Tigray Declares Full-Blown War as Its Own Commanders Are Detained
Armed men detained four veteran Tigrayan military leaders overnight, including the former commander-in-chief of the Tigray Defence Forces, Tadesse Werede — all of them men who had questioned the new offensive. Tigrayan forces have seized the region’s main airports and local reports say they have taken Abala in Afar; Ethiopian Airlines has suspended flights to Tigray and to Lalibela. Seven armed groups formed an alliance on Sunday aimed at removing Abiy Ahmed’s government.
The detentions are the tell: a leadership that has to arrest its own most experienced commanders to start a war is not one that has settled the argument at home. Magnus Taylor of the International Crisis Group judged the movement weaker than before, its forces depleted since the last war ended, even as it gains allies — Amhara Fano, the Oromo Liberation Army and movements from three other regions. The TPLF’s own explanation, from central committee member Abdisalam Balema, is encirclement: “We don’t want a repeat of 2020 when we were encircled and alone.” The human arithmetic is already grim before this round — more than 600,000 dead in the last war by African Union estimates, and some 750,000 people displaced within Tigray. A resident of Mekelle described a society sorting itself into “patriots” and “traitors”. Watch Eritrea.