Category: General

The U.S., France and Germany have joined other countries in urging their citizens to leave Ethiopia as fighting between federal forces and rebel groups moves closer to the capital, Addis Ababa. The U.N. has also announced evacuation flights for family members of its staff in the country. The presidents of neighboring Kenya and South Africa have joined calls for an urgent cease-fire.
As the security situation worsens in Ethiopia, there are increasing concerns about what happens next.
William Davison is the International Crisis Group’s Senior Analyst for Ethiopia.
“There is a real prospect of the war coming to Addis Ababa and that could have even more terrible consequences we have seen so far we could see, very serious urban warfare. We could see Amhara-Oromo clashes if the OLA is involved lots of popular resistance obviously to the Tigray forces, the potential breakdown in government authority if there is an effort to regime change. We could see the violence against Tigrayans civilians increase and the repression rapidly. So definitely a need for a cease-fire,” he said.
CNN reports the U.S. military has prepared special forces to assist its embassy workers and citizens if the security situation deteriorates in the Horn of African nation.
Briefing reporters in Washington Tuesday, U.S. Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa Jeffrey Feltman said there was progress in getting all parties to agree to a cease-fire.
Feltman expressed fears the military confrontation threatens Ethiopia’s stability and unity.
The Kenyan and South African presidents Tuesday also called for a cease-fire.
In November of last year, armed conflict broke out in the Tigray region between Ethiopian government forces and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front. Since then, the conflict has spread to other parts of the country.
Tigray forces and the Oromo Liberation Army threaten to drive Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed out of power by storming Addis Ababa.
On Tuesday, Abiy said he would be at the front line to guide troops against the advancing rebel groups.
Tobias Wellner is a sub-Saharan Africa senior intelligence analyst with Dragonfly Intelligence, a group that works on global security and political risks. He said Abiy’s plan to lead the military on the battlefront is to keep the troops’ morale high.
“It’s really to rally support as the government is struggling to defend against the advancing rebel forces. I personally think it’s very unlikely that Abiy is actually going to fight himself; it’s more of a propaganda act and it also means it’s a sign that Abiy will fight rather than step down from his position,” said Wellner.
On Wednesday, Ethiopia government spokesman Legesse Tulu said the prime minister had arrived at the battlefront without giving details.
Tulu also said Abiy’s deputy, Demeke Mekonnen Hassen, is handling government activities while he is away.
Wellner said a victory for either the rebel groups or the government will create more rebellion in the country.
He said there will be no winner in this war.
“The connections between the TDF and OLA and other rebel groups that have joined the fray, it’s a very cautious and not so strong alliance. Right now they are under the umbrella of opposing Abiy Ahmed but if they need to rule Ethiopia is a whole ‘nother question, then the Ethno-politics will come out and make that alliance very shaky. Last scenario stalemate there is going to be some sort of cease-fire that will often be broken,” said Wellner.
The Tigray leadership is calling on lifting the humanitarian blockade so that more than 400,000 people can receive much-needed humanitarian assistance. The government wants Tigray forces and other rebel groups to leave areas of the country they have captured.

Source: Voice of America

Somalia has declared a state of humanitarian emergency as drought ravages 80 percent of the country, leaving more than two million people short of food and water.
Somali Prime Minister Mohamed Hussein Roble, who declared the emergency, appealed for an urgent response.
He said, “I am calling upon all Somalis, including the business community, religious leaders, members of the diaspora community and international partners, to take part in aiding those affected by the famine.”
The situation is very dire and there is a need for an immediate response, the prime minister added.
Badia Moalim Osman is among thousands of Somali pastoralists who lost their livestock in the escalating drought.
She was displaced to Dhobley town in the Lower Jubba region, one of most affected areas.
She said they lost herds of cattle to the drought and were only left with two cows that also succumbed to the famine.
U.N. agencies in the country say their efforts to reach those affected are limited by a lack of funding and access due to conflict in some areas.
Cindy Isaac is the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs deputy head in Mogadishu.
“The humanitarian partners and authorities in Somalia are really trying to scale up the responses mainly through water tracking, repairing boreholes and delivering food and health assistance to address the extraordinary critical water and food needs however the efforts have been significantly hampered due to the ongoing inadequate funding and access constraints in the areas affected by the conflict,” she said.
The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization warns food insecurity is projected to worsen significantly through May 2022, with many households experiencing widening food consumption gaps and erosion of their coping capacity if expected rains fail again.

