Ending a five-month ceasefire, fighting between rebels in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region and central government forces broke out on the outskirts of the city of Kobo on Wednesday. Each side blamed the other for the outbreak of conflicts.
The fight is a blow to hopes of peace talks between Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the party that controls the breakaway region of the same name.
Fighting in Africa’s second most populous nation began in November 2020 and displaced millions of people, pushing sizable parts of Tigray into famine and leaving thousands of civilians dead.
The dispute pits the Addis Ababa-based government, led by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed for four years, and the TPLF insurgents — the group that led the coalition that ruled Ethiopia from 1991 to 2018, in a phase marked by authoritarianism and allegations of corruption. .
On Tuesday (23), the military accused Tigré rebels of preparing to attack and covering their tracks by spreading fake news on social media. “It has become an open secret that they (the TPLF) are campaigning to frame our army,” the government statement said, accusing the rebels of spreading “pre-conflict propaganda.”
For its part, the military command of Tigray’s forces accused the government of violating the ceasefire, saying in a statement that it believed the attack near Kobo was a distraction and its forces expected a new major offensive.
“The peace process is set to fail,” said Debretsion Gebremichael, leader of the TPFL. He also accuses the government of withholding key services and blocking the region. The government denies.
Redwan Hussein, the prime minister’s national security adviser, said the Ethiopian army shot down a plane carrying weapons to Tigre. But Getachew Reda, a spokesman for the TPLF, called the statement “a blatant lie”.
The war in Tigris broke out nearly two years ago and spread to neighboring Afar and Amhara regions in mid-2021. Last November, Tigris forces marched towards Addis Ababa, the capital, but were repulsed by an offensive by the government.
A ceasefire was announced in March after the government declared a humanitarian truce so food could reach the region. According to the UN, almost 90% of the people in Tigré need help, malnutrition rates have “risen” and the situation will worsen until the October harvest.
On Wednesday, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for a ceasefire, peace talks, full humanitarian access and the restoration of public services in Tigre. The region has been without banking and communications services since late June, and fuel imports are restricted, limiting the distribution of aid.
In June, Ahmed’s government formed a committee to negotiate with the TPLF, and earlier this month said it wanted talks “without preconditions”. The government of Tigre called for the restoration of services to civilians before the start of the dialogues, in an appeal echoed by diplomats.
The prime minister, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, took office amid popular protests and, in a way seen as promising, began to implement liberal reforms in the country. Quickly, however, he clashed with the TPLF.
For the leaders of the Tigray region, the projects aimed at the centralization of power in Ethiopia and, therefore, at the loss of regional autonomy – one of the political pillars of recent decades in the country.
