(Addis Ababa) The Ethiopian government said Thursday that it will not back down in the “existential war” against the Tigrayan rebels, who have claimed in recent days to have seized several strategic cities and threatened to march on the capital Addis Ababa .
One year to the day after the federal army was sent to Tigray, the northernmost region of Ethiopia, the rebels of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) claim to have advanced up to a few hundred kilometers from Addis Ababa.
325 km from the capital
This weekend, they claimed responsibility for the capture of two strategic towns in the Amhara region, where they advanced after recapturing most of Tigray in June.
On Wednesday, they announced that they had entered Kemissie, 325 kilometers north of the capital, where they joined fighters from the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), an armed group of the Oromo ethnic group with which they have made an alliance.
PHOTO EDUARDO SOTERAS, FRANCE-PRESS AGENCY
A woman holds a candle during a memorial service for victims of the Tigray conflict hosted by the city administration in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, November 3, 2021.
This nationalist organization is based in Oromia, the largest region of Ethiopia that surrounds Addis Ababa. An OLA spokesperson told AFP on Wednesday that the capital could fall in a matter of weeks.
“The TPLF and its puppets are being surrounded” by government forces, the government denied in a belligerent statement denouncing “foreign propaganda” favorable to the rebels.
“We are waging an existential war! “, He launched, echoing the statements of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed accusing in recent days the” terrorists “of wanting to” destroy “the country.
“We must all unite […] to silence our enemies drunk with temporary victories, ”the text continues.
The second most populous country in Africa (more than 110 million inhabitants), Ethiopia is a mosaic of peoples united in a system known as “ethnic federalism”.
“Blatant” obstruction
On Thursday, Parliament approved the state of emergency declared two days earlier by the government throughout the country, while the authorities in the capital asked residents to organize to defend the city.
“After a year of war, the Ethiopian conflict is at an incredibly dangerous stage, where neither side shows signs of retreating,” said William Davison, analyst at the International Crisis Group.
Begun on November 4, 2020, the conflict in Tigray, which aimed for the federal army to remove the dissident regional authorities from the TPLF, has seen a spectacular turnaround in recent months.
Abiy Ahmed, Nobel Peace Prize 2019, proclaimed victory on November 28, 2020. But in June, pro-TPLF fighters took over most of the region, then continued their offensive in neighboring Afar regions and of the Amhara.
The rebel advance worries the international community.
A senior official from the US government humanitarian agency (USAID) warned Thursday that a rebel march on the capital would worsen the already dire humanitarian situation in the north of the country.
More than 400,000 people are on the verge of famine in Tigray, subject to a “de facto” blockade according to the UN.
The government and the TPLF accuse each other of obstructing the delivery of aid and starving the population.
But the USAID official on Thursday pointed to the responsibility of the government leading against Tigray “perhaps the most flagrant humanitarian obstruction in the world”.
“Hardly any fuel, cash, medicine or medical supplies have entered for months, forcing humanitarian (organizations) to cut back or completely stop their programs,” he said.
In the past two weeks, no aid has been able to reach Tigray, he said, also highlighting the growing needs in Afar and Amhara regions, where hundreds of thousands of civilians are fleeing the fighting.
Risk of “fragmentation”
US Horn of Africa envoy Jeffrey Feltman arrived in Addis Ababa on Thursday to promote a peaceful solution to the conflict.
The US embassy has announced that it is allowing the voluntary departure of most of its staff and advising against travel to Ethiopia.
The British Embassy has advised its citizens to “consider leaving” on available commercial flights.
The EU renewed its calls for a ceasefire and negotiations, arguing that “the recent escalation […] risks dragging the country further into fragmentation and generalized armed conflicts, and worsening the situation of the population ”.