In the wake of the changing political fortunes of a man who was once a pariah, Isaias Afwerki, President of Eritrea, proved to be a staunch ally of the Nobel laureate of Ethiopia and Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who desperately needed his troops gave support to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) in Tigray.
In a recent speech to the Ethiopian parliament, the Nobel laureate revealed that Eritrea, a highly militarized one-party state, fed, dressed and armed Ethiopian soldiers when the TPLF first attacked them and at their bases in Tigray, an Ethiopian region, seized what borders Eritrea.
Mr. Abiy said it would allow them to return to fight the TPLF, a former guerrilla movement with about 250,000 forces, until it was driven out into the region on November 28.
“The Eritrean people have shown us … they are a family member who stands by us on a difficult day,” he added.
This was an important recognition by Mr. Abiy, though he did not go so far as to claim that Mr. Isaiah also sent troops to defeat the TPLF, a longtime enemy of the Eritrean leader who had been in power since 1993. .
Hospital allegedly shelled
The allegation that Eritrean troops are fighting in Tigray was made by the TPLF, civilians fleeing the conflict and Eritreans inside and outside the country.
“Isaiah sends young Eritreans to die in Tigray. The war will also further weaken the economy. But Isaiah will be in power for a long time to come. He makes people fight for their survival so they do not fight for their freedom,” he said. Paulos Tesfagiorgis, an Eritrean human rights activist who was forced into exile by the regime in Asmara.
A State Department spokesman also said there had been “credible reports” of the presence of Eritrean troops in Tigray, calling it a “serious development”.
Both governments deny the reports, while Foreign Minister Osman Saleh Mohammed Eritrea describes them as ‘propaganda’.
As for the UN chief, António Gueterres, he said that Mr. Abiy assured him that there are no Eritrean troops in Tigray except in the area that Ethiopia has agreed to surrender to a historic peace deal between the two nations in 2018.
The agreement put an end to the “no war-no peace” situation that has existed between the two nations since their border war from 1998 to 2000, which left up to 100,000 people dead. This has Mr. Abiy won the Nobel Peace Prize, although the territory had not yet been transferred to Eritrea by the start of the conflict in Tigray in early November.
Abiy’s government has severely restricted access to Tigray for the media, UN agencies and human rights agencies, making it difficult to verify reports or to investigate allegations of atrocities on all sides in the conflict, including shelling a hospital from the Eritrean territory.
Eritrea does not comment on the alleged bombing, cited in a statement by the UN’s human rights chief. Mr. Abiy denies that his troops killed a single civilian in Tigray.
“This war has been waged in absolute darkness. Nobody knows the true extent of the conflict or its impact,” said Horn of Africa analyst Rashid Abdi in Kenya.
Eritrean forces accused of looting
U.S. analyst Alex de Waal said he was informed by a UN source that the conflict had caused the “large-scale displacement” of people in the region, the poorest in Ethiopia with a population of about five million.
“If it goes on like this, there will be mass famine in Tigray, and a bitter and angry population,” he said. De Waal said.
He added that he also learned from reliable sources in Tigray, including clergy, that Eritrean forces were involved in looting.
‘We hear that they even steal doors [and] bathroom accessories, ‘he said.
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Other Eritreans said that soldiers, including their relatives, were fighting against the TPLF forces in various areas, and that some of them even wore Ethiopian camouflage.
Eritrea insists it has no troops in Tigray, with its foreign minister quoted as saying: “We are not involved.”
However, former Eritrean diplomat Abdella Adem said he personally knew soldiers wounded in battle, while a source at the public hospital in Senafe in Eritrea, Senafe, told the BBC that both Eritrean and Ethiopian troops were treated there.
‘Isaiah wants TPLF’s liquidation’
Other sources in Eritrea said Ethiopian troops were also seen regrouping in the central city of Hagaz and taking their wounded to the nearby Gilas military hospital.
British Eritrean academic Gaim Kibreab has said he believes Mr. Isaiah sent troops to Tigray to pursue the “liquidation” of the TPLF, which, according to the Eritrean leader, had been since the 1998-2000 border war.
The TPLF was in power at the time in Ethiopia’s federal government and the Tigray regional government.
‘In the 1998-2000 war, the TPLF humiliates the president [Mr Isaias] by taking over the small town of Badme. Even when an international tribunal ruled that the town belonged to Eritrea, the TPLF refused to withdraw from the occupied place for 18 years.
“The president has been waiting for this moment and the TPLF is underestimating his cunning and patience at his own risk,” he said. Gaim added.
Missiles fired at Eritrea
Mr Isaias’ supporters insisted that Eritrean troops did not cross into Tigray and said they were only pursuing the goal of regaining sovereign territory by taking Badme and surrounding areas without causing casualties.
Paulos expressed a different view, saying: “Badme is back in Eritrean hands, but there was no public announcement about it, because that is not Isaiah’s biggest concern. He still insists on crushing the TPLF.
“Abiy started out as a peacemaker and reformer, but then he fell into the trap of taking revenge on the TPLF, which Isaiah wanted.”
Mr Abiy says he has tried peacefully to resolve the differences with the TPLF, but has been forced to take action after seizing a military base on November 3 and convincing him that he wanted his government overthrow.
Although Mr. Isaias rushing to the aid at the time, Eritrean state media kept his audience in the dark about the conflict, and did not even report on the TPLF-fired missiles that landed on the outskirts of the capital Asmara in early November, causing loud noises has. explosions heard by residents.
“Eritrean TV talks about bombs in Syria, but when the missiles landed in Asmara, it said nothing,” said former Eritrean government official Dawit Fisehaye.
In a tweetEritrea Information Minister Yemane Meskel said it was “pointless to strengthen it” [the TPLF’s] last, predictable, though unimportant acts “.
‘Refugee kidnapped’
Internet access in Eritrea is restricted and the country has no independent media and no opposition parties. The fate of 11 politicians and 17 journalists detained nearly 20 years ago remains unknown.
Furthermore, military service is compulsory, while jobs are limited, which leads to many people – especially young people – fleeing the country. About 100,000 have been living in UN camps in Tigray for years.
The UN refugee agency said it had received an “overwhelming number of credible reports” that refugees had been killed, abducted and forcibly returned to the one-party state during the current conflict.
Although it is not said who was behind the abductions, a refugee told the BBC that it was Eritrean soldiers who loaded them onto trucks in the city of Adigrat and took them across the border to the city of Adi Quala.
Eritrea did not comment on its alleged involvement, but had earlier accused the UN agency of “smear campaigns” and of trying to depopulate the country.
Mr Dawit said he did not believe the regime would ever reform.
There has been no change in Eritrea so far because the leadership did not want it and the demise of the TPLF will not change it. The expectation of reform is a pipeline, “he added.