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Ethiopian authorities round up and arrest masses of Tigrayans and UN staff

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Government forces continue to round up Tigrayans as conflict rages in Ethiopia.
Camera IconGovernment forces continue to round up Tigrayans as conflict rages in Ethiopia. Credit: AP

Ethiopian authorities have rounded up high-profile Tigrayans - from a bank CEO to priests - as well as United Nations staff in a mass crackdown on suspected supporters of rebellious northern forces.

Police denied targeting the Tigrayan ethnic group, saying those arrested were believed to have links to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which has fought the central government for a year.

The conflict has killed thousands, forced more than two million people from their homes, sucked in troops from neighbouring Eritrea, and left hundreds of thousands suffering famine.

Fighting has spread into the neighbouring Afar and Amhara regions, threatening the stability of Ethiopia and the wider Horn of Africa.

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Ethiopia declared a state of emergency last week as Tigrayan forces pushed south towards the capital Addis Ababa.

The United Nations said on Tuesday at least 16 Ethiopian staff and dependents were detained but has not specified their ethnicity. On Wednesday, it said nine were still in custody.

The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission said the arrests of Tigrayans were at least in the hundreds, including elderly people and mothers with children.

Government spokesman Legesse Tulu did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

On Tuesday, police detained Daniel Tekeste, the Tigrayan CEO of Lion Bank along with five other staff, a bank employee said, adding they were released later that night.

Three high-level members of the former federally appointed Tigray administration were detained last week but later released, sources said, adding many lower-ranking regional Tigrayan officials were still detained.

A list compiled by an imprisoned priest and passed to a family member said 37 religious workers had been arrested from four churches in the capital. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Tadele Gebremedhin, a Tigrayan lawyer handling the cases of detained journalists and senior TPLF officials, was arrested at his home on November 4, said a colleague. He remains in prison.

A UN official said that as well as the 16 staff and dependents, 72 drivers contracted by the UN’s World Food Programme were also arrested in Semera, the capital city of Afar region.

“Those that have been detained are Ethiopians who violate the law,” government spokesman Legesse said of the UN staff on Tuesday.

This month, the Tigrayans joined up with another armed group, the Oromo Liberation Army. The two have threatened to either attack the capital or seize a transport corridor linking landlocked Ethiopia to the region’s main seaport.

The war is rooted in a power struggle between Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and the TPLF, which dominated politics for three decades until he took office in 2018 and curbed its power.

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