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· European Union has postponed almost Euro 90 million in budget support payments to Ethiopia over the bloc’s concerns of the Tigray crisis, according to some media reports
· EU earlier expressed its desire to end the hostilities and lift restrictions on humanitarian activities and media access to the northern region
· The recent tensions in the Northern part of Trigaya between the federal army and the agitators has killed thousands, and displaced 950,000, according to UN estimates
The European Union has postponed almost Euro 90 million in budget support payments to Ethiopia over the bloc’s concerns of the Tigray
crisis, according to some media reports. EU earlier expressed its desire to end the hostilities and lift restrictions on humanitarian
activities and media access to the northern region.
The recent tensions in the Northern part of Trigaya between the federal army and the agitators has killed thousands, and displaced
950,000, according to UN estimates. A large number of people have fled to Sudan, worsening the fragile economic condition of that country.
To counter the unrest in the region, Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announced a military attack targeting Tigray’s ruling party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) purportedly in response to TPLF-orchestrated attacks on federal army camps in the region. Recently, the Ethiopian prime minister claimed that the federal army could flush out the TPLF from the region and exhorted the people to bring about normalcy in civic life.
The Euro 88.5 million (US$107.6 million) by the EU and includes Euro 60 million for a program supporting transport and logistics links with Ethiopia’s neighbors and Euro 17.5 million for the health sector. The current predicament poses great concern to the western forces which perceive Ethiopia as a strong allay in the fight against Islamist Jihadis.
