With reference to the ongoing starvation in Gaza and the Ethiopian famine of 1984, Gaby Hinsliff writes: “Except this time it’s no natural disaster” (There is a dangerous disconnect: on Gaza, politics no longer speaks for the people, 24 July). But the starvation of Tigrayans in northern Ethiopia in the 1980s was as man-made as that of Gaza.
The Ethiopian government of the time blocked food from reaching Tigray to starve it into submission. The earlier government of Emperor Haile Selassie did likewise, and also persuaded its ally, the British government, to bomb Tigray in 1943.
Today, the starvation, and the rape and killing of Tigrayans, continues as the Pretoria agreement, which was supposed to bring peace after the most recent war on Tigray, in which 600,000 Tigrayans perished (2020-22), has not been fully implemented.
Many Tigrayans are still unable to return to their ancestral homes in western Tigray as it is occupied by hostile forces from other Ethiopian regions and from neighbouring Eritrea. Across the world, starvation remains an effective tool of war.
Gail Warden
London
