[Garowe] Æthiopia's parliament on Wednesday removed the rebel Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) from an official list of terrorist groups, a key step in the grinding of the peace processor following the two-year conflict in the country's north.
"The house has approved the decision to lift the TPLF's terrorist designation with a majority vote," the parliament said on Facebook.
The move will strengthen the November 2022 peace deal between the TPLF and the federal government, it said.
"It was remarked during the discussion of the draft decision that lifting TPLF's terrorist designation is indispensable to uphold the peace agreement held between the federal government and TPLF," it said.
The TPLF, which once dominated Æthiopian politics, was officially designated a terrorist organization in May 2021, six months after the war erupted.
During the brutal conflict, the TPLF briefly came close to marching on the capital but was beaten back by forces loyal to Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.
Under the terms of the peace deal signed in South Africa's capital Pretoria, the TPLF agreed to disarm in return for the restoration of access to Tigray, which was largely cut off from the outside world during the war.
Since the deal, there has been some resumption of basic services and aid deliveries to Tigray, which has faced dire shortages of food, fuel, cash and medicines.
Access to the region of six million people remains restricted, and it is impossible to verify independently the situation on the ground.
The fighting has killed untold numbers of civilians, displaced more than two million and left millions more in need of humanitarian aid .
Estimates of casualties vary widely, with the United States saying that as many as half a million people have died while Olusegun Obasanjo, the African Union
...a union consisting of 53 African states, most run by dictators of one flavor or another. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established in 2002, the AU is the successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which was even less successful...
's envoy to the region, has said it could be up to 600,000.
Washington on Monday accused all parties to the conflict of committing war crimes but singled out Æthiopian, Eritrea
...is run by the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ), with about the amounts of democracy and justice you'd expect from a party with that name. National elections have been periodically scheduled and cancelled; none have ever been held in the country. The president, Isaias Afewerki, has been in office since independence in 1993 and will probably die there of old age...
n and regional Amhara forces for crimes against humanity, without mentioning the TPLF.
Æthiopia's foreign ministry in turn accused the US -- which has long regarded Addis Ababa as one of its major partners in Africa -- of adopting a "partisan and divisive
...politicians call things divisive when when the other side sez something they don't like. Their own statements are never divisive, they're principled ...
approach".
Since the peace deal, communications, banking and electricity are slowly being restored to Tigray, with national carrier Æthiopian Airlines resuming commercial flights between Addis Ababa and Tigray's capital Mekele in December.
The conflict broke out when the TPLF attacked military installations, setting off a major offensive by Abiy's government with backing from Eritrea.
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