Ethiopia says Eritrea to withdraw from border

By Addis Getachew

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AA) – Ethiopia said Friday Eritrea has agreed to pull out its forces from Ethiopian territories along the border.

The announcement was made by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed who just returned from a two-day official visit to Eritrea's capital Asmara.

“In our March 26, 2021 discussions with President Isaias Afeworki during my visit to Asmara, the government of Eritrea has agreed to withdraw its forces out of the Ethiopian border,” the Nobel laureate tweeted.

“The Ethiopian National Defense Forces will take over guarding the border areas effective immediately,” he added.

The outlawed Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) fired rockets across the border into Asmara thereby provoking the Eritrean troops into crossing the border, Abiy said.

Ethiopia and Eritrea, he said, would continue to strengthen their bilateral relations and economic cooperation.

Last year in November, Ethiopia ended a security operation in Tigray which was triggered by an armed attack by TPLF on Ethiopian troops stationed in the region's capital Mekele.

However, sporadic fighting continues as hundreds of thousands of people were internally displaced and more than 60,000 fled to neighboring Sudan.

The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission in a report this week alleged that Eritrean troops killed 100 civilians in the historic town of Axum in Tigray.

On Thursday, the United Nations and the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission agreed to launch a joint investigation into all the atrocities committed in the region in a comprehensive manner.