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Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said Monday the Tigray region's dissident leaders had fled west of the regional capital after weeks of fighting but indicated federal forces were monitoring them closely and would attack them soon.
Abiy, winner of last year's Nobel Peace Prize, this month ordered military operations against leaders of Tigray's ruling party, the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), in response to what he said were TPLF-organised attacks on Ethiopian federal army camps.
More than three weeks of fighting between federal soldiers and pro-TPLF forces has left thousands dead in the northern region, and prompted tens of thousands of refugees to flee across the border into Sudan.
"I want them to hear me: yesterday evening, around midnight, we saw them from the situation room in the area between Hagere Selam and Abiy Addi," Abiy said in remarks to lawmakers, referring to two towns west of the Tigray capital Mekele.
"We didn't attack them at night because as they retreated they took their wives, children and abducted soldiers... But this will not continue."
The fighting has been a dramatic escalation of tensions between Abiy and the leaders of the TPLF, which dominated Ethiopian politics for nearly three decades before anti-government protests swept Abiy to office in 2018.
Abiy said on Saturday the military operations were "completed" after federal forces claimed control of the Tigray regional capital Mekele.
The TPLF leaders, however, have repeatedly vowed to fight on as long as federal forces are on Tigrayan soil.
Their exact whereabouts remain unknown.
'Mekele is ours'
As the Ethiopian military bore down on Mekele last week, global concern mounted about a possible bloodbath in a city that, before the conflict, had a population of half a million.
A communications blackout in Tigray has made it difficult to verify claims from both sides about how the fighting is going.
On Monday, Abiy claimed soldiers did not kill any civilians as they took over Mekele and other cities in Tigray.
"Mekele is ours, it was built with our own resources. We are not going to destroy it," he said. "Not even a single person was harmed by the operation in Mekele."
The International Committee of the Red Cross said Sunday that hospitals in Mekele were flooded with trauma patients, though it did not specify how the injuries were sustained.
Abiy also dismissed claims from TPLF leader Debretsion Gebremichael that airstrikes had resulted in many civilian casualties.
As Abiy tries to shift towards helping Tigray recover, the national human rights body called Monday for telecommunications to be restored and for water, electricity, and health services to resume.
The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC), which is government-affiliated but independent, also noted "complaints of ethnic profiling" including "forced leave from work" and travel restrictions.
"EHRC is gravely concerned that while there is no government policy nor legal framework condoning ethnic profiling, security measures designed t
He replaces Debretsion Gebremichael, whose immunity from prosecution was removed Thursday.
Meanwhile, Amnesty International said Thursday that scores of civilians were killed in a \"massacre\" in the Tigray region, that witnesses blamed on forces backing the local ruling party.
The \"massacre\" is the first reported incident of large-scale civilian fatalities in a week-old conflict between the regional ruling party, the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), and the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, winner of last year's Nobel Peace Prize.
\"Amnesty International can today confirm... that scores, and likely hundreds, of people were stabbed or hacked to death in Mai-Kadra (May Cadera) town in the southwest of Ethiopia's Tigray Region on the night of 9 November,\" the rights group said in a report.
Amnesty said it had \"digitally verified gruesome photographs and videos of bodies strewn across the town or being carried away on stretchers.\"
The dead \"had gaping wounds that appear to have been inflicted by sharp weapons such as knives and machetes,\" Amnesty said, citing witness accounts.
Witnesses said the attack was carried out by TPLF-aligned forces after a defeat at the hands of the Ethiopian military, though Amnesty said it \"has not been able to confirm who was responsible for the killings\".
It nonetheless called on TPLF commanders and officials to \"make clear to their forces and their supporters that deliberate attacks on civilians are absolutely prohibited and constitute war crimes\".
Abiy ordered military operations in Tigray on November 4, saying they were prompted by a TPLF attack on federal military camps -- a claim the party denies.
The region has been under a communications blackout ever since, making it difficult to verify competing claims on the ground.
Abiy said Thursday his army had made major gains in western Tigray.
Thousands of Ethiopians have fled across the border into neighboring Sudan, and the UN is sounding the alarm about a humanitarian crisis in Tigray.
The latest case of 12 extrajudicial killings of Fulani men in Tanwalbougou, northeastern Burkina Faso, has gripped the public after gruesome details emerged following their detention by gendarmes in the area, adding to the overall crisis in the Sahel.
Although the military has issued a statement admitting that 12 of the Fulani (also called Peul) men, arrested on suspicion of terrorism, died in military cells, a number of the facts are in dispute.
Human rights groups including Burkinabé groups, the Collective Against Impunity and Stigmatisation of Communities (CISC) and MBDHP as well as US-based Human Rights Watch, are calling for an independent investigation into the Burkina Faso gendarmes.
\"Another part of it is a lack of effective control over security forces, and either a lack of means to effectively punish the people who perpetrate these attacks, or the lack of political will, either from military leadership or civilian governments to police these military,\" he adds.
Killing of 31 Fulani in Burkina Faso could be war crime, says HRW
Part of the issue stems from the overall perception that the Fulani communities in the Sahel, including northern Burkina Faso, have traditionally been a much-maligned community, and therefore jihadist groups in the area have exploited these prejudices, recruiting a number of people in the community, especially after alleged military massacres.
New documents have revealed that China mishandled and underreported coronavirus cases there at the beginning of the pandemic. The data... View Article
The post Leaked documents show China's mishandling of pandemic during early stages appeared first on TheGrio.
