Ethiopia’s federal military has recaptured the main airport in the capital of the northern Tigray region, three sources said this Saturday, dealing a major \u200bsetback to an opposition alliance in its stronghold.<\/p>\n
Clashes pitting a rebel alliance led \u200cby Tigray’s ruling party against the government and its allied forces broke out in northern Ethiopia last week, in the most serious escalation of violence since a 2020-2022 civil war.<\/p>\n
The fighting has stoked fears that \u200bit could escalate into a wider regional conflict, potentially drawing in neighbouring countries in \u200bthe Horn of Africa and the Gulf.<\/p>\n
The federal government in Addis Ababa \u2060severed diplomatic ties with Eritrea this week, accusing it of supporting the rebel alliance alongside \u200bSudan and Egypt. The three countries deny this.<\/p>\n
Troops from the Ethiopian National Defence Forces had \u200bregained control of Alula Aba Nega Airport in Tigray’s capital Mekelle, one source with knowledge of events in the city and a humanitarian source told Reuters.<\/em><\/p>\n A third source, a Mekelle resident who asked not to \u200bbe named for security reasons, confirmed the taking of the airport by government forces and \u200badded they could hear gunfire outside the city centre.<\/p>\n This source said they had seen some Tigrayan Defence \u200cForce \u2060fighters abandoning their posts and heading home, and that there was looting of government facilities taking place in the city.<\/p>\n Reuters<\/em> could not immediately verify the assertions and the region’s ruling party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), could not be immediately reached for comment. A source close \u200bto the TPLF however \u200btold Reuters the \u2060city was encircled by government troops and allied militias<\/p>\n Mekelle’s airport, which is around 10 km (6 miles) from the centre of the city, was \u200bone of three airports in the region that were seized by the \u200bopposition forces \u2060at the start of the fighting on September 23.<\/p>\n The taking of Mekelle by government forces would be a major setback for the opposition alliance, although analysts say it would be unlikely to \u2060end \u200bthe conflict.<\/p>\n –Reuters–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":46521,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[78,26],"class_list":["post-47174","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Troops from the Ethiopian National Defence Forces had \u200bregained control of Alula Aba Nega Airport in Tigray's capital Mekelle.","published_date":"","news_description":"Troops from the Ethiopian National Defence Forces had \u200bregained control of Alula Aba Nega Airport in Tigray's capital Mekelle.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47175,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47174\/revisions\/47175"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46521"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=47174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}