26 November 2020″ SOURCE : AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
In statement hours after an ultimatum for TPLF to surrender expired, the prime minister asks residents in capital Mekelle to ‘stay indoors’.Abiy’s government set a 72-hour ultimatum on Sunday for the TPLF to lay down its arms or face an assault on Mekelle [Eduardo Soteras/AFP]
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The Ethiopian military will begin the “final phase” of an offensive in the northern Tigray region, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has said in a statement, hours after an ultimatum for the Tigrayan forces to surrender expired.
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Abiy said the army has been ordered to move on the embattled Tigrayan capital, Mekelle, and warned its residents to “stay indoors”.The statement by the prime minister’s office means tanks and other weaponry can now close in on the city of some half a million people. “We will take utmost care to protect civilians,” it says, Al Jazeera’s Malcolm Webb, reporting from the Kenyan capital Nairobi, said the federal government is claiming a large number of Tigrayan fighters have surrendered to its forces in the last 72 hours.
“Prime Minister Abiy said thousands of Tigrayan fighters have surrendered in the last three days. But the last comment we heard from the TPLF leadership refuted that claim,” he said.
“Government forces also said they have surrounded Mekelle. Again, Tigray military leadership have refuted that claim.” Claims by all sides have been impossible to verify because phone and internet connections to the region are down and access to the area is tightly controlled, Thousands of people are already believed to have died and there has been widespread destruction from aerial bombardment and ground fighting since the conflict began on November 4.
The international community is pleading for immediate de-escalation, dialogue and humanitarian access as Ethiopian forces fight their way through Tigray to Mekelle, But Abiy, last year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner, has rejected international “interference”.His government said three high-level African Union envoys, who reached Ethiopia on Wednesday, can meet Abiy, but not with Tigrayan leaders.
The TPLF once dominated Ethiopia’s government but has been sidelined under Abiy’s rule. The two governments now regard each other as illegal, The United Nations on Thursday said shortages have become “very critical” in the Tigray region as its population of 6 million remains sealed off.
Fuel and cash are running out, more than a million people are now estimated to be displaced and food for nearly 100,000 refugees from Eritrea will be gone in a week, according to the UN’s update released overnight.
More than 600,000 people who rely on monthly food rations haven’t received them this month, the UN said, Travel blockages are so dire that even within Mekelle, the UN World Food Programme cannot obtain access to transport food from its warehouses there, Another crisis is unfolding as more than 40,000 Ethiopian refugees have fled into a remote area of Sudan, where humanitarian groups and local communities struggle to feed, treat and shelter them.
SOURCE : AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
