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Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said Monday the Tigray region's dissident leaders had fled west of the regional capital after weeks of fighting but indicated federal forces were monitoring them closely and would attack them soon.
Abiy, winner of last year's Nobel Peace Prize, this month ordered military operations against leaders of Tigray's ruling party, the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), in response to what he said were TPLF-organised attacks on Ethiopian federal army camps.
More than three weeks of fighting between federal soldiers and pro-TPLF forces has left thousands dead in the northern region, and prompted tens of thousands of refugees to flee across the border into Sudan.
"I want them to hear me: yesterday evening, around midnight, we saw them from the situation room in the area between Hagere Selam and Abiy Addi," Abiy said in remarks to lawmakers, referring to two towns west of the Tigray capital Mekele.
"We didn't attack them at night because as they retreated they took their wives, children and abducted soldiers... But this will not continue."
The fighting has been a dramatic escalation of tensions between Abiy and the leaders of the TPLF, which dominated Ethiopian politics for nearly three decades before anti-government protests swept Abiy to office in 2018.
Abiy said on Saturday the military operations were "completed" after federal forces claimed control of the Tigray regional capital Mekele.
The TPLF leaders, however, have repeatedly vowed to fight on as long as federal forces are on Tigrayan soil.
Their exact whereabouts remain unknown.
'Mekele is ours'
As the Ethiopian military bore down on Mekele last week, global concern mounted about a possible bloodbath in a city that, before the conflict, had a population of half a million.
A communications blackout in Tigray has made it difficult to verify claims from both sides about how the fighting is going.
On Monday, Abiy claimed soldiers did not kill any civilians as they took over Mekele and other cities in Tigray.
"Mekele is ours, it was built with our own resources. We are not going to destroy it," he said. "Not even a single person was harmed by the operation in Mekele."
The International Committee of the Red Cross said Sunday that hospitals in Mekele were flooded with trauma patients, though it did not specify how the injuries were sustained.
Abiy also dismissed claims from TPLF leader Debretsion Gebremichael that airstrikes had resulted in many civilian casualties.
As Abiy tries to shift towards helping Tigray recover, the national human rights body called Monday for telecommunications to be restored and for water, electricity, and health services to resume.
The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC), which is government-affiliated but independent, also noted "complaints of ethnic profiling" including "forced leave from work" and travel restrictions.
"EHRC is gravely concerned that while there is no government policy nor legal framework condoning ethnic profiling, security measures designed t
He replaces Debretsion Gebremichael, whose immunity from prosecution was removed Thursday.
Meanwhile, Amnesty International said Thursday that scores of civilians were killed in a \"massacre\" in the Tigray region, that witnesses blamed on forces backing the local ruling party.
The \"massacre\" is the first reported incident of large-scale civilian fatalities in a week-old conflict between the regional ruling party, the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), and the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, winner of last year's Nobel Peace Prize.
\"Amnesty International can today confirm... that scores, and likely hundreds, of people were stabbed or hacked to death in Mai-Kadra (May Cadera) town in the southwest of Ethiopia's Tigray Region on the night of 9 November,\" the rights group said in a report.
Amnesty said it had \"digitally verified gruesome photographs and videos of bodies strewn across the town or being carried away on stretchers.\"
The dead \"had gaping wounds that appear to have been inflicted by sharp weapons such as knives and machetes,\" Amnesty said, citing witness accounts.
Witnesses said the attack was carried out by TPLF-aligned forces after a defeat at the hands of the Ethiopian military, though Amnesty said it \"has not been able to confirm who was responsible for the killings\".
It nonetheless called on TPLF commanders and officials to \"make clear to their forces and their supporters that deliberate attacks on civilians are absolutely prohibited and constitute war crimes\".
Abiy ordered military operations in Tigray on November 4, saying they were prompted by a TPLF attack on federal military camps -- a claim the party denies.
The region has been under a communications blackout ever since, making it difficult to verify competing claims on the ground.
Abiy said Thursday his army had made major gains in western Tigray.
Thousands of Ethiopians have fled across the border into neighboring Sudan, and the UN is sounding the alarm about a humanitarian crisis in Tigray.