Ambassador Brita Wagener talks to DW about Ethiopia's reforms, its impending constitutional crisis prompted by its deferred August elections and how COVID-19 is affecting AU-EU relations.
To make matters worse, the coronavirus crisis hit Ethiopia just after it finally set a date to hold national elections in August.
Germany's government sent strong signals of support at the very beginning of Prime Minister Abiy's tenure with German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas making his inaugural visit to Africa in Addis Ababa.
Do you believe that Germany and Europe, which have been very concerned with their own internal affairs in the coronavirus crisis, but also beforehand, are becoming less of a focus for Ethiopia?
The coronavirus crisis hit the cooperation between the European Union and the African Union at a time when the new European Commission President, Ursula Von der Leyden from Germany, had been very supportive of a union on the continent.
Harriet Tubman, born in 1820, was a runaway slave from Maryland who became known as the Moses of her people. Over the course of 10 years, and at great personal risk, she led hundreds of slaves to freedom along the Underground Railroad, a secret network of safe houses where runaway slaves could stay on their journey north to freedom. She later became a leader in the abolitionist movement, and during the Civil War she was a spy with for the federal forces in South Carolina as well as a nurse.
Although not a traditional railroad, the underground railroad was a critical system of transporting slaves to freedom in the mid-1800s. One of the most famous conductors was Harriet Tubman. Between 1850 and 1858, she helped more than 300 slaves reach freedom.
Tubmans name at birth was Araminta Ross. She was one of 11 children of Harriet and Benjamin Ross born into slavery in Dorchester County, Maryland. As a child, Ross was hired out by her master as a nursemaid for a small baby, much like the nursemaid in the picture. Ross had to stay awake all night so that the baby wouldnt cry and wake the mother. If Ross fell asleep, the babys mother whipped her. From a very young age, Ross was determined to gain her freedom.
As a slave, Araminta Ross was scarred for life when she refused to help in the punishment of another young slave. A young man had gone to the store without permission, and when he returned, the overseer wanted to whip him.
He asked Ross to help but she refused. When the young man started to run away, the overseer picked up a heavy iron weight and threw it at him. He missed the young man and hit Ross instead. The weight nearly crushed her skull and left a deep scar. She was unconscious for days, and suffered from seizures for the rest of her life.
In 1844, Ross married a free black named John Tubman and took his last name. She also changed her first name, taking her mothers name, Harriet. In 1849, worried that she and the other slaves on the plantation were going to be sold, Tubman decided to run away. Her
[DW] A latest report by the Mo Ibrahim Foundation on African governance shows a decline in overall progress for the first time in a decade. This has been driven by a decline in security and the rule of law in some countries.
Can the Peach State wrestle Senate control from the GOP?
Continue reading on ZORA »
[East African] Countries in the region have seen increased borrowing over the past decade, amassing $73.8 billion in external debt.
[RFI] Ethiopia's army captured the town of Alamata, in southern Tigray, 115 kilometres from the regional capital Mekelle, according to a statement on Monday by the Ethiopian government, as a conflict between the federal government and Tigray region continues to escalate.
Forces of Libyan Marshal Khalifa Haftar confirmed their “redeployment” out of Tripoli, after their rivals announced the total reconquest of the Libyan capital following heavy fighting.
On Thursday, the UN-recognized Government of National Unity (GNA) said it had regained control of the entire western city of Tripoli, another setback for rival troops of Marshal Haftar, a Libyan strongman from the east.
“We are announcing the redeployment of our forces out of Tripoli on condition that the other side respects a ceasefire,” said Haftar’s spokesman, Ahmad al-Mesmari.
On Wednesday, the UN announced the resumption in Geneva of negotiations —suspended for more than three months— of the 5+5 military committee, a body comprising five pro-GNA and five pro-Haftar members, aimed at achieving a cease-fire in a conflict between the two sides which erupted in April 2019.
Since pro-Haftar forces launched an offensive in April 2019 to seize the capital, the headquarters of the GNA, hundreds of people, including many civilians, have been killed and some 200,000 have fled their homes.
FIRED opposition MDC-T national organising secretary Abednico Bhebhe yesterday rubbished the decision to expel him, saying he would remain in the race for the party presidency. By Richard Muponde Bhebhe was shown the exit door during a national council meeting held virtually on Saturday “for grossly violating the constitution of the party by supporting political party other than the MDC-T”. He was expelled soon after he trounced party bigwigs, interim leader Thokozani Khupe, acting secretary-general Douglas Mwonzora, acting chairperson Morgen Komichi and former Energy minister Elias Mudzuri during provincial nominations held in Bulawayo recently. The defiant Bhebhe yesterday told NewsDay that his expulsion was not enforceable at law. “I am not aware of any constitutional and legally enforceable expulsion except what I read in the Press,” Bhebhe said. He, however, remained mum on whether he was going to seek legal recourse. But Mwonzora defended the party’s decision to expel Bhebhe and dismissed allegations that he was manipulating the electoral process to get rid of candidates who posed a serious threat to his presidential bid. “First and foremost, we have acted above board in accordance with the law. If he thinks that we acted unlawfully, he can find recourse in the courts or any other remedies,” Mwonzora said. Khupe and Mwonzora have been accused of engineering a resolution by the MDC-T national standing committee to suspend provincial nominations during a strategic retreat held in Nyanga last week. Initially, the pair is said to have been pushing for the nomination of only two candidates to contest for the presidency, but Mudzuri and Komichi were roped in after they protested. Reports also say that there is a fresh plot to reshuffle the standing committee after the congress and dump Mudzuri and Komichi.
