JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Peace talks between the warring sides in the
brutal two-year-old conflict in
Ethiopia’s Tigray region opened in Pretoria on
Tuesday, the South African presidency announced.
اضافة اعلان
Led by the
African Union (AU), the talks follow a fierce surge in fighting in recent weeks that
has alarmed the international community and triggered fears for civilians
caught in the crossfire.
They “have been
convened to find a peaceful and sustainable solution to the devastating
conflict,” Vincent Magwenya, spokesman for South African President Cyril
Ramaphosa, told reporters, adding that they would run until October 30.
South Africa hopes
“the talks will proceed constructively and result in a successful outcome that
leads to peace for all the people of our dear sister country,” he said.
The dialogue
between negotiators from the Ethiopian government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed
and the regional authorities in war-stricken Tigray was launched almost two
months to the day since fighting resumed in August, shattering a five-month
truce.
They are being
facilitated by AU Horn of Africa envoy and Nigeria’s former president Olusegun
Obasanjo, supported by Kenya’s former leader Uhuru Kenyatta and South Africa’s
ex-vice president Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, said Magwenya.
There was no
immediate comment from the AU, the Ethiopian government, or the rebel
Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) about the launch of the eagerly-expected
process.
‘Peace will prevail’
Diplomatic pressure has ratcheted up in recent weeks to silence the guns
in a war which has left millions in need of humanitarian aid and, according to
a US estimate, as many as half a million dead.
The talks come as
federal forces and their allies in the Eritrean army appear to be gaining the
upper hand on the ground, seizing a string of towns in Tigray including the
strategic city of Tigray in offensives that have sent civilians fleeing.
It is impossible to
verify developments on the battleground as Tigray — a region of 6 million
people — is largely cut off by a communications blackout and access to northern
Ethiopia is severely restricted.
An initial AU
effort to bring the two sides to the negotiating table earlier this month
failed, with diplomats suggesting logistical issues and a lack of preparedness
were to blame.
The Pretoria
dialogue represents the first publicly announced talks between the rivals,
although a Western official has confirmed that previous secret contacts took
place organized by the US in the Seychelles and twice in Djibouti.
Abiy first sent
troops into Tigray in November 2020, promising a quick victory over the
northern region’s dissident leaders, the TPLF, after what he said were attacks
by the group on federal army camps.
The move followed
long-running tensions with the TPLF, which had dominated Ethiopia’s ruling
coalition before Abiy came to power in 2018 and sidelined the party.
In a rare comment
on the conflict last week, Abiy — who won the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize for his
rapprochement with Eritrea — said the war “would end and peace will prevail”.
But on Monday,
Tigray’s leader Debretsion Gebremichael issued a defiant statement saying: “The
Tigray army has the capacity to defeat our enemies totally.”
‘Civilians are afraid’
The international community has been calling for an immediate ceasefire,
humanitarian access to Tigray and a withdrawal of
Eritrean forces, whose return
to the conflict has raised fears of renewed atrocities against civilians.
Amnesty
International on Monday urged the rivals to protect civilians in the face of
intensifying hostilities as government forces capture towns in Tigray.
“Tigrayan civilians
are afraid that the widespread abuses, such as unlawful killings, sexual
violence and systematic attacks, that were rampant when the Ethiopian National
Defense Forces (ENDF) and its allied forces were in control of these areas from
November 2020 to June 2021, might happen again,” said Muleya Mwananyanda,
Amnesty’s director for East and Southern Africa.
The Amnesty
statement charged that air strikes on Tigray’s capital Mekele and the town of
Adi Daero in August and September had “killed hundreds of civilians including
children.”
It also claimed —
without giving sources — that the Eritrean army had in September
“extrajudicially executed” at least 40 people, including Eritrean refugees, in
the northwestern Tigrayan town of Sheraro.
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