· African Union (AU) has called for ending the conflict in the Northern Tigray region of Ethiopia, which, of late, has become an epicenter breeding hostilities with the Federal government
· The United Nations also told Abiy Ahmed to initiate a dialogue with Tigryans
· The response from the Prime Minister’s office was that he was not ignoring international calls for peace.
The violence in the northern region bordering Eritrea and Sudan has been a “pain point” for Ethiopia, which is the second most populated country in the region after Nigeria. Ethnic conflicts have had a heavy causality in the region. Federal security forces are stationed in Tigray. There are reports about casualties mainly from the Trigray side. But such reports could not be verified because of the breakdown of the communication channels. Telephones are mostly down in the region.
The head of the AU Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, has expressed concern over the escalation of the military confrontation and exhorted both parties to go on a dialogue mode to find a peaceful solution in the interest of the country.
The reports coming from different sources in Ethiopia and outside indicate that the escalating violence has killed hundreds of people. But the prime minister assured that Ethiopia is not sliding into a civil war. Abiy Ahmed, the Nobel Prize winner for Peace in 2019, insisted that his country was not descending into “chaos” despite an ongoing military operation in Tigray.
The violence in Tigray region has led to dissolution of the local government by the Federal Government and neutralization of the military assets in the region, according to Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed. The regional authorities of the Tigray, People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), say that the Prime Minister has lost the mandate to continue in office since he has unilaterally postponed the elections. Ethiopia postponed the elections due in August because of the Covid-19 pandemic. www. Trendsnafrica.com has been reporting about these developments from time to time
In the meantime, Abiy Ahmed said that military intervention in Tigray on November 4 following an attack on federal troops orchestrated by their regional authorities, will have a successful end, but did not spell out the details. Abiy Ahemd hails from the Oroma tribal region. Before he came to power in 2018, the power in 2018, people from Trigray were playing a dominant role in Ethiopian politics.
Ethiopian army chief, Berhanu Jula, claimed that federal forces had captured four towns in western Tigray. The Ethiopian TV broadcast also shown images of Ethiopian government forces entering the border town of Dansha in Tigray
