria Agreement — the African Union, Canada, the United States, Kenya, South Africa, and the EU — to make Tigrayan authorities halt forced recruitment.
Unified condemnation from all Tigrayan political parties and civil society: whatever their differences, forced conscription is a crime, and it must stop.
The youth of Tigray survived a genocide. They will not now be marched into another war at gunpoint by their own leaders. We stand with them.

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