Amhara regional state in Ethiopia declares all-out defensive war against TPLF

By Addis Getachew

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AA) - The Amhara Regional State Government in Ethiopia declared an all-out defensive struggle to push "the invading forces" back as Tigray rebels gain towns southward in new offensives.

It said towns such as Alamata and Korem have fallen to TPLF fighters, in a six-point declaration issued Tuesday.

"The terrorist TPLF forces" were now pushing westward to the fertile lands of Humera, it said.

The TPLF fighters' push southwards and westward came in the past few days following a unilateral cease-fire declared last month by the federal government.

Following the declaration of a truce. purportedly to allow farmers in Tigray to make use of the current rainy season for harvesting, national defense forces withdrew troops from Tigray.

"It is a large scale invasion now being on several fronts into Amhara lands," said the regional government.

TPLF forces attacked the Northern Command of the Ethiopian Defense forces on Nov. 3, killing soldiers and looting sizable military hardware.

The following day, the federal government declared a sweeping law enforcement operation in the northernmost region of Tigray.

Apparently, with the federal army silencing its guns, TPLF fighters took free rein to launch attacks southward and westward into hotly contested lands.

TPLF ruled Ethiopia at the head of a four-party coalition with a heavy hand, exorbitant corruption and myriad records of human rights violations for 27 years until 2018.

The Ethiopian parliament has declared the TPLF a terror organization.

Coming under intense pressure from the international community, led by the US administration, the administration of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed faces the daunting task of quelling the TPLF insurgency and mending the walls in an ethnically divided nation.