Tigray forces launch offensive against Ethiopian government

Tigrayan rebels have seized control of airports in the Tigray region in northern Ethiopia and launched an offensive against federal forces in the neighbouring Afar and Amhara regions.

The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) has “launched an all-out offensive against government positions in Afar and Amhara”, Getachew Reda, an adviser to Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, said in a post on his X account on Wednesday.

“It has taken over federally controlled airports in Tigray leading to the suspension of flights to and from Tigray. The TPLF politico-military leadership has obviously taken irresponsibility to new heights,” said Reda, a former TPLF leader who fell out with the party and joined the federal government.

The Tigray regional government, however, said it was countering an “invasion” by federal forces.

In a statement posted on Facebook, it accused federal troops of “intensive bombardments” on Tuesday involving “aircraft, drones, and artillery”.

“The Tigray army has been instructed to counter the attack and genocidal invasion launched against us, and has entered into a defensive battle,” the statement added.

Clashes were under way in various parts of Afar, including Abala and Berahle, amid reports of shelling along the border with Amhara, and an Al Jazeera correspondent reported significant military build-ups by various parties in the border areas.

The development comes after the TPLF announced on Sunday that it had allied with six other armed groups across Ethiopia to overthrow Abiy’s government.

The TPLF ruled Ethiopia from 1991 to 2018 before being sidelined after Abiy took office, triggering a devastating civil war from 2020 to 2022. The conflict killed about 600,000 people, according to estimates by the African Union, before the Pretoria Peace Agreement ended hostilities.

“Very close to war”

The region has still not recovered. About one million people remain displaced, and parts of the peace agreement are unfulfilled. An uneasy calm held until late 2025 when clashes resumed, and a further escalation in recent months has raised fears of a return to all-out war.

Alan Boswell, Horn of Africa director at the International Crisis Group, said with the peace agreement broken down, the situation has turned very dangerous.

“The TPLF has joined with other rebel groups to say that they are going to overthrow and topple the current regime, which is something very close to a declaration of war,” Boswell told Al Jazeera.

“We’ve seen an ongoing and escalating drone campaign by the federal government against the TPLF, and then you’ve seen quite an escalation over the past day. So if we’re not all the way back into something like a full war, we are very, very close,” he said.

He also noted that with Eritrea allying itself with the TPLF, the issue threatens to become a regional one. Ethiopia’s federal government and its allies in Eritrea fought the TPLF together in the civil war, but now Ethiopia’s federal government accuses those same former allies of supporting the TPLF.

“Eritrea is also quite close, for instance, with the Sudanese army, and relations between Ethiopia and the Sudanese army have also been deteriorating,” Boswell said, adding that Ethiopia is also getting more involved in the Sudan war essentially against the Sudanese, at least along its border.

“So this is all becoming one big regional mess, and it could get very, very ugly if we don’t see de-escalation.”