Ethiopia: TPLF leader reappears with long message broadcast
Debretsion Gebremichael, president of the Tigray People's Liberation Front speaks during the party's congress on January 4, 2020 in Mekelle (illustrative image).
EDUARDO SOTERAS / AFP
Text by: RFI Follow
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In Ethiopia, the leader of the TPLF reappears.
While rumors gave him for dead, the leader of what is now the armed rebellion of Tigray, Debretsion Ghebremichael, broadcast a long message on Saturday, January 30, by his satellite television channel which resumed its broadcasts.
It had been weeks since we had heard his voice.
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It is a voice that is well known to Tigrayans and it is the voice of the one who was the chief executive of the province of Tigray, until November 4, and former deputy prime minister of Ethiopia but who is now a fugitive.
Debretsion Ghebremichael says he is "
in the field
", although it is not possible to know when or where his phone call was made.
Debretsion Ghebremichael, of course, attacks what he calls "
the fascist Abiy Ahmed
", the Ethiopian Prime Minister.
He accuses him of trying to "
exterminate the people of Tigray by bullets and by hunger
".
He says the state of Tigray has been attacked by the Ethiopian federal army, the Eritrean army, Amhara militias and Somali soldiers.
He calls on the Tigrayans to continue fighting and “
the international community
” to “
take appropriate measures to stop the ongoing atrocities and acts of genocide
”.
He also calls for investigations to be launched to try the culprits, namely, according to him, Abiy Ahmed and Eritrean President Issayas Afeworki.
Ethiopia under great pressure
This statement is not released this weekend by chance.
Ethiopia happens to be under great pressure.
The United States, the United Kingdom and France now, three permanent members of the UN Security Council, disapprove of the current situation, as does the European Union.
Furthermore, the
High
-
Commissioner
of the United Nations for
refugees
is precisely in Tigray, since Saturday, with Eritrean refugees for which it has repeatedly expressed great concern, while nevertheless continuing Ethiopia to say that everything is normal in the area.
Read also: Ethiopia: senior TPLF officials arrested and exhibited as war prizes
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