Clashes end between Ethiopia and Tigray rebels

n n

Fighting has ended between the Ethiopian army and Tigray rebels, local and security sources told AFP on Sunday, after violence flared near the border with Sudan.

n

“There is a de-escalation,” one member of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) said on condition of anonymity, without giving any casualty figures.

n

Clashes involving heavy artillery and drones broke out in Shererina at about 6:00 am (0300 GMT) on Saturday and ended at about 5:00 am, they added.

n

A security source, who also asked for their name not to be used, confirmed that fighting had stopped.

n

On Saturday, the TPLF, which has been removed from the list of political parties but remains influential in the region, accused the federal authorities of having “intensified its destructive actions and taken them to a higher level”.

n

It also denounced what it said was a “large-scale infantry offensive.

n

There was no immediate response from the federal authorities.

n

AFP has not been able to independently verify the TPLF claims or identify which forces were on the ground in Shererina.

n

Fighting has been taking place in the contested area of western Tigray, which is controlled by nationalists from the neighbouring regional state of Amhara.

n

Federal troops and Tigrayan forces have for several months been massed along the border of northern Tigray in the north of Ethiopia, with both sides accusing the other of wanting to trigger a new conflict.

n

Fears of a new war have grown as a result, less than four years after the end of a bloody conflict between the two sides, with the TPLF backed by local militias and the Eritrean army.

n

It left at least 600,000 dead, according to an African Union estimate.

n

dyg/phz/giv

n n