After two years of highly violent and bloody fighting, the Ethiopian government and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) signed a Cessation of Hostilities Agreement on November 2 in Pretoria, South Africa. It is estimated that conflict resulted in up to 500.000 casualties, severe destruction of properties and infrastructure. Unlike the unilateral ceasefire announced by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed back in March 2022, the Pretoria peace agreement is the first formal written agreement between the two sides and provides for a mechanism for monitoring, supervision and compliance.
To achieve this, the African Union will appoint ten African experts, while the parties to the agreement will work on establishing a joint mechanism. The regional organization might use satellites to implement this mission. Although the team of experts is relatively small and might find it difficult to monitor compliance of the parties across the Tigray region, the parties to the agreement can appoint more monitors afterwards.
Moreover, although the United States placed persistent pressure to enable the signing of the peace deal, Ethiopia gives most of the credit to the African Union promoting the principle of “African Solutions for African Problems.”
Mediation and Pressures
If war is to be perceived as a solution to a conflict inside a certain country, it is undoubtedly not the best. In the case of Northern Ireland, the militarization of the boycott and the curfew showed how futile securitization policies can be as the war further worsened the situation. The more casualties and the more people the British Army arrested, the worse the violence and attacks became.
The same holds true for the ongoing conflict in the Casamance region in Senegal. Since the conflict broke out in 1982, the region was ruled by a military commander who cracked down on separatists and imposed restrictions even on their daily life, to which the separatists would respond by killing civilians in the villages and set up deadly traps for the Senegalese army. In view of the two cases, mediation and negotiation must be prioritized to achieve permanent peace to resolve internal conflicts.
Based on that, the two parties to the conflict in the Tigray region chose to go to negotiations and reach a peaceful settlement. The United States made most of the efforts prior to negotiations holding secret talks in Djibouti and the Seychelles. Perhaps this is what paved the way for mediation led by Olusegun Obasanjo, the African Union (AU) High Representative for the Horn of Africa and the former president of Nigeria, Uhuru Kenyatta, former president of Kenya, and Dr. Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, former Deputy President of South Africa. Moreover, the United States, the United Nations and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) played a crucial role in the peace agreement, placing pressure on the Ethiopian government and providing security and logistic support to the Tigray delegation to the negotiations held in Pretoria.
The negotiations were set to continue into the last week of October but were extended to the second Wednesday of November when the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement was signed.
Article 1 states that the objectives of the agreement are to:
1) Reach an immediate and permanent cessation of hostilities with a view to silencing the guns and creating a conducive environment and laying the foundation for sustainable peace; 2) Restore the constitutional order disrupted due to the conflict in the Tigray Region; 3) Reject violence as a method of resolving political differences; 4) Guarantee security for all; 5) Ensure a lasting settlement of the conflict; 6) Provide a framework for addressing matters arising out of the conflict; 7) Provide a framework to ensure accountability for matters arising out of the conflict; 8) Foster reconciliation and the rehabilitation of social bonds; 9) Facilitate economic recovery and reconstruction; 10) Commit to addressing the underlying political differences; 11) Provide a framework for monitoring and verification of the implementation of the Agreement.
Gains for Both Parties
Among the major gains made by the federal government is that it will take over the administration of the Tigray region, including federal installations, and its federal army will be able to peacefully enter Mekelle, the capital city of the region. Moreover, the regional council elections will be held and the people of Tigray will be represented in the federal parliament.
Establishing confidence-building, Article 7 of the agreement states that the TPLF shall respect the constitutional mandate of the Federal Government to deploy the Ethiopian National Defence Force as well as federal security and law enforcement agencies to discharge their responsibilities under the Constitution, relevant laws, and regulations.
Article 6 states that both parties 1) Agree and recognize that the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia has only one defense force; 2) Shall design and implement a comprehensive Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) program for TPLF combatants consistent with the Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia.
Moreover, the TPLF agrees to finalize the overall disarmament of its combatants, including light weapons within 30 days from the signing of this Agreement. This process will be massive given the huge size of the TPLF forces, estimated to have 200.000 fighters.
On the other side, the TPLF, which was forced to pull from major cities by the alliance of forces from Amhara, Eritrea and Ethiopia to run in the next elections, where the government will remove them from its blacklist of designated terrorist groups. The TPLF will accordingly be part of the temporary administration of the Tigray region based on bilateral dialogue. Part 2 of Article 7 states that the federal government undertakes to ensure unhindered humanitarian access into the Tigray region. The development is important because humanitarian aid to the region was cut off for two months, while services were disrupted for two years.
Overall, this is a concise but objective agreement that reflects the recent combatant gains made by the Ethiopian army and allied forces in the Tigray region. Making these concessions by the Tigray forces was not considered as likely in the beginning of this year.
Eritrea’s Role
Although the Eritrean armed forces took part in the fight against the Tigray Defense Forces, the Eritrean government was not invited to the negotiations held in South Africa. While Eritrea was not mentioned in the text of the agreement, the Ethiopian federal government will be responsible for the withdrawal of any Eritrean troops. Part 2 of Article 3 of the agreement states that the permanent cessation of all forms of hostilities shall include, among others the subversion or use of proxies to destabilize the other party or collusion with any external force hostile to either party. This applies to regional forces, especially those from Amhara, and the Oromo Liberation Army.
On the other side, the Ethiopian national defense forces, as per Article 8, the shall be deployed along the international boundaries of Ethiopia and shall safeguard the international borders of the country from foreign incursion and ensure that there will be no provocation or incursion from either side of the border. This is especially relevant to the border with Eritrea. That is, the TFLF seems to have undertaken to respect the border delineation agreement signed with Eritrea, which will make its president Isaias Afwerki feel that he emerged victorious after he intervened in the conflict in the Tigray region. Afwerki’s goal was to weaken the TPLF to preempt any future threats. In any case, all other major issues will be subject to political dialogue between the two parties, set to be held one week after the TPLF is removed from the blacklist of designated terrorist groups. Additionally, the issue of disputed lands will be settled as per the Ethiopian constitution.
Challenges to the Agreement
There are, however, several areas where the agreement can collapse in the short term. Deployment of international peacekeeping troops could help in supervising the DDR process, withdrawal of Eritrean troops, restoration of services as well as monitoring compliance with the agreement. The team of African experts is too small for this mission. Moreover, due to a lack of technical and logistic capabilities, the African Union is unable to perform this job alone.
On the other hand, part 3 of Article 10, states that the Ethiopian government shall implement a comprehensive national transitional justice policy aimed at accountability, ascertaining the truth, redress for victims, reconciliation, and healing, consistent with the Constitution of FDRE and the African Union Transitional Justice Policy Framework. The transitional justice policy shall be developed with inputs from all stakeholders, and civil society groups through public consultations and formal national policy-making processes. But the question is whether Prime Minister Abiy Ahemd, the Tigrary leaders and all those involved in this senseless war will accept accountability?
Lastly, and as part of respect for constitutional principles and values viewed as the reference for this agreement, can Article 39 of the country’s constitution be activated so as to allow a referendum on the secession of Tigary, demanded by the TPLF?
The agreement represents a major victory for the African Union. The expansion of the mediation team to include the United States, the IGAD as monitors and South Africa as a host country, has promoted the credibility of the peace process. Moreover, this agreement marks a watershed moment in Ethiopia’s history because it put an end to the bloody war in Tigary through negotiations and not through winning battles. The Ethiopian model should represent an opportunity for researchers in negotiation and mediation in internal conflicts to explore early mediation and preventive diplomacy. African governments often ignore emerging crises until, in some cases, they escalate into armed conflicts. The problem does not lie solely in ignoring the early sings of conflict, but also in powerful responses such as violent oppression that often leads to armed conflicts.
