Adigrat — "Our city is overwhelmed by a multitude of newLY displaced people who have arrived from the border areas. More than 100,000 people live in the city and in the nearby villages, counting only on the help of other families. Each family is taking care of five or six other families". This was announced by Bishop Tesfaselassie Medhin, head of the Catholic Eparchy of Adigrat, raising the alarm about the situation.
The scenario described by the Bishop, and relaunched by him through local media such as Tigray television, shows how the peace agreements signed on November 2 in Pretoria to put an end to the bloody two-year conflict in the northern areas of Ethiopia have not canceled the dramatic effects of that war on the daily life of the population.
The Eparch defines the peace agreement as "good news for the people, to breathe a little hope of peace". At the same time, Thesfaselassie Medhin points out that "more than a month has passed since the agreement, but the sick continue without medicine, those who are hungry, do not have food, as well as all those who do not have shelter, continue to live in the same conditions". The Eparch also reiterates the words of Kibrom Gebresellassie, executive director of the Ayder hospital in Mekelle, who complained that all the medicines supplied to the hospital under the agreement have run out in two days. It is said that the medicines that are arriving are insufficient for the seriousness of the current health situation: "it is commendable that some humanitarian assistance arrives, that some medicines and food appear. But this is far from what is expected to reach the millions of people in need.
"This situation - adds Tesfaselassie Medhin - can only be resolved when the roads are reopened, when the occupying armies, whether from Eritrea or the Amara region, leave the places and the displaced can return to their places of origin".
The peace agreements, reached after negotiations that began on October 25, 2022, were signed by Redwan Hussein (National Security Affairs advisor to the Ethiopian Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed Ali) and by Getachew Reda, representative of the Liberation Front People's Republic of Tigray (TPLF) and Advisor to the President of Tigray, Debretsion Gebremichael. The agreements were reached thanks to the mediation of the African Union.