For Ethiopians who escaped intense fighting in their northern homeland of Tigray by fleeing into Sudan, they are now safe; but the terrifying nightmare of what they witnessed still haunts them.
\"I saw bodies dismembered by the explosions,\" said Ganet Gazerdier, a 75-year-old sitting alone in the dust at Um Raquba refugee camp in eastern Sudan, newly opened to cope with a sudden influx of over 25,000 people fleeing air strikes, artillery barrages and massacres in Ethiopia.
\"Other bodies were rotting, lying on the road, murdered with a knife\", she added.
Distraught at having been forced to flee their homes, traumatised by becoming separated from family members in the mad rush, and horrified after witnessing killings, refugees wander as if dazed in the camp.
\"I lived with my three daughters,\" said Gazerdier, dressed in a blue dress and white headscarf to protect her from the blazing sun. \"When the shells started to rain down on our house, we all panicked and fled in the dark.\"
The bombardment not only destroyed her house in the western Tigray town of Humera, the site of reportedly some of the heaviest fighting, but also separated her from her family.
Everyone scattered, and she has yet to make contact with them.
\"I met some friends who were fleeing too, and I followed them,\" she added. \"I looked around several times in search of my daughters, but to no luck.\"
She has found some help at Um Raquba, 80 kilometres from the border, but conditions are spartan, with so far only basic emergency relief set up at the isolated camp.
She stops other Ethiopians to tell them her story, but no one pays attention. So many have terrible stories to tell.
\"I have a daughter who lives in Khartoum but I don't know her address,\" she said quietly. \"How can I find her in this big city?\"
Ethnic divides
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announced on November 4 he had ordered military operations in Tigray in response to attacks by the regional ruling party, the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF).
The conflict has turned ethnic divides deadly, said Gerdo Burhan.
If you are Tigrayan and captured by government soldiers, you are in trouble, said the 24-year-old.
\"They ask you, with a gun pointed at you, if you belong to Tigrayan forces,\" he said. \"At the slightest hesitation, you are dead. They shoot you down on the spot and leave the body in the street.\"
Pleading with them that you are a civilian does not make a difference, said Burhan.
\"They beat you, sometimes to death, or they take you with them to an unknown destination - and I doubt if you come back alive from there,\" he added. \"It's terror.\"
Burhan managed to escape to Sudan, trekking through the hot bush across the border, but he was separated from his father, mother and two sisters on the way.
\"I don't know if they're okay,\" he said.
Faced with long columns of refugees suddenly crossing into Sudan, the government decided to reopen Um Raquba, a camp closed 20 years ago.
It once housed refugees who fled Ethiopia's 1983-85 famine that killed more
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Congresswoman Yvette D. Clarke (NY-09) issued the following statement discussing a letter to the FCC pushing to reform the E-Rate program to accommodate distanced learning:
[UN News] National elections in Libya will take place on 24 December 2021, Stephanie Williams, the head of the UN mission in the country, announced on Friday during a virtual press conference.
Today is the 252nd day of 2020. There are 114 days left in the year.TODAY'S HIGHLIGHT1992: Nelson Mandela calls for the removal of the homeland ruler whose troops killed 24 protesters, sparking a major confrontation between black and white leaders in South Africa.�OTHER EVENTS1494: France's King Charles VIII enters Turin, Italy, seeking to establish his claim to throne of Naples.
Zimbabwe's High Court granted bail to an opposition politician detained after calling for anti-government protests over corruption and economic crisis.
A tribute to Argentine legend Mardona at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris just before Seria A game Parma against Genoa.
At the end of 90 minutes, it was Parma's night with a brace for Ivorian star Gervinho.
The 33 year old putting up an impressive display to give Parma a 2-1 win.
Gervinho put Parma ahead 10 minutes in, latching on to a through ball from Juraj Kucka before firing beyond Alberto Paleari.
Two minutes into the second half, the former Arsenal forward doubled the lead.
The victory ensured Parma climbed to the 16th spot on the Serie A table after gathering nine points from nine games.
