- Ethiopia says some international bodies and countries are pushing the Tigray conflict to push a sinister political agenda.
- AU led talks in Pretoria are set to end on Sunday with hope for a solution.
- The US says its ready to take measures against those who obstruct a resolution of the conflict.
Talks to end hostilities in the Tigray region of Ethiopia, taking place in Pretoria, are set to end on Sunday, but already the federal government of Ethiopia has reservations.
On Friday, Ethiopia threatened to cut diplomatic ties with countries that it accused of framing the conflict as part of a “sinister political agenda”.
The government also accused some international bodies of “joining this orchestrated campaign against Ethiopia”.
In a statement from its communications service, the government said it was thus “forced to weigh its options and consider its relations with some states and entities that are making unsustained and politically motivated accusations”.
Ethiopian government officials and Tigrayan authorities are in closed-door talks in Pretoria.
Former Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta, former Nigerian president and now-AU Commissioner to the Horn of Africa Olusegun Obasanjo, and SA’s former deputy president Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka are facilitating the talks.
The talks are being held under the auspices of the African Union, while the United Nations and the United States, through its special envoy to the Horn of Africa Mike Hammer, are there as observers.
The Ethiopian government said it was in support of the talks underway so that the conflict could be ended in a “durable fashion”.
The US is widely seen as pro-Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF).
US ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield they and their partners were “prepared to take appropriate measures against those who obstruct a resolution of this conflict”.
Mukesh Kapila, a specialist in crisis and conflict management, humanitarian affairs, post-conflict, and development, addressed the Committee on International Human Rights at the Canadian Parliament on Friday.
“It is my conviction that the situation in Tigray is nothing less than a genocide,” he said.
World Health Organisation director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus also had strong words about the war in Tigray.
“There is no other situation in the world in which six million people have been kept under siege for almost two years like in Tigray, Ethiopia.
“This is a health crisis. I urge the international community to give this crisis the attention it deserves,” he said.
Ghebreyesus, in an apparent reference to the talks in South Africa, said: “There is a narrow window now to prevent genocide.”
News24
