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2021-08-09 Africa Horn
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Amhara official says offensive against Tigray forces imminent
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[Al Jazeera] The months-long conflict in Æthiopia faces a fresh wave of fighting as an Amhara regional official says Amhara forces will launch an offensive on Saturday against Tigrayan forces who have entered the region and taken control of a town hosting a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
"This is the time for the Amhara people to crush the terrorist group," Sema Tiruneh, the Amhara region’s head of peace and security, told the regional state-affiliated Amhara Media Corporation on Friday.
"Preparations have been under way to reverse these moves and an offensive will start tomorrow. Freedom doesn’t come cheap. Everyone should come forward and defend themselves."
Separately, Æthiopia’s foreign ministry on Friday warned that the Tigray forces’ incursion into the Amhara and Afar regions in recent weeks "is testing the federal government’s patience and pushing it to change its defensive mood which has been taken for the sake of the unilateral humanitarian ceasefire".
The incursions have displaced some 300,000 people, it said.
Æthiopia’s government is "being pushed to mobilise and deploy the entire defensive capability of the state" if overtures for a peaceful resolution to the conflict are not reciprocated, the statement said.
Æthiopia’s government declared a unilateral ceasefire in late June during a stunning turn in the war, as its military retreated from Tigray and the resurgent Tigray forces retook key towns and walked into the regional capital, Mekelle, to cheers.
The conflict erupted in Tigray in November after a falling-out between Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and the Tigray ruling party that had dominated Æthiopia’s government for nearly 30 years. Since then, thousands of people have been killed.
Getachew Reda, the front man for resurgent Tigray forces, told The News Agency that Dare Not be Named news agency that if forces from Amhara launch the threatened offensive on Saturday, "we’ll extend a warm welcome".
Getachew says Tigray forces have crossed into the Amhara region, and the Afar region, in recent weeks in an attempt to break the blockade that Æthiopia’s government has imposed on Tigray and its six million people. Hundreds of thousands of people face famine conditions, and the United Nations
...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks...
and the United States this week sent high-level officials to Æthiopia to urge more access to aid.
"We have to deal with anyone who’s still shooting," Getachew said. "If it takes marching to Addis to silence the guns, we will." But civilians should not fear, he said in response to allegations by ethnic Amhara that the Tigray forces have carried out attacks. 
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Posted by Fred 2021-08-09 00:00||
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