Shaken, the survivors are left to count bodies. Each has accused the other of lying or carrying out atrocities against supporters. It is not clear how many people in Amhara have been killed claims by the warring sides cannot be verified immediately. “Even as we entered Debark, we stepped on a dead body. “As we came here, there were lots of dead bodies (of defense forces and civilians) along the way,” said Khadija Firdu, who fled the advancing Tigray forces to a muddy camp for displaced people in Debark.
#DARK FORCES SOURCE PORT FULL#
Propping a gun on a full plastic sack, she lay on the ground and practiced sighting.īut the consequences of the call to war are already coming home. We are here to stop this,” said Mekdess Muluneh Asayehegn, a new Amhara militia recruit.
Ethiopia’s government says “millions” have answered the call. Many Ethiopians outside Tigray support the federal government’s war effort, and as Tigray forces advance, families heed recruiting drives and send loved ones for military training. While the U.S., United Nations and others urge all sides to stop the fighting and sit down to talks, those on the ground believe there’s no peace to come. He called the Tigray fighters “very aggressive.” USAID, which feeds millions throughout Ethiopia, has seen Tigray forces looting and emptying some of its warehouses, he said. Agency for Economic Development, Sean Jones, told the Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation. looted the warehouses, they’ve looted trucks and they have caused a great deal of destruction in all the villages they have visited,” the head of the U.S. “In Amhara now, we now know that the (Tigray forces have). The United States, which for months has been outspoken about the abuses against Tigrayans, this week turned sharp criticism on the Tigray forces.
Angered by the attacks on their communities and families, the fighters are being accused of targeting civilians from the other side. The Tigray forces retook much of their home region in a stunning turn in June, and now the fighting has spilled into Amhara. Thousands of people died, though the opaque nature of the war - most communications and transport links have been severed - means no one knows the real toll. Accounts of atrocities often emerged long after they occurred: Tigrayans described gang-rapes, massacres and forced starvation by federal forces and their allies from Amhara and neighboring Eritrea. The war that began last November was confined at first to Ethiopia’s sealed-off northern Tigray region. “Everyone can come and witness the destruction that they caused.” He said his team had to transfer some 400 patients elsewhere for care. “It is a lie that they are not targeting civilians and infrastructures,” hospital manager Birhanu Mulu told the AP.