Abiy Ahmed (Washington Insider Magazine) -A state of emergency has been declared by Ethiopia’s government in response to advances being made by armed forces from the northern Tigray part of the country. Addis Ababa has warned that a military assault on the capital may be imminent.
Ethiopia’s prime minister Abiy Ahmed called on Ethiopian civilians to take up arms against the advancing TPLF to prevent the country’s “demise”.
The Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front was largely in control of the East African country for the three decades leading up to 2018. Whilst the situation has remained tense since then, this is the first time TPLF troops have clashed with government personnel on such a scale. The short term catalyst was the cancellation of local Tiigray elections by Ahmed’s government but ethnic tensions have been a long-term cause of volatility in the country.
The development marks the newest step in the year-long long conflict that until now has mainly taken place in the country’s north. The worst of the outbreak in violence seemed to be a thing of the past until an uptick in fighting over the last few days.
It is estimated that thousands have been killed and over 2m people have been displaced from their homes since the outbreak of civil war in November 2020. Ahmed, who won a Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 for his work in progressing relations between Ethiopia and Eritrea, was widely criticised for sending troops into Eritrea at such an early stage of the conflict last year.
Reports have since come out of the country of atrocities inflicted by both sides.
The TPLF claims its most recent advances into the strategic town of Kombolcha and Dessie in the adjacent Amhara region is a response to a government blockade preventing food and other humanitarian supplies from reaching Tigray. They may also grant access to the majority of Ethiopia’s overseas trade due to their proximity to the road that links the country’s main port, Djibouti, with Addis Ababa.
The United Nations have said that up to 5m people in Tigray need urgent food relief and around half a million people are in famine-like conditions.
