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FILE PHOTO: Members of the Amhara region militias travel in their truck as they head to the mission to confront the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), in Sanja, Amhara region, near the border with Tigray , Ethiopia, November 9, 2020. REUTERS / Tiksa Negeri // File photo reuters_tickers
This content was published on Nov 16, 2020 – 07:43
By Giulia Paravicini
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) – Ethiopian forces have liberated a city in the northern region of Tigray, the government’s emergency task force said on Sunday, accusing local leaders of taking 10,000 prisoners from the city as they fled.
Tigray forces fired rockets into neighboring Eritrea on Saturday, escalating a 13-day conflict that has killed hundreds of people on both sides and threatens to destabilize other parts of Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa.
“When the TPLF (Tigray ruling party) militia was defeated in Alamata, they fled with some 10,000 prisoners,” the government task force said on Twitter.
With access restricted and most communications in Tigray, Reuters was unable to independently verify the claims made by all parties.
There was no immediate comment from Tigray leaders about the events in Alamata, a city near the border with the regional state of Amhara, about 120 km (75 miles) from Mekelle, the capital of Tigray.
The top US State Department diplomat for Africa, Tibor Nagy, denounced the attacks by Tigray forces in Eritrea, calling them “efforts to internationalize the conflict” in Tigray.
Debretsion Gebremichael, regional president of Tigray, has accused Eritrea of sending tanks and thousands of troops to his region in support of the Ethiopian government offensive.
Eritrea’s Foreign Minister Osman Saleh Mohammed told Reuters last week that his country was not involved in the conflict.
Abiy launched the campaign in Tigray on November 4 after accusing local forces of targeting federal troops based in the northern state, which borders Eritrea and Sudan and is home to some 5 million people.
The fighting spread to Ethiopia’s Amhara state, whose local forces are fighting federal troops in Tigray. Late on Friday, rockets were fired at two airports in Amhara in what the TPLF said was retaliation for government air strikes.
The government says the attacks are aimed at destroying equipment controlled by insurgent forces in Tigray.
At least 20,000 Ethiopians have fled to Sudan, the United Nations said on Sunday.
(Written by Duncan Miriri; Editing by Michael Perry)
