Ethiopia Returns to Civil War Days After America Dropped Its Eritrea Sanctions

Tigrayan forces seized three airports on September 23, less than four years after a peace deal ended a conflict that killed an estimated 600,000 people, and have since pushed into the neighboring Afar region. That places the road and rail line to Djibouti, which handles almost all of Ethiopia’s international cargo, within the rebels’ reach.Ethiopia’s army chief, Field Marshal Birhanu Jula, accuses Eritrea, Sudan, and Egypt of backing the insurgents. Eritrea and the Sudanese army reject the charge, and Egypt calls any suggestion that it meddles in other countries baseless.Fighting has spread across Tigray, Afar and Amhara. Tigrayan forces took the Afar town of Erebti on September 27, and pro-government forces said a day later they had captured Alamata, a supply town about 75 miles south of the Tigrayan capital, Mekelle. The American Embassy at Addis Ababa has advised American citizens not to travel to Amhara, Tigray, or Afar for any reason. Via Google MapsAbout 150,000 people have fled their homes in Afar, according to a local aid group. Doctors Without Borders says the number of wounded treated at hospitals in Korem and Alamata topped 420 between September 22 and 25.The United Arab Emirates has declared solidarity with the federal government, while Qatar has called for an immediate end to the fighting. A deal meant to have prevented a renewal of the civil war collapsed under its own weaknesses, according to a scholar who studies the Horn of Africa.“The Pretoria deal broke down because key provisions of the deal were not implemented, and as a result, the parties lost confidence. Although no agreement is perfect, there were some design issues, particularly its weak enforcement mechanisms,” an associate professor at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, Michael Woldemariam, tells The New York Sun.How did a peace that ended one of the century’s deadliest wars come apart, and what happens if Ethiopia’s neighbors join the fight?Pretoria UnravelsThe Pretoria Agreement, brokered by the African Union and signed in South Africa’s capital on November 2, 2022, ended a two-year war between Addis Ababa and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front. It required Tigrayan fighters to disarm and opened the way for unhindered humanitarian access. Eritrean troops and Amhara fighters, who had fought beside the federal army, were not parties to it, and both later fell out with Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.The TPLF also split, and a faction under Debretsion Gebremichael rejected the order the deal created; it later seized power in Tigray and repaired relations with its former enemies.Smaller clashes had been building for weeks. Fighting between Tigrayan and federal forces began near the Sudan border on August 1, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, and Ethiopian drones have struck party officials and fighters in recent months.The two sides now tell opposite stories about who started the September offensive. Tigray’s government calls it a defensive war, while Getachew Reda, who now advises Mr. Abiy, says the TPLF attacked first.The agreement, however, was fragile from the start.“The Pretoria Agreement is not a peace agreement, but a cessation of hostilities agreement, whose aim was to restore the status quo ante, hence not addressing the root causes of the outbreak of war in 2020,” a professor and vice rector for research at Oslo New University College, Kjetil Tronvoll, tells the Sun.The collapse came long ago, Mr. Tronvoll says, yet “the open hostilities between Tigray and feds were initiated now with the establishment of the Alliance for Survival.”Old Enemies, One AllianceSeven armed movements announced that alliance days before the offensive, pledging to remove Mr. Abiy’s government. Members include the Tigrayan party, the Amhara Fano National Movement and the Oromo Liberation Army, along with groups from the Somali, Afar and Benishangul-Gumuz regions.A government spokeswoman, Billene Seyoum, says members of the new alliance were already working together with financial backing from Asmara. Eritrea denies supporting Ethiopian armed groups, and a senior Tigrayan party official says the alliance receives no military or logistical support from Eritrea or Sudan.Not every analyst accepts the denials.Access to the Red Sea lies at the root of the dispute. Landlocked since Eritrea’s independence in 1993, Ethiopia is estimated to spend $1.5 billion to $2 billion a year on getting its goods onto ships, mostly at ports in Djibouti. However, Djibouti’s port authority reports much lower revenue since much of Ethiopia’s cost is incurred en route to the port. Mr. Abiy has responded by pushing for a route through Eritrean ports, which has strained relations with Asmara.“A likely objective of the Alliance is to cut the road/train route from Djibouti to Addis — this will have an enormous impact on livelihoods in Addis and beyond, as well as fuel supplies to the federal forces to sustain a warfare against the Alliance,” Mr. Tronvoll says.Washington Shifts CourseThe fighting erupted days after a shift in American policy. The Treasury Department on September 18 announced the expiry of a national emergency declared by President Biden in 2021 related to the civil war. That ended sanctions penalizing Eritrea’s army and its ruling party, giving up Washington’s main source of leverage over Eritrea, which Addis Ababa accuses of backing the rebels.Senate Democrats have criticized the timing of the decision, which came just five days before the offensive. However there has been no reporting to show that it triggered the fighting, which had been building since August 1.On September 23, the American ambassador to Ethiopia, Ervin Massinga, said in a written statement that he was disappointed that Tigrayan leaders, whom Washington sanctioned earlier this year, had launched a large-scale offensive, and that more sanctions are possible. Two days later, the American Embassy at Addis Ababa advised American citizens not to travel to Amhara, Tigray, or Afar for any reason.On September 28, six Senate Democrats, led by Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the ranking member of the Foreign Relations Committee, urged Secretary of State Marco Rubio to engage Mr. Abiy’s government, the Tigrayan party and allied armed groups and return to mediation.Their statement says an Ethiopian military drone hit a truck carrying American-funded food aid for displaced persons in northwestern Tigray, damaging or destroying much of the shipment. The senators note that the fighting came less than a week after the Trump administration let the Eritrea sanctions expire. They also fault the Tigrayan party for undermining the region’s interim administration, refusing to disarm, and forcibly conscripting civilians.Physicians for Human Rights, which works with medical partners across Ethiopia, says in an August brief that armed groups in Tigray, Amhara, and Afar have struck hospitals with drones and killed health workers, and that years of impunity have made such attacks routine. Earlier reports from the group documented widespread sexual violence in the conflict and warned that American aid cuts were disrupting HIV supplies and maternal health services.Mr. Tronvoll doubts that the United States or any other country or body has the capacity, or the will, to apply the diplomatic, economic, and military pressure needed to stop the war from developing further.Backing the African Union’s mediation effort is the most realistic option on the table, yet it comes with a warning. “Sadly, I think there are limits to what the US can achieve in terms of mediation once the shooting starts,” Mr. Woldemariam says.

Ethiopia Returns to Civil War Days After America Dropped Its Eritrea Sanctions

Ethiopia Returns to Civil War Days After America Dropped Its Eritrea Sanctions

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