Tigray war
The Tigray war, also referred to in some academic and policy sources as the Northern Ethiopia Conflict, was an armed conflict that lasted from 3 November 2020 to 3 November 2022. It was a civil war primarily fought in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia between forces allied with the Ethiopian federal government and Eritrea on one side, and the Tigray People's Liberation Front on the other.
After years of increased tensions and hostilities between the TPLF and the governments of Ethiopia and Eritrea, fighting began when TPLF forces attacked the Northern Command headquarters of the Ethiopian National Defense Force, alongside a number of other bases in Tigray. The ENDF counterattacked from the south – while Eritrean Defence Forces began launching attacks from the north – which Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed described as a "law enforcement operation". Federal allied forces captured Mekelle, the capital of the Tigray Region, on 28 November, after which Abiy declared the operation "over." However, the TPLF stated soon afterwards that it would continue fighting until the "invaders" were out, and on 28 June 2021, the Tigray Defense Forces retook Mekelle; by July the same year, they had also advanced into the Amhara and Afar regions. In early November 2021, the TDF, together with the Oromo Liberation Army, took control of several towns on the highway south from Tigray Region towards Addis Ababa, and the TPLF stated that it considered "marching on ." Together with seven smaller rebel groups, the TPLF and OLA declared a coalition aiming to "dismantle Abiy's government by force or by negotiations, and then form a transitional authority."
After a successful government counter-offensive in response, and then a series of negotiations with the TPLF, Ethiopia declared an indefinite humanitarian truce on 24 March 2022, in order to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid into Tigray. However, fighting dramatically re-escalated in late August 2022, after peace talks broke down. Rapid mobilization of troops soon followed, with Ethiopia, Eritrea and Tigray reportedly organizing hundreds of thousands of troops against each other by October the same year. After a number of peace and mediation proposals in the intervening years, Ethiopia and the Tigrayan rebel forces agreed to a cessation of hostilities on 2 November, which went into effect the day after; Eritrea was not a party to the agreement, however, and they largely continued to occupy parts of Tigray as of 2023.
All sides, particularly the ENDF, EDF, Amhara forces and TDF, committed war crimes during the conflict. Mass extrajudicial killings of civilians took place throughout, including in Axum, Bora, Chenna, Kobo, the Hitsats refugee camp, Humera, Mai Kadra, the Mahbere Dego, and Zalambessa. Additionally, the ENDF and EDF were accused of genocide. Between 162,000 and 378,000 people were killed, and war rape became a "daily" occurrence, with girls as young as 8 and women as old as 72 being raped, often in front of their families. A survey found that, over the course of the conflict, around 1 in 10 women in Tigray were subjected to sexual violence, 8 in 100 were subjected to rape, and 4 in 100 were subjected to gang rape. Nails, screws, plastic rubbish and other foreign bodies were forced into reproductive organs of women, in what was seen as part of a wider effort to destroy fertility of women in Tigray.
A major humanitarian crisis developed as a result of the war, which led to a widespread famine. It also inflicted immense economic damage on the region, with the cost of rebuilding alone estimated to be roughly $20 billion.
Background
Historical and political context
Following the end of the Ethiopian Civil War in 1991, Ethiopia became a dominant-party state under the rule of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front, a coalition of four ethnically based parties. The founding and most influential member was the Tigray People's Liberation Front, led by Meles Zenawi, who was the prime minister of Ethiopia until his death in 2012. He was succeeded by Deputy Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, the chairman of the Southern Ethiopian People's Democratic Movement, a coalition member. On 15 February 2018, Hailemariam announced his resignation as both prime minister and chairman of the EPRDF, owing to a growing discontent within the public, fueled by a reaction to 27 years of repressive governance.On 28 March 2018, in a closed-door election to chair the EPRDF, executive committee members elected the Oromo Peoples' Democratic Organisation chairman Abiy Ahmed. On 2 April 2018, Ethiopian parliament elected Abiy as prime minister. One of Abiy's first actions after his election was to initiate a warming of relations with Eritrea, a long-time rival of the TPLF, to end a 20-year long border conflict. While this decision was considered a cause of celebration at the time, many within the Tigray Region were heavily critical of this, seeing it as a betrayal of those who died in the 1998–2000 war. The TPLF condemned the peace initiatives, saying they were hastily made, had "fundamental flaws", and also claimed it was decided on without consulting long-time TPLF members.
On 1 December 2019, Abiy merged the ethnic and region-based parties of the EPRDF and several opposition parties into his new Prosperity Party. The TPLF, which had long dominated Ethiopian politics, refused to join this new party. After losing the election and being ousted from the federal government, TPLF officials relocated to the Tigray Region, continuing to administer control there while frequently clashing with the federal government. In one instance, the Tigray regional government was reported to have defied the federal government and refused to allow Ethiopian Federal Police to arrest Getachew Assefa, the former chief of the National Intelligence and Security Service of Ethiopia and executive member of the TPLF.
The Ethiopian government and its supporters accused the TPLF of trying to re-establish their rule over the country through violence and force. In turn, the TPLF accused the federal government of accumulating too much power for itself, and that it was engaging in ethnic discrimination of Tigrayans.
