Ethiopia PM claims military success against rebels in north
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed says the military has suppressed rebels in the northernmost region of Tigray.
“The army not only repulsed the attacks but has managed to control important and key locations,” Ahmed said in a televised address on Wednesday evening.
There were no confirmed reports about casualties or whether the fighting was going on. But Ahmed said the government would “conduct more operations in the coming days.”
The army also said it had inflicted “massive” damage on the rebel Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF).
On Sunday, an attack on civilians killed at least 54 people from the ethnic Amhara group in Ethiopia’s restive Oromia.
Ahmed blamed the TPLF for the attack. His office said in a statement that early on Wednesday, the TPLF had also attempted to steal artillery and other equipment from federal forces stationed in the region.
He then ordered a military response.
The government also declared a state of emergency in the region.
Ahmed was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 for resolving a border conflict with neighboring Eritrea.
In his Wednesday statement, he alleged that the TPLF was threatening that truce.
The rebels have been “manufacturing military outfits resembling that of the Eritrean National Defense Forces, to implicate the Eritrean government in false claims of aggression against the people of Tigray,” he said.
The Tigrayans held much political power from 1991 to 2018, when Ahmed was elected.
Since then, his government has introduced a number of reforms. Many senior Tigrayan officials have also been detained, fired, or sidelined, in what the federal government describes as a clampdown on corruption.
The once-powerful TPLF, however, complains of being unfairly singled out in corruption prosecutions.
Tigray’s population makes up five percent of Ethiopia’s 109 million people, but it is wealthier and more influential than many other, larger regions.
Simmering ethnic tensions have now concerned rights groups, which have warned against destabilization in Africa’s second-most populous country.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has expressed alarm about the reported armed clashes in the Tigray region, calling for “immediate measures to de-escalate tensions and ensure a peaceful resolution to the dispute.”
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