Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has accused the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), an armed opposition party in Ethiopia, of preparing for another round of war.
PM Abiy said the TPLF is arming its 200,000 troops and purchasing weapons to this end.
In an interview he gave in the Tigriyan language for the state run Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation (EBC), he blamed the TPLF for the start of the previous conflict that is said to have claimed over 600,000 lives in the bloody two-year conflict.
He said if the TPLF restarts fighting, it will be the end of its existence.
“TPLF is preparing for another round of war. “It is not going to be like last time. It will be flooded away,” he said.
He described TPLF as “backward with stagnant thoughts.”
In the interview he said, one of the fundamental problems with the TPLF was that it refused to accept the “change” – referencing reform measures that were introduced after the TPLF lost central power in April 2018.
He also blamed TPLF for spending the budget from federal transfer for Tigray to finance the war.
The TPLF has admitted that it has over 200,000 armed forces even after the Pretoria agreement. The core provision of the agreement which ended the bloody war was for the TPLF to disarm its forces which didn’t happen.
Abiy did not spare Eritrea too. He blasted the Eritrean leadership as anti-change and anti-development. He said the same during his last appearance at the Ethiopian parliament, that his administration’s problem with Eritrean leadership started when troops from northern neighbour “killed over 100 youth in Axum” during the war (2020-2022).
He even claimed that the Ethiopian army “tactically” blocked the Eritrean forces from entering another town in the region. He accused Eritrean forces of looting the Tigray region.
After Ethiopia and Eritrea ended two decades of hospitality in 2018, there was an influx of Eritreans to Ethiopia.
That trend is no longer the case. There were several instances when Abiy Ahmed’s government arrested Eritreans in Addis Ababa and elsewhere.
Ahmed justified his government’s action that Eritrean government spies were entering along with other Eritreans and that the government introduced restrictions.
MG/as/APA