Long-term Peace in Ethiopia–The Need for Proactive Trust-building After the Deadly Civil War with the Tigray

Protests against the war in Tigray expand internationally to the United States in the lead-up to peace negotiations in 2021. Photo by Becker1999.

In 2019, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for successfully negotiating the end of decade-long tensions between Ethiopia and Eritrea. During his acceptance speech he proclaimed, “It takes a few to make war, but it takes a village and a nation to build peace.”

Less than eleven months after Prime Minister Abiy’s words, Ethiopia entered a new war. This time, the fighting was within its own borders, as civil war broke out in November 2020 between the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and the Ethiopia government, with the latter receiving support from long-time adversary turned ally Eritrea. The fighting lasted two years; after numerous attempts at negotiations, the African Union successfully arranged a peace agreement between the two groups on November 2, 2022. 

However, the challenges to long-lasting peace are severe. Foremost amongst these are the massive wartime atrocities perpetrated by both armies: over 600,000 deaths, the migration of thousands of inhabitants in the Tigray region, and numerous human rights violations. In view of such issues, the current standing of the peace negotiations is insufficient for promoting stability. Equally problematic is the inadequate inclusion of key actors like Eritrea and the Amhara (an ethnic Ethiopian group in Tigray’s neighboring state that also participated in the fighting) in the negotiations, as well as the slow adoption of transitional justice mechanisms. Although demilitarization processes are underway, the Ethiopian government needs to provide a system of strong post-conflict transitional justice, resource allocation, and trust-building to prevent further tensions and preserve internal stability. 

To understand the negotiations following the Ethiopian civil war, a historical analysis of the conflict is necessary. The TPLF came into power by leading the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) coalition government from 1991 to 2018 after the end of the Ethiopian Civil War in 1991, which established twenty federal states under a centralized government. After being elected to office in 2018 and resolving the Eritrean dispute, Prime Minister Abiy created the Prosperity Party, which replaced the EPRDF. His reasoning for the change was to use his new Prosperity Party as a means to conduct political reforms. The TPLF opposed the formation of the new party over complaints that it would diminish the federal system of governance that had benefited them ever since its establishment.

In November 2020, TPLF held regional elections in the Tigray region after the 2020 national elections were postponed due to the pandemic; the Ethiopian central government did not recognize the legitimacy of the elections. Although Prime Minister Abiy was adamant as late as October 2020 that military action or cutting economic ties with the region would not be appropriate solutions to existing tensions between the Tigray and the central government, troops entered the Tigray region shortly after the November election. Abiy’s government justified such military incursion as a response to the supposed storming of an army base by TPLF fighters. The movement of troops triggered the start of Ethiopia’s most recent war. The central government has since recognized the TPLF as a terrorist organization, officially classifying it as such in 2021.

Within these political and social dimensions, the complicated demands of the actors participating in the war are far from evident. It is, however, paramount to understand them in full. Seeing the war as a fight for increased power by the TPLF and Tigray minority is reductionistic, as the fighting has spread to neighboring states of Amhara and Afar. Other groups, such as the Oromo Liberation Army, also joined the TPLF in opposition to the Ethiopian government. This development hints towards more widespread opposition to the government as a whole. Particularly indicative of the significance of such opposition is that the Oromo are the ethnic group to which Prime Minister Abiy belongs. 

The war has resulted in a humanitarian crisis. With the continuation of the war, there was “nowhere on earth where the health of millions of people was more under threat than Tigray,” according to WHO Director General Tedros in 2022. According to UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet, although violence was conducted by all groups, a majority of the atrocities were perpetrated by the Ethiopian and Eritrean forces. In 2021 alone, 2.5 million Tigray refugees were internally displaced and thousands fled to Sudan. Contributing to the humanitarian cost of the conflict, access to humanitarian aid in Tigray was blocked by the Ethiopian government. Initially, food support was also restricted, but channels were opened after the region experienced its worst drought in over forty years in September 2022. 

In the context of the political and humanitarian conditions, all participating sides called for peace agreements, such as a failed ceasefire in March 2022. The successful November peace agreement negotiated by the African Union details many important steps toward conflict resolution. The Tigray militias were given thirty days to disarm. All other militias, including foreign ones, were required to abandon the region in thirty days. Notably, however, the Eritrean forces were not mentioned explicitly in the agreement, nor were they included in the negotiation process. The Ethiopian government regained control of federal facilities and infrastructure projects in the region, in exchange for reinstating the Tigrayan communications, banking, and transportation systems that were blocked during the civil war.

Yet the provisions for peace are insufficient if humanitarian reforms are not prioritized and adequately implemented. As of December 2022, an estimated 5.5 million people in Northern Ethiopia were facing “severe acute food insecurity.” By opening up important channels between the Tigray region and the country as a whole, efforts to rebuild after the tremendous damage of two years are underway. However, economic constraints have led many scholars to question the ability of reconstruction projects and humanitarian channels to continue preserving peaceful post-conflict environments. 

Another factor that threatens peace is the exclusion of Eritrea in the peace process. The Eritrean government had their own motivations for involvement in the war, namely rebuilding their international strength and opposing the Tigray, with which they have had prior land disputes. Nonetheless, Eritrean forces caused significant destruction throughout the war; during the very week before peace negotiations, for instance, forces massacred ten Tigray villages, killing over 300 people. As such, they were more than a “foreign actor” in the conflict, despite being categorized as such by the peace agreement. Indeed, acts of repression and the raping of Tigray civilians committed throughout the war by Eritrean troops are reportedly continuing to this day. By minimizing their accountability and not including provisions related to them in the agreement or the transitional justice committees, efforts aimed at rehabilitating Ethiopia and the countless victims of its civil war are likely to falter. In order for peace to last, Eritrean compliance is thus crucial.

The peace agreement also omitted other actors in the conflict. Several other ethnic groups participated in the war alongside the Tigray, yet their goals were not prioritized in peace talks. Representatives from the Amhara were absent from negotiations. The lack of consideration for their needs threatens the stability of peace in Ethiopia. Addressing regional conflicts should be of increasing importance for Prime Minister Abiy because Ethiopia is built upon federal states that predominantly represent the main ethnic groups. As such, the stability of the governmental structure relies on the central government’s ability to balance its power with regional interests. 

Finally, creating an environment of trust moving forward is perhaps the greatest challenge the Ethiopian government faces. One of the main factors behind the failure of the previous cease-fire was the lack of trust between the Ethiopian government and the TPLF. For instance, in exchange for the cease-fire, the Tigray were promised the opening of telecommunications in the region, yet access was not granted. A similar form of mistrust contributed to TPLF forces disarming their troops at a slower rate than agreed upon in the 2022 peace agreement; although the troops have demobilized their heavy weapons, only 65% had pulled out entirely by January 2023.

The November agreement places the responsibility of building post-conflict trust on the Ethiopian government. Against the backdrop of geopolitical tensions with neighboring countries and economic constraints after a declining growth rate during the two-year war, the Ethiopian government cannot afford another internal conflict. As such, the stakes for a failed peace agreement threaten thousands of lives. After two years of violence and failed negotiations, the Ethiopian government must preserve the peace agreement if it wishes to stabilize its internal federal structure and promote domestic trust.

Ada Baser (GS ‘24) is a Staff Writer for CPR studying political science. Her main interests include US-Middle Eastern relations, water governance, and transitional justice.