Ethiopia: Tigray government and rebels accuse each other of wanting to resume hostilities

A kindergarten in Mekele, capital of Tigray, devastated by a bombardment, August 26, 2022. VIA REUTERS - TIGRAI TV

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In Ethiopia, in the rebel province of Tigray, tension is rising the day after the deadly aerial bombardment that hit a kindergarten on Friday August 26.

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We are starting to know a little more about

Friday's strike

: the kindergarten hit by the Ethiopian air force is in downtown Mekele, just behind the palace-museum of Emperor Yohannes IV, according to reports. satellite pictures.

It is not known, however, whether other buildings were affected in the area.

The federal government claims that the Tigrayan authorities are speeding up preparations for a resumption of war, while in Mekele, the region's president Debretsion Gebremichael accuses Addis Ababa of “

 extending its genocidal project 

”.

In a statement, the very secret President of Tigray Debretsion Gebremichael added that the Ethiopian air force, responsible for the bombardment, had also struck the south of the region, not far from the front line, in Mehoni.

Military observers also evoke troop movements everywhere in Tigray, and in particular in this sensitive sector, around the city of Kobo, inside the neighboring state of Amhara, where Ethiopian troops had been seen. in recent days heading towards the fighting and from where they withdrew this Saturday.

The federal government, in a new communiqué, denounced the preparations by the Tigrayans for a " 

large-scale conflict

 " on the front lines of Amhara and Afar, "

 ruling off the path of peace

 " .

, a " 

way of peace 

" which, as far as he is concerned, he adds, is nevertheless " 

preserved

 ". 

Verbal escalation

The two belligerents accuse each other of having relaunched the war, while the efforts of recent months to bring them to negotiate peace have led to nothing.

On Thursday, Ethiopian troops mounted on trucks paraded, flags flying, in the locality of Kobo, on the road leaving Tigray and sinking into the Amhara region.

But this Saturday, the federal government announced the withdrawal of its soldiers from this small town "

 in order to avoid massive losses in the exchange of fire 

".

He affirms that the federal army has taken up defensive positions outside the locality and warns: "

 If the terrorist clique of the TPLF

 ", the ruling party in Tigray, continues to use its youth in "

 its strategy of human waves

 ", the army, he said, " 

will be forced to fulfill its legal, moral and historical duty

 ".

Tigray regional government spokesman Getachew Reda for his part immediately declared on Twitter that "

 Abiy Ahmed's unfortunate offensive on the southern front

 " had " 

not only gotten off to a bad start

 ", but that “ 

Tigray forces hold firm and more

 ”.

He accuses the Ethiopian Prime Minister of taking his orders from Eritrean President Issayas Afewerki for " 

a second round of genocidal campaign against Tigray 

".

And he concludes: “

 Those who repeated to us that Abiy Ahmed was ready for peace should think twice.

 »

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  • Ethiopia