Yet through the acquisition of drones from Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Iran and aerial bombardment of the Tigray forces, the ENDF stopped the onslaught and drove Tigray forces out of Amhara and most of Afar. Like Abiy before, the TPLF leadership exhibited little willingness to negotiate compromises, asking for the formation of a transitional government, Abiy’s resignation, and return of Tigray areas occupied by the Amhara. By early November, the Tigray insurgency seemed on the doorstep of the capital and the government’s survival appeared precarious. In summer and fall 2021, Tigray forces continued to sweep through Amhara and pushed closer to Addis Ababa even as Abiy made the fraught decision to form anti-Tigray militias across the country. In Afar, Tigray forces sought to take a major logistical artery from landlocked Ethiopia to Djibouti to relieve Addis Ababa’s debilitating blockade of Tigray.
But Tigray forces rapidly pushed into neighboring Afar and Amhara on August 5, seizing the important and historic town of Lalibela. Severe human rights abuses perpetrated against the Tigray population by ENDF and Eritrean forces helped entrench the Tigray insurgency.īy June 2021, the ENDF were routed in Tigray and Abiy ordered them out of Tigray, declaring a unilateral ceasefire. Despite ENDF initial successes, the capable Tigray forces became increasingly potent. Since November 2020, the Tigray war has seen dramatic reversals of military fortunes for the two principal warring parties. Hoping for a rapid crushing of the TPLF and a strong deterrent message to other ethnic groups, Abiy responded with military force and enlisted the help of Eritrea, a long-term TPLF enemy. Fearing the federal government’s response, Tigray leaders seized local military depots. After Abiy unilaterally postponed Ethiopia’s August 2020 elections, using the COVID-19 pandemic as justification, Tigray leaders went against his orders and held elections in September 2020. In turn, Tigray leaders started to sabotage Abiy’s government. With tensions resulting in ethnic violence, assassinations, and internal displacement, Abiy responded with authoritarian measures and confrontational attitude toward Tigray political leaders, seeking to prosecute them for EPRDF crimes. Elected prime minister in 2018, Abiy, an Oromo, struggled to stave off pent-up grievances of long-suppressed ethnic groups, including the Oromo and Amhara, and demands for faster economic redistribution. Since 2018, ethnic tensions and competition over state resources and power have been intensifying in Ethiopia, as the country has sought to move away from three decades of authoritarian rule by the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), which was dominated by the Tigray ethnic minority. It yet remains to be seen whether Abiy’s recent decisions reflect a new-found realization that some political accommodation with TPLF is necessary, a hope for a victor’s peace, or merely a tactical - and in vain - gambit to avoid U.S. But the hope is slim, with various ominous clouds hanging over any prospect of a rapid and lasting negotiated settlement. The December 21 decision of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to halt the counteroffensive of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces (ENDF) at Tigray’s borders gives some hope that international diplomacy, bolstered by a U.S.-created sanctions regime, could finally help incentivize a negotiated end to the conflict. The most recent reversal of military fortunes allowed the Ethiopian government, severely embattled until November, to push the TPLF back into Tigray.
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