More than 500 rape cases were reported to five clinics in Ethiopia’s Tigray region, the United Nations said on Thursday, warning because of stigma and a lack of health services the actual numbers were likely to be much higher.

“Women say they have been raped by armed actors, they also told stories of gang rape, rape in front of family members and men being forced to rape their own family members under the threat of violence,” Wafaa Said, deputy UN aid coordinator in Ethiopia, said in a briefing to UN member states in New York.

She said at least 516 rape cases had been reported by five medical facilities in Mekelle, Adigrat, Wukro, Shire and Axum.

“Given the fact that most health facilities are not functioning and also the stigma associated with rape, it is projected that actual numbers are much higher,” she added.

A dozen top UN officials on Monday called for a stop to indiscriminate and targeted attacks against civilians in Tigray, particularly calling out reports of rape and “other horrific forms of sexual violence”.

Fighting in Tigray broke out in November between government troops and the region’s former governing party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front.

Thousands killed

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has also said troops from neighbouring Eritrea were in the region.

Redwan Hussein, spokesperson for the government’s emergency task force on Tigray, Billene Seyoum, spokesperson for the prime minister, Mulu Nega, head of Tigray’s interim administration, Eritrea’s Foreign Minister Osman Saleh Mohammed and Eritrea’s Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel did not respond to calls and messages requesting comment on the UN remarks on Thursday.

The violence in Tigray has killed thousands of people and forced hundreds of thousands from their homes in the mountainous region of about five million.

“Most of the internally displaced people left with nothing more than the clothes they were wearing. They are generally traumatised and tell stories of the difficult journey they took in search of safety. Some reported walking for two weeks and some as far as 500km,” Said said.

“Of the people who travelled with them, some were reportedly killed – particularly youngsters, people were reportedly beaten, women were subject to rape, some were pregnant and delivered on the way losing their babies,” she said.

This week, Abiy acknowledged for the first time that atrocities, such as rape, had been committed and said any soldiers committing crimes would be punished.

Dozens of witnesses in Tigray have said Eritrean soldiers routinely killed civilians, gang-raped and tortured women, and looted households and crops.

Eritrea has not responded to queries on reports of atrocities.