大象传媒

A warning, you might find some of the details in this report destressing.

In Ethiopia now and the ongoing fighting between federal forces and those of the Tigray People's Liberation Front or TPLF. The two sides are now in a battle concentrating around the towns of Dessie and Kombolcha in Amhara. The region borders Tigray where the government has intensified bombardment on the capital city Mekelle in the past few days.

Information on the fighting in Ethiopia is hard to verify from both sides with communication cut by the authorities.
We got more from Eyder Peralta, the Africa correspondent for US National Public Radio. He's currently in Cape Town in South Africa but till a couple of days ago was close to the front line.

"The fighting continues. The government has been building up for this battle for months and the rebels seems to be advancing. So this will tell us a lot about whether the government can hold the advances of the Tigrayan rebels. This is a bloody civil war where soldiers are fighting face-to-face and many are dying. But we don't know how many because no-one is keeping a count."

"Civilians tell us: 'We don't know what this war is about. We want it to stop.' This is a war between people who look like each other, who have the same religion, who marry each other, who have lived side-by-side with each other for centuries."

(Pic: Dessie town in Amhara, Ethiopia; Credit: Reuters)

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