Tigray official denounces damage caused by troops from “ neighboring ” country

Troops from a “neighboring country” destroyed factories and universities during the conflict in northern Ethiopia’s Tigray state, an official in the region’s interim administration told media on Thursday. ‘State in an apparent reference to Eritrea.

Tigray has been the scene of fighting since early November 2020, when Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announced military operations against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), accusing them of attacking federal army camps.

He declared victory after pro-government troops captured the regional capital Mekele in late November and appointed an interim government to succeed the TPLF leadership. The fighting continued, however.

The presence of soldiers from neighboring Eritrea has been widely documented, but repeatedly denied by Addis Ababa and Asmara.

Alula Habteab, who heads the interim administration’s construction, roads and transport department, appeared to openly criticize Eritrean soldiers, as well as the neighboring region of Amhara, for their actions during the conflict.

“There were armies from a neighboring country and a neighboring region that wanted to take advantage of the law enforcement objective of the war,” he told state media.

“These forces have inflicted more damage than the war itself.”

He said troops across the border destroyed major factories in Tigray, such as the pharmaceutical factories Almeda Textiles and Adigrat, as well as two large universities in Adigrat and Axum.

“The universities and factories produced by Tigray over the past 30 years have all been destroyed.”

In a rare rebuke to the national army from the interim administration, he also accused the Ethiopian National Defense Force of “seizing a lot of properties” that belonged to the Tigray state government.

Tigray is one of 10 largely ethnically separated semi-autonomous states in Ethiopia.

Its former leadership, the TPLF, dominated the federal government for decades before Abiy came to power in 2018 and has been accused of sidelining them.

Under the TPLF-dominated regime, Ethiopia waged a brutal border war with Eritrea in 1998-2000, followed by a long diplomatic standoff.

Abiy won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 largely for initiating a rapprochement with Eritrea, of which President Isaias Afwerki and the TPLF remain bitter enemies.

There is also a history of hostility between Tigray and the neighboring region of Amhara, over land and political disputes, and Amhara militiamen are widely documented to have fought alongside federal troops in Tigray.