Ethiopian Human Rights Commission has sent an independent group to investigate the situation that unfolded on Monday night at the town of Mia-Kadra in the western part of Tigray.
In light of the situation, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has order the Ethiopian defense force to a military engagemenet in the Tigray region after the TPLF was accused of attacking a military camp in the region with attempts to loot military asset. The TPLF denies the attack and has accused Abiy of concocting the story to justify deploying the military.
The so called law enforcement operation has lasted for more than ten days resulting to military offence and counter measures in the northern part of the country both in Amhara and Tigray regions.
The federal government has said the National Air Force is attacking major possible targets, however TPLF has been saying that there have been no air strike in the region and later gave a contradicting statement accusing the federal government for air attacks and military operation in the region. On Friday Debretsion G/Michael president of the TPLF, on his statement said that the government had launched air strikes on Mekelle, Adigrat, Alamata, and parts of the western Tigray region and Shiraro.
“The war is not complete, this is just the beginning, more than 10,000 members of the Northern Command and Defense Forces currently are under the control of the Tigray National Regional State,” said Debretsion.
According to the state of emergency fact check, in the late hours of November 13, 2020, TPLF had fired a rocket towards Bahir Dar and Gondar cities. As a result, the airport areas have sustained damages.
Also the Tigray regional government has accused Abiy’s government for cooperating with Eritrea to attack Tigray region and its people, however, the Eritrean government has announced it as a false accusation.
A statement posted on the Facebook page of the Tigray government said it would win the “justified” war, and added that a fighter will not “negotiate with their enemies”.
On Tuesday, TPLF had announced that Debretsion G/Michael had sent a letter to all political & civic stake holders regarding the current affairs. On his statement, Debretsion said problems cannot be solved through military means; also African Union has the responsibility to bring all political and civic stack holders of the country in to an all inclusive and comprehensive dialogue.
On Saturday, the upper house of parliament has decided to establish a new interim administration allowing the intercession of the federal government and abolishing the existing illegal regional government lead by Debretsion. The interim administration will appoint officials, ensure the respect for rule of law, approve the region’s budget and facilitate the process of conducting elections.
With reports of increasing casualties, concern is rising for the protection of civilians against hostilities. Civilians caught in the cross-fire, especially children, women, elders and the disabled, are of paramount importance to protect. Humanitarian partners have asked federal and regional authorities to facilitate humanitarian access to reach people in need in areas under their respective control.
On Monday, November 9, Amhara regional state has announce a death toll of about 500 civilians in Mai-Kadra town in the South West Zone of Ethiopia’s Tigray Region where both Tigray and Amhara natives live.
As Daniel Bekele, head of Ethiopia Human Right Commission informed Capital, the commission has sent a group of investigators to investigate the situation on Mai-kadra. The commission will compose reports and information to ensure accountability by investigating and gathering evidence of human rights violations committed by any party involved in the conflict.
“One of the concerns of the commission is working to protect civilians and non-participants on the war, and the commission is working closely with different stakeholders to insure civilian protection,” he stated.
“In the current context of the ongoing conflict in the Tigray region, it is important to ensure access to humanitarian assistance and basic services, especially for the safety and protection of civilians who are not involved in the conflict,” he added.
“Therefore, the armed forces involved in the conflict have a responsibility to protect civilians,” says the commission.
Furthermore, the commission has said that it is closely following the government’s crackdown on the conflict in various parts of the country and allegations of discrimination in some areas on the basis of ethnicity.
As the regional government states the mass killing was ethnic based where hundreds of Amhara peoples where selected to death. As of Thursday November 12, Amnesty International in its report confirms that scores, and likely hundreds, of people were stabbed or hacked to death in Mai-Kadra.
The organization’s Crisis Evidence Lab has examined and digitally verified gruesome photographs and videos of bodies strewn across the town or being carried away on stretchers. It confirmed the images were recent and using satellite imagery, and geo-located them to Mai-Kadra in western Tigray state.
“We have confirmed the massacre of a very large number of civilians, who appear to have been day laborers who in no way are involved in the ongoing military offensive,” said Deprose Muchena, Amnesty International’s Director for East and Southern Africa.
“This is a horrific tragedy whose true extent only time will tell as communication in Tigray remains shut down,” he added.
The federal government has accused the TPLF for the massacre in the town for killing civilians; however on Friday TPLF has denied the accusation and the Amnesty report arguing the direct and indirect culprits is the fascist and the terrorist “Abiy Ahmed” who declared war on the people of Tigray.
“The TPLF is violating international child rights provisions and is barring even children from joining the Special Forces,” said the federal government.
Moreover, the federal government is accusing TPLF Criminal gangs for setting up executive networks in Addis Ababa and other parts of the country to instill fear by caring out terrorist attacks.
The Federal police have also announced that they have banned 14 private security agencies from operating illegally. According to the police commission, some private security agencies have recently been set up to carry out attacks on public and government institutions, as well as the recruitment and deployment of security forces, in defiance of their purpose. And the Addis Ababa Police Commission, in collaboration with other security forces, seized 163 firearms, 1194 rounds of ammunition and other assets during a three-day search operation.
On Thursday, November 12, the house of federation has decided to lift up the immunity of 39 members of the house of federation from the 44 members, including Debretsion, president of TPLF. Also the federal police commission has issued an arrest warrant on officials of TPLF. The suspects are said to have been involved in armed robbery, by attacking the national defense and other related crimes. Also seven military officers have been appeared to the court by betraying the nation and attacking the national defense force.
On Friday November 13, the federal government has appointed Mulu Nega as