Tigray crisis: Ethiopia at risk of humanitarian catastrophe as fighting intensifies
Ethiopia’s Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) confirmed that it will not stop its battles with the Ethiopian army until the fall of the current Ethiopian government, according to Al Arabiya News.
For more than 8 months, the Tigray region has witnessed clashes between the Ethiopian government forces with some of the areas that later supported them on the one hand, and the Tigray Defence Forces (TDF), in addition to the number of people suffering from starvation, the United Nations announced that the war has caused thousands of deaths.
On November 4, the Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed ordered the implementation of a military operation against the Tigray Liberation Front, and his forces attacked civilians.
The Ethiopian army succeeded in inflicting successive strikes on the Tigray Liberation Front and defeating it in many locations until the tide has reversed and the TDF reached Mekelle, the regional capital, on the 28th of the same month, but humanitarian and human rights organizations accuse Addis Ababa of committing human rights violations in the region.
The TDF succeeded in controlling the region, defeating the Ethiopian army last June, and detaining about 5,000 Ethiopian government forces.
Tigray’s humanitarian catastrophe
The prolongation of the conflict in Ethiopia portends a humanitarian catastrophe in the region, which includes more than 7 million Ethiopians, as the United Nations World Food Program warned that the food aid it provided to the Tigray region in Ethiopia will run out this week, according to the Associated Press.
Earlier this month, WFP announced the resumption of aid deliveries to the region, which is suffering from a food crisis that has reached the point of famine. According to United Nations statistics, more than 400,000 residents of the region are currently suffering from starvation.
The Under-Secretary-General of the International Organization for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Martin Griffiths, visited Ethiopia and pointed out that about 5.2 million people (90% of the population) need humanitarian assistance in the Tigray region, stressing that the UN official aims to conduct constructive discussions on expanding the humanitarian response throughout the country, where more than 90 United Nations agencies are working to By international NGOs and others to meet the humanitarian needs of the affected people in Ethiopia.