Source: Speech delivered by Prince Asfa-Wossen Asserate Kassa at the European Parliament, June 2026
Ethiopian scholar, author, and royal descendant Prince Asfa-Wossen Asserate Kassa delivered a powerful address before the European Parliament, urging international institutions to break their silence over what he described as a deepening and largely unreported catastrophe unfolding across Ethiopia, particularly against the Amhara people and Orthodox Christian communities.
A Nation in Multidimensional Crisis
Prince Asfa-Wossen opened his remarks by outlining the scale of Ethiopia’s deterioration, describing simultaneous political, social, economic, spiritual, psychological, environmental, and geopolitical crises. He argued that these overlapping emergencies pose an existential threat to a country that is not only the second most populous nation in Africa, but also the home of the African Union and several multilateral organizations.
He contended that Ethiopia’s government has abandoned its core obligation to defend human and national security and instead manages the country through an ethnic elite framework, a system he characterized as one of the most conflict-ridden and corruption-laden in the world, yet one that receives insufficient global attention.
A Government Using Ethnic Division as a Governing Tool
At the heart of the crisis, Prince Asfa-Wossen argued, lies the Ethiopian constitution itself, a document he described as structurally built on ethnic division. He drew a striking comparison to apartheid South Africa, noting that Ethiopia describes itself as an “ethnic federation,” a classification he said mirrors the very language used by architects of apartheid. He urged a shift toward genuine federalism rooted in individual rights, unity in diversity, and shared national identity across Ethiopia’s more than 120 ethnic groups.
Alarming Statistics: Drone Strikes, Mass Detention, and Sexual Violence
Prince Asfa-Wossen presented figures attributed to a U.S.-based human rights advocacy organization, stating that between October 2025 and March 2026, the Ethiopian federal government carried out aerial and drone attacks on the Amhara region resulting in nearly 40,000 casualties, with more than 14,000 killed and the remainder wounded. On a single day in February 2026, drone strikes reportedly caused over 1,600 casualties.
Beyond the battlefield, he cited data indicating that nearly 1,800 women and girls were subjected to rape by government forces, over 3,400 people were abducted, and approximately 14,900 individuals were arrested and jailed. He also noted that nearly 4,700 schools have been damaged or destroyed, leaving only about one in five children in the Amhara region attending school, a statistic he connected to findings by the Centre for International Policy Studies, which concluded that the pattern of targeting educational institutions is consistent with war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
Orthodox Christian Communities Under Systematic Attack
A significant portion of Prince Asfa-Wossen’s address focused on what he described as an eight-year coordinated campaign against Orthodox Christian communities, particularly in Ethiopia’s Oromia region. He described the destruction of ancient churches, the massacre of priests, monks, deacons, nuns, and worshippers, the forced displacement of tens of thousands of believers, and the government-backed removal of the church’s canonical leadership, replaced, he said, by regime loyalists and extremist figures.
He stated that the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, one of the oldest continuously functioning Christian institutions in the world, dating to the first century AD and predating the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions, has survived empires, invasions, and Marxist persecution across two millennia. He warned that it now faces deliberate institutional destruction under circumstances where the international community has the knowledge and the means to intervene.
Prince Asfa-Wossen directly named Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali as bearing personal responsibility for these crimes, asserting that the government does not merely fail to protect religious minorities but actively coordinates and shields perpetrators of violence.
Cultural Voices Silenced
The speech also highlighted the case of renowned Ethiopian artist Tewodros Kassahun, widely known as Teddy Afro, whose songs released in April 2026 resonated with over 70 million listeners globally and addressed issues of displacement, national identity, and human rights violations. One of his songs reportedly reached the second position on the Billboard Global chart in 2026. In response, the prince said, authorities raided the artist’s establishment, jailed his managers, and unleashed a campaign of personal attacks against him, a reaction he described as evidence of the government’s intolerance toward peaceful voices calling for reconciliation and unity.
International Calls to Action
Prince Asfa-Wossen concluded his address with specific demands directed at key international bodies:
- United Nations Human Rights Council — to open an independent investigation into the persecution of Orthodox Christians in Ethiopia’s Oromia region, focusing on documented massacres, church burnings, and displacement of clergy.
- United States Congress and Administration — to invoke the International Religious Freedom Act and formally designate Ethiopia as a Country of Particular Concern for systematic violations of religious freedom.
- European Parliament and the European Union — to impose targeted sanctions on individuals within the Ethiopian government who have enabled, coordinated, or shielded perpetrators of violence against religious and ethnic minorities.
- African Union — to end institutional silence and acknowledge that a member state is committing crimes against its own people.
- International Criminal Justice Bodies — to begin systematic documentation of evidence for the prosecution of those responsible for crimes against humanity, including Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali and senior security officials.
- Global Media and Civil Society — to break the wall of silence, provide sustained coverage, and amplify the voices of Ethiopian communities living under fear.
A Warning from History
Closing his remarks, Prince Asfa-Wossen invoked the precedent of the Rwandan genocide, the Yazidi genocide, and the Srebrenica massacre, instances where the international community stood by and later expressed remorse. He argued that remorse without prevention does not constitute justice, and called on the world not to repeat the same failure in Ethiopia.
“We demand justice. We demand accountability. We demand action now,” he declared.
European Parliament officials present at the session acknowledged the gravity of the testimony and indicated they would explore mechanisms available to the EU, including sanctions and urgency debates at the plenary session, as potential avenues for response.
This article is based on the public address delivered by Prince Asfa-Wossen Asserate Kassa before the European Parliament in June 2026. It has been paraphrased and compiled for informational purposes. All figures and claims cited reflect those stated by the speaker during his address.
