Tag Archives: Ethiopia

More than a dozen Ethiopian staffers working for the United Nations have been arrested in Addis Ababa in raids targeting ethnic Tigrayans under a state of emergency, UN and humanitarian sources told AFP Tuesday. “Some of them were taken from their homes,” one of the sources said, while a UN …

Tigray forces fighting Ethiopia’s government on Sunday played down reports that they would face a hostile population or cause a “bloodbath” if they advanced into the capital city. Several countries have urged their nationals to leave Ethiopia and the US has withdrawn diplomats as the year-long conflict in the north …

The United States said Saturday it has ordered the departure of its non-essential diplomats from Ethiopia, as the war between Tigray rebels and government forces intensifies. “The Department of State ordered the departure of non-emergency US government employees and their family members from Ethiopia” on Friday, the State Department said …

The top US envoy for the Horn of Africa is heading to Ethiopia later this week as Washington and the international community look on with concern over the deteriorating situation. “United States Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa Jeffrey Feltman will travel to Ethiopia November 4 and 5,” a …

Ethiopia declared a state of emergency on Tuesday after forces from the northern region of Tigray said they were gaining territory and considering marching on the capital Addis Ababa. The announcement on state-affiliated media came two days after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed urged citizens to take up arms to defend …

Rebellious Tigrayan forces said on Saturday they had seized the strategic town of Dessie in Ethiopia’s Amhara region where tens of thousands of ethnic Amharas have sought refuge from an escalation in fighting. The fighters pushed Ethiopian government forces from Dessie and were headed towards the town of Kombolcha, Getachew …

Ethiopia’s military on Thursday carried out an airstrike on the capital of the war-torn Tigray region that a hospital official and rebel sources said killed six people and injured 21 others. The government said the strike, the latest in a campaign of air bombardments, hit a factory in Mekele used …

Ethiopia conducted two airstrikes in Tigray on Sunday as the government intensifies a nearly week-old campaign of aerial bombardment against the rebellious forces who control most of the region. One strike hit the western Tigray area of Mai Tsebri, targeting a training site of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), …

An Ethiopian government air strike hit a university in the Tigray regional capital on Friday, rebellious Tigrayan forces and humanitarian sources said, as thousands of people fled fighting further south. The government said its strike targeted a base formerly belonging to the military and now being used by the Tigray …

Ethiopian government airstrikes hit the capital of the northern Tigray region on Wednesday, the third such attack this week in a stepped-up campaign to weaken rebellious Tigrayan forces in an almost one-year-old war. Tigrai Television, controlled by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), said the attack targeted the center of …

Rebellious Tigrayan forces accused the Ethiopian government of launching airstrikes on the capital of the Tigray region on Monday, though the government denied the reports. The reported attack follows intensified fighting in two other Ethiopian regions, where the central government’s military is trying to recover territory taken by the northern …

As food and the means to buy it dwindled in a city under siege, the young mother felt she could do no more. She killed herself, unable to feed her children. In a Catholic church across town, flour and oil to make communion wafers will soon run out. And the …

Fighting has escalated between Ethiopia’s national army and rebels from Tigray, days after Addis Ababa launched a new major offensive in the restive northern region. Getachew Reda, a spokesman for the rebel Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), said on Wednesday that there had been fresh clashes between the Tigrayan rebels …

Ethiopia’s national army has launched a ground offensive on forces from the rebellious northern region of Tigray, just days after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed was sworn in for a new five-year term as the leader of Africa’s second-most populous country. Getachew Reda, a spokesman for the Tigray People’s Liberation Front …

Ethiopians in the south of the country have voted almost unanimously to have their own state, part of a push for increased autonomy that’s intensified since Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took office in 2018. South West will become Ethiopia’s 11th state after 1.26 million Ethiopians in six zones and one …

A top official in the interim administration of Ethiopia’s war-hit Tigray region told AFP on Saturday he had fled the country and was seeking asylum, citing fears for his safety. Gebremeskel Kassa served as chief of staff of the administration appointed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed after the Nobel peace …

Ethiopia’s parliament confirmed incumbent Abiy Ahmed as prime minister for a five-year term on Monday, cementing his power domestically amid mounting international concern about his government’s handling of the conflict in northern Ethiopia. Abiy’s party won a landslide victory in June’s election. He was sworn in on Monday, and a …

Ethiopia said on Thursday that rebellious forces from the Tigray region had been defeated in the adjacent Afar region and had withdrawn, but the Tigrayan forces said they had merely shifted troops to neighboring Amhara for an offensive there. “The TPLF force has left Afar (region),” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Dina …

At least 125 villagers were massacred in Ethiopia’s Amhara region earlier this month, doctors and local officials told AFP Wednesday, but rebels from neighbouring Tigray rejected claims they were responsible. It was the latest reported mass killing in the 10-month conflict in northern Ethiopia between government forces and Tigray rebels …

Ethiopian Airlines said on Monday its transport of weapons to Sudan was a “legal and commercial” shipment of hunting guns, after reports the cargo had been confiscated by the authorities in Khartoum. Sudan’s SUNA news agency had said on Sunday that the weapons were seized by customs and an investigation …