We call upon the Church of England and Westminster Abbey to return to Ethiopia the religious and sacred to the Ethiopian Christian church, a tablet called a tabot, a precious artefact that was was looted from the Empire of Abyssinia by the British in 1868.

This item is a holy relic to the 35 million members of the Ethiopian Christian Church, the oldest branch of Christianity in recorded human history.  So revered is this object, that only priests from the country's Ethiopian Orthodox church are able to lay their eyes upon it. The object is said to symbolise the Ark of the Covenant. 

Westminster Abbey has recently denied senior clergy from the Ethiopian Christian church the ability to observe and pray before the relic which is housed inside Westminster Abbey hidden at the back of the  Henry VII Lady Chapel.  We the undersigned say that not only should senior clergy from the Ethiopian church been given immediate access to the ancient relic, but in addition the item  should be formally returned to his country of origin, the modern day country of Ethiopia. it is entirely unacceptable that such restrictions should be placed on an item that is seen as central to the faith of others. That this relic should be part of colonial plunder and be bathed in the blood of colonial genocide, provide even more compelling reason for its return.

We call upon Westminster Abbey, the government and the Church of England to make reparation on this matter with immediate return of this important and significant religious relic to the Ethiopian Christian church.