Lead-up to the war
Throughout 2020, tensions between the federal government and the TPLF escalated in the months leading up to November. In March, the National Election Board of Ethiopia delayed the general elections – originally scheduled for 29 August 2020 – to a then-undetermined date, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The terms of federal and regional lawmakers, as well as the executive branch, were then extended by federal parliament beyond the October 2020 constitutional mandates.The TPLF, led by its chairman Debretsion Gebremichael, rejected these measures, arguing that they were unconstitutional, and held its own regional election on 9 September, in defiance of the federal government. Several journalists were barred by the Ethiopian government from travelling to cover Tigray's regional election. Ethiopia considered the Tigray election to be illegal, and responded by slashing federal funding to the region, a decision the TPLF described as "tantamount to declaration of war."
File:Voter registration in the Tigray Region, August 2020.png|left|thumb|People in Tigray registering to vote in the 2020 regional election during the COVID-19 pandemic |229x229px
In late September 2020, the TPLF stated that the constitutional term limit of the House of Federation, the House of Peoples' Representatives, the prime minister, and the Council of Ministers was 5 October 2020 and that for this reason, it would consider "the incumbent" constitutionally illegitimate after 5 October; they proposed replacing the government with a technocratic caretaker government, as detailed in a plan posted on Facebook by the Coalition of Ethiopian Federalist Forces. Ethiopian elite units were transported to Gherghera base near Asmara, as part of an alleged pact between Prime Minister Abiy and Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki to "strike out of existence the TPLF," according to former Eritrean Minister of Defence Mesfin Hagos.
In late October 2020, the Ethiopian Reconciliation Commission stated that it was trying to mediate between the federal government and the TPLF, as well as the other regional governments, but that the pre-conditions set by all sides were blocking progress. As tension continued to grow, a brigadier general appointed by Abiy was prevented by the Tigray government from taking up his military post. The same day before the Tigray forces launched the Northern Command attacks, the federal parliament of Ethiopia had suggested designating the TPLF as a terrorist organization.
Constitutional context
The 1995 Constitution of Ethiopia states in Article 39.1, "Every Nation, Nationality, and People in Ethiopia has an unconditional right to self-determination, including the right to secession." Article 62.9 grants the House of Federation the right to "order Federal intervention if any State , in violation of Constitution, endangers the constitutional order."Course of the war
Initial fighting (3–28 November 2020)
;Northern Command attacksJust before midnight on 3 November 2020, Tigray Special Forces and allied local militia attacked the Ethiopian National Defense Force Northern Command headquarters in Mekelle, the Fifth Battalion barracks in Dansha, and other Northern Command bases. Several people were killed and the TPLF claimed the attack was carried out in self-defense or preemptive self-defense.
In retaliation, an Ethiopian offensive was launched on 4 November, which was accompanied by the declaration of a state of emergency, the creation of the State of Emergency Inquiry Board and a shutdown of government services in the Tigray Region. During the subsequent days, skirmishes continued and the Ethiopian federal parliament declared the creation of an interim government for Tigray. Ethiopian offensives in the north were accompanied with airstrikes and several towns and cities were retaken.
;Early massacres
On the night of 9 to 10 November 2020, 600 civilians, mostly Amharas and Welkait, were killed in a massacre in the town of Mai Kadra with machetes and knives used by local militias and police that were loyal to the TPLF, according to preliminary investigations by Amnesty International and the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission; other refugees, interviewed by the Financial Times and Reuters, said it was the Amhara militia who were the perpetrators and Tigrayans who were the victims. Two days later, refugees interviewed by the Daily Telegraph, The Guardian and The New York Times stated that Amhara militias, including Fano, and the ENDF carried out beatings and massacres of 92 Tigrayans in Humera. Humera was shelled from the direction of the Eritrean–Ethiopian border for two days around 9–11 November. The ENDF gained control of the town one day later. Within the same month, Amhara Region forces took over and occupied Western Tigray.
Offensives of joint ENDF-Amhara Region-Eritrean forces into Tigray were facilitated by the intervention of "Pterosaurus" drones, launched by the United Arab Emirates from its base in Assab, Eritrea. The Chinese-made, armed drones bombed Tigrayan artillery and weapons depots. In the late hours of 13 November 2020, Tigray forces fired a rocket towards the airports of Bahir Dar and Gondar in the Amhara Region. On 14 November, Tigray forces launched rockets at the Eritrean capital of Asmara, but the missiles missed. The Tigray government claimed these locations contained military terminals that served as bases to carry out airstrikes.
;Mekelle offensive
From 17 to 19 November, Ethiopian forces captured the Raya district and the towns of Shire, Alamata, Adwa, and Axum, and began moving towards Adigrat. Fighting between Tigray and Eritrea took place in Adi Quala, Zalambessa, Taruna, Ali Tina, Wadqomdi, and Badme. On 23 November, Ethiopian forces reached the regional capital of Mekelle and encircled it. A military spokesperson for Ethiopia South Command, Colonel Dejene Tsegaye, announced that Mekelle would be shelled, and told Tigray civilians to flee the city because Ethiopian forces would show no mercy.
Though TPLF leaders and special forces had already left the city, Ethiopian forces continued their direct assault on Mekelle on the morning of 28 November, and started heavily shelling the city. By the evening, Prime Minister Abiy declared Ethiopian forces had taken full control of the city. In total, 27 civilians were killed and 100 others were injured. The Tigray government vowed to continue fighting.