SW News: In Ethiopia in the Horn of Africa, Tigray separatist fighters have announced that they have handed over heavy weapons and ammo to the federal government. This comes as part of the truce signed between both parties in the capital Addis Ababa at the end of last year bringing an end to the two-year-long conflict.

According to the spokesperson of the Tigrayan fighters, they have surrendered heavy weapons in order to honor the terms of the truce. Getachew Reda, the advisor to the president of the Tigray Region, said on Twitter that a monitoring team sent by the African Union has testified that the surrender of weapons has indeed taken place. He said it would go a long way in implementing the terms of the ceasefire.

As per the terms of the truce which was inked on November 2 last year, rebel troops have to lay down their weapons and surrender them before the federal authority and resume communications to the restive region which were severed since the middle of 2021. The Tigray separatists also want the federal troops to withdraw from the war-torn region. They also want Eritrean soldiers to leave the province although they were not party to the pact. There are reports that Eritrean soldiers remain in some hamlets in Tigray.

It was in November 2020 that fighting erupted in Tigray when Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed ordered federal troops to march to Tigray to detain Tigrayan separatist leaders. He accused them of attacking federal military targets in the province.

UN observers have reported that hundreds of thousands of civilians have lost their lives in the conflict. Thousands have been forced to leave their homes. The severing of communication lines virtually cut off the region from the rest of the world. The intense fighting also resulted in the blocking of humanitarian aid to Tigray. The intense conflict also saw the destruction of churches and monasteries and unspeakable human rights violations.