Ethiopia peace talks have begun on Tigray, South Africa says

AP | Peace talks to end Ethiopia’s devastating Tigray conflict have begun in South Africa, a South African government spokesman said Tuesday.

The spokesman for South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, Vincent Magwenya, said the African Union-led talks that started Tuesday are expected to continue until Sunday. Delegations from the Ethiopian government and Tigray authorities arrived in South Africa this week. There was no immediate comment from either side.

“Such talks are in line with South Africa’s foreign policy objectives of a secure and conflict-free continent,” Magwenya said.

Former Nigerian president and African Union (AU) envoy Olesegun Obasanjo, former South African deputy president Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and former Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta are facilitating the talks.

The peace talks – led by Ethiopia’s national security adviser Redwan Hussein and by Tigray forces spokesman Getachew Reda and Gen. Tsadkan Gebretensae – begin as Ethiopian and allied forces from Eritrea have taken over some urban areas in Tigray in the past few days.

Those include the towns of Axum, Adwa and now Adigrat, according to a humanitarian source who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.

The Tigray region of more than 5 million people is again cut off from the world by renewed fighting that began in late August following months of a lull in the conflict that allowed combatants to regroup.

The war since exploding in November 2020 has also spilled over into Ethiopia’s neighboring Amhara and Afar regions, putting hundreds of thousands of people there in peril. Meanwhile, the economy of Ethiopia, once one of the fastest-growing in Africa, has suffered.