Ethiopia mobilized for war in the northern Tigray region on Thursday, dashing international hopes of averting a conflict between Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s government and the powerful ethnic faction that led the ruling coalition for decades.
Troops were being mustered from around the country and dispatched to Tigray, he said. The announcement followed clashes on Wednesday between government forces and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), after Abiy ordered retaliation for what the government described as a TPLF attack on its troops.
The conflict pits government troops against the TPLF, for decades the dominant political force in the country’s multi-ethnic ruling coalition, until Abiy, a member of the Oromo ethnic group, took office two years ago.
Abiy, who has tried to open up what has long been one of the most restrictive economic and political systems in Africa, reorganized the ruling coalition into a single party which the TPLF refused to join.
Countries in the region fear that the crisis could escalate into all-out war under Abiy, who won the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize for ending a decades-old conflict with neighboring Eritrea but has failed to prevent outbreaks of ethnic unrest.