Tigrayan leaders say war with Ethiopia’s federal government has begun again, after a series of military moves that has ended the relative calm established by the Pretoria Agreement in November 2022. The Tigray People's Liberation Front, or TPLF, has taken control of airports in the northern region, while fighting has been reported along the eastern border with Afar and in Amhara.
The federal government has accused Tigrayan fighters of beginning offensives. Getachew said the TPLF leadership launched an all-out offensive against government positions in Afar and Amhara early on Wednesday. The claims come after months of tension between Mekelle and Addis Ababa, with many of the disputes that drove the earlier conflict still unresolved.
The TPLF seized the airport in the regional capital and took three airports in a single day. Ethiopian Airlines cancelled all flights to Tigray after the airports were seized, further disrupting connections with the region as the fighting developed.
The confrontation marks a severe breakdown in the arrangements intended to end the 2020–2022 war. Ethiopia’s federal government and the TPLF signed the Pretoria Agreement in November 2022 after two years of devastating conflict that killed more than 600,000 people.
The agreement was intended to establish a permanent cessation of hostilities. It also set out provisions for the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration of Tigrayan forces. Article 7 required the TPLF to refrain from conscription, training, deployment and mobilisation of military forces, as well as preparations for renewed conflict.
Events during 2026 had already suggested that the settlement was weakening. Reports emerged of renewed recruitment and forced mobilisation in Tigray. Tigray Defence Forces-aligned troops crossed the Tekeze River into the disputed Tselemt district in January. By August, fighting had again broken out in western Tigray near the Sudanese border.
On Sunday, the TPLF announced an alliance with six other armed groups in Ethiopia which aims to remove the government in Addis Ababa. The alliance of seven armed groups said it sought to overthrow the prime minister, adding a national political objective to fighting that had already spread beyond Tigray.
There have also been reports of strikes affecting civilians. Tigrayan authorities said a strike in the southern town of Alamata on Tuesday killed at least 14 people and injured 22 others. Mogos Shiferaw, the town’s mayor, said more than five drones and one fighter jet carried out more than 21 strikes from around 03:30.
The US State Department’s Bureau of African Affairs separately condemned a drone strike it said occurred on Monday and targeted a convoy of Catholic vehicles carrying food aid. The available accounts do not establish the full number of casualties since fighting resumed, the positions of federal forces or the extent of military capabilities held by either side.
In May, the TPLF reinstated the regional government that had been in place before the 2020 war. Nearly four years after the large-scale conflict ended, its political settlement had left core disputes unsettled. Whether the present fighting reaches the scale of the earlier war, whether the new armed alliance can coordinate its operations, and whether any mediation is under way remain unclear.
Comments (0)