The Orthodox Christmas Day Massacre in Southern Tigray by the Fascist Oromo Army of Ethiopia

✞ On 8 and 9 January (the days following Christmas in Tigray, Ethiopia), Oromo soldiers of the Ethiopian army massacred more than 100 civilians in Bora villages in southern Tigray in vengeance, after the army sustained heavy casualties in a fight with local militia.

Tghat first reported a massacre at Bora Selewa on 12 January, 2021. We reported that the massacre took place on 10 January. We have learned that the main massacre took place on 8 followed by some more massacres on 9 and 10.

First, on the Orthodox Christmas day of 7 January, 13 military trucks full of Ethiopian soldiers arrived at the town of Bora. They started firing to the villages, terrorizing the entire area. The next day, early in the morning, local militias gathered and engaged the soldiers starting from as early as 5 AM. The fighting lasted until 19 PM. Several reinforcement trucks full with soldiers came from Adi Shihu. The Oromo soldiers sustained a huge number of casualties, said eyewitnesses. Some eyewitnesses estimated up to 700 Ethiopian soldiers were killed in the day-long fight.
Eyewitnesses said the Ethiopian soldiers were angry. A part of the Ethiopian troops went to Bora town around 14PM and started massacring villagers, even old people. “It was just a pure vengeance “, said eyewitnesses. One eyewitness said he saw soldiers entering an old woman’s house and killing her in her house.

The main massacre took place in the Bora town (Gra Demo area), then in the villages of Chelena, Wa’ero, Mebal, Mai LiHam and Qilma. In Gra Demo area of Bora, the soldiers killed people in their houses and outside. They killed two or three members in one household.