Aid agencies distributing U.S. food aid in Ethiopia's war-affected Tigray region say they have had to stop feeding millions of people because of the Trump administration's restrictions on foreign aid.

During its war with Tigray fighters that devastated the region in 2020-2022, Ethiopian government restrictions on the rebellious region reduced aid flows to a trickle. Then in 2023, U.S. and U.N. aid distributions of grain were halted for months over a corruption scandal.

Now the Trump administration’s dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, has again halted food deliveries to a sprawling camp of over 20,000 people outside Tigray’s regional capital, Mekele.

“We will just die in silence,” said Tsege, one of the 2.4 million people in Tigray who depend on humanitarian grain, most of it provided by the U.S.

Aid agencies in Ethiopia had to apply to USAID for waivers to continue handing out U.S. grain. These have been secured, but USAID’s payments system is still not functioning.