United States secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected in Ethiopia on Wednesday to meet African Union (AU) Commission chair Moussa Faki Mahamat and examine the progress in the cessation of hostilities in the Tigray region.
Blinken will meet Ethiopian officials a week after appearing before the US House Foreign Affairs Committee, where he said one of the sticking points in Ethiopia was the failed withdrawal of Eritrean and Amhara forces.
The Ethiopian National Defence Force and its allied Amhara militia as well as the Eritrean army combined to fight the Tigray People’s Liberation Front in what was the world’s biggest conflict.
European institutions and academics estimate that more than half a million civilians died in the conflict.
That’s compared to the estimated 8 100 civilians who have died in Ukraine after the Russian invasion, according to figures from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
During a state visit to Kenya in February, Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki downplayed his part in the Ethiopian conflict by telling journalists:
Do not drag us into the situations. If you do not want these Pretoria and Nairobi agreements to be implemented, do not make Eritrea’s presence in Ethiopia a pretext. This has nothing to do with the implementation of the peace agreements.
When an agreement on the cessation of hostilities was reached in November 2022 after two years of conflict, the withdrawal of the two armies from the region was one of the key demands.
According to a statement issued by his office, Blinken’s three-day visit to Ethiopia will “discuss the implementation of the cessation of hostilities agreement to advance peace and promote transitional justice in northern Ethiopia”.
When he appeared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Blinken raised concerns about “ethnic cleansing” in Tigray.
Various independent reports, including one by Human Rights Watch last year, documented an invisible campaign of ethnic cleansing.
According to HRW last year, “older people, women and children have been loaded onto trucks and forced out of their villages and hometowns. Men have been herded into overcrowded detention sites, where many have died of disease, starvation or torture. In total, several hundred thousand Tigrayans have been forcibly uprooted because of their ethnicity”.
Thus, transitional justice will be at the centre of Blinken’s engagements in Ethiopia despite the authorities disputing some of the findings by Amnesty International, which squarely placed the blame for rights violations on Tigray.
The war in Tigray cut access to food aid for millions in need. Since the peace deal, considerable provisions have been supplied in the region.
According to the United Nations, in January, two months into the peace deal, more than two million people in Tigray received food aid.
The area is not only affected by the war, but also climate change-induced hunger, and there have been calls for more aid.
Blinken’s office said he would “also meet humanitarian partners and civil society actors to discuss humanitarian assistance delivery, food security and human rights”.
The cessation of hostilities in Tigray was a top priority of US foreign policy in Africa last year. The AU played the central role in that process, and Blinken would also seek to engage the regional bloc on other traditional pressing matters, most of which formed the basis of the US-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington DC in December.
“The Secretary will also meet with African Union Commission Chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat to discuss shared global and regional priorities and follow up on commitments from the US-Africa Leaders Summit regarding food security, climate and a just energy transition, the African diaspora, and global health,” his office said in a statement.
“The Secretary will underscore US support for African permanent representation in multilateral bodies,” it added.
Blinken will end his two-nation Africa tour with a visit to Niger, the first in history by a US secretary of state. He will meet President Mohamed Bazoum and Foreign Minister Hassoumi Massaoudou.