Source: Voice of America

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed on Wednesday reportedly joined the front line where government forces are battling rebels from the Tigray region, prompting U.S.-led international calls for a diplomatic solution and an immediate cease-fire to the conflict.
The fighting in the north of Africa’s second-most populous country has killed thousands of people and forced hundreds of thousands into faminelike conditions.
Foreign governments have told their citizens to leave amid the escalating war and fears the Tigrayan rebels could march on the capital, Addis Ababa.
Abiy, winner of the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize, “is now leading the counter-offensive” and “has been giving leadership from the battlefield as of yesterday,” Fana Broadcasting Corporate reported.
It was not clear where Abiy, a former radio operator in the military who rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel, had deployed.
State media did not broadcast images of him in the field, and officials have not responded to requests for details about his whereabouts.
Addressing reports of Abiy at the front, the U.S. State Department late Wednesday warned “there is no military solution” to Ethiopia’s civil war.
“We urge all parties to refrain from inflammatory and bellicose rhetoric, to use restraint, respect human rights, allow humanitarian access, and protect civilians,” a State Department spokesperson said.
A day earlier Washington’s special envoy for the Horn of Africa, Jeffrey Feltman, said that “nascent progress” risked being “outpaced by the military escalation by the two sides.”
Other foreign envoys also have been frantically pushing for a cease-fire, though there have been few signs a breakthrough is coming.
On Wednesday, U.N. chief Antonio Guterres called for a swift end to the fighting, comments made while on a visit to Colombia to mark the fifth anniversary of a peace deal between the government and former FARC rebels.
“The peace process in Colombia inspires me to make an urgent appeal today to the protagonists of the conflict in Ethiopia for an unconditional and immediate cease-fire to save the country,” he said.
The war erupted in November 2020 when Abiy sent troops into Tigray to topple its ruling party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF).
He said the move was in response to TPLF attacks on federal army camps and promised a swift victory, but by late June the rebels had retaken most of Tigray, including its capital Mekele.
Since then, the TPLF has pushed into neighboring Amhara and Afar regions, and this week it claimed to have seized a town 220 kilometers from Addis Ababa.
Abiy’s announcement Monday that he would deploy to the front “has inspired many to … join the survival campaign,” Fana said Wednesday.
Hundreds of new recruits took part in a ceremony held in their honor Wednesday in the capital’s Kolfe district.
As officials corraled sheep and oxen into trucks bound for the north, the recruits broke into patriotic songs and chants.
“When a leader leaves his chair … and his throne it is to rescue his country,” Tesfaye Sherefa, a 42-year-old driver, told AFP.
Feyisa Lilesa, a distance runner and 2016 Olympic silver medalist, told state media the rebels’ advance presented “a great opportunity” to defend the nation.
The marathon runner gained political prominence by raising and crossing his arms as he finished the marathon at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, a gesture of solidarity with fellow ethnic Oromos killed while protesting abuses committed during nearly three decades of TPLF rule.
Even as it rallies citizens to fight, Abiy’s government insists the TPLF’s gains have been overstated, criticizing what it describes as sensationalist media coverage and alarmist security advisories from Western embassies.
The war has triggered a humanitarian crisis, with accounts of massacres and mass rapes, and on Wednesday the United Nations expressed worry over reports of large-scale displacement from western Tigray, where the U.S. has previously warned of ethnic cleansing.
“Tigray zonal authorities report of 8,000 new arrivals, potentially up to 20,000,” the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR said, adding that it could not immediately corroborate the figures.
Several witnesses have told AFP of mass roundups of Tigrayan civilians in western Tigray in recent days.
Amhara forces occupied the fiercely contested area a year ago, with Amhara officials accusing the TPLF of illegally annexing it three decades earlier.
As Amhara civilians have poured in over the past year, Tigrayans have fled in the tens of thousands, either west into Sudan or east, deeper into Tigray.

Source: Voice of America

A top U.S. diplomat said Tuesday he was worried that military developments in Ethiopia were overtaking efforts to stop escalation of the country's bloody yearlong conflict.

Addressing reporters after his return from a trip to Ethiopia, U.S. Special Envoy to the Horn of Africa Jeffrey Feltman said he and other diplomats were trying to achieve a de-escalation and cease-fire between the Ethiopian federal government and forces led by the Tigrayan People's Liberation Front. TPLF says those forces are Tigray Defense Forces (TDF). The federal government says TPLF is a designated terrorist group.

Feltman said that the talks had made progress but acknowledged that both sides remained poised for more clashes.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announced on social media Monday that he would go to the battlefront to lead his forces in person, and he called on citizens to join him.

Meanwhile, the TPLF-led forces, who have been pushing south toward the capital, Addis Ababa, were reported Monday to have occupied a town about 220 kilometers away from the city.

On Tuesday, Feltman urged both sides to pull back from the brink of intensified war.

"After more than a year of fighting and hundreds of thousands of casualties and people displaced by fighting, it should be clear that there is no military solution," he said.

Feltman said Tigrayan leaders had told him their top priority was to break "the de facto humanitarian siege that the government of Ethiopia has imposed on Tigray since July."

He said Abiy wanted rebel forces to pull back to Tigray and leave the lands they occupied in the Amhara and Afar regions.

"The basic point is that these two objectives are not mutually exclusive. With political will, one can achieve both," he said. "Unfortunately, each side is trying to achieve its goal by military force, and each side seems to believe that it's on the cusp of winning."

Feltman said the U.S. was not taking sides in the conflict, but he added that the U.S. was against a military advance by Tigrayan forces on the capital.

"I want to make it clear we are absolutely opposed to the to the TDF threatening Addis by cutting off the road to Djibouti or threatening Addis by actually entering," he said.

Source: Voice of America

The U.S. State Department is stepping up its push for Americans in Ethiopia to leave the country immediately, amid fears the country’s internal war is about to escalate.

At a news briefing Monday, Senior State Department officials said U.S. citizens in Ethiopia should leave the country now while commercial flight options are still available.

“Our core message is: Do not wait until the situation gets worse to decide to leave; leave before things change,” said one official, speaking on condition of anonymity. “The U.S. embassy is unlikely to be able to assist U.S. citizens in Ethiopia with departure if commercial options become unavailable.”

The official said there are no plans to bring the U.S. military into Ethiopia to facilitate evacuations, as the military recently did in Afghanistan.

“There should be no expectation, particularly after we have issued so many warnings that advise departing immediately, that the U.S. will be able to facilitate evacuations via military or commercial aircraft in a non-permissive environment, including Ethiopia,” said the official.

Officials said they did not have a firm number of how many Americans are in the East African country.

The federal government led by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and the rebel Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front have been at war for more than a year. On Monday, the prime minister said he would travel to the front lines to lead his troops against the advancing rebel fighters, who this week claimed control of Shewa Robit, a town 220 kilometers northeast of the capital, Addis Ababa.

The U.S. embassy authorized the departure of non-essential U.S. government employees and family members from Ethiopia on November 3, and has since repeatedly warned Americans in the country to leave using commercial flights.

On Tuesday, the embassy also warned Americans in Ethiopia of the ongoing possibility of terrorist attacks. It urged U.S. citizens “to maintain a high level of vigilance and avoid areas frequented by foreigners.”

Source: Voice of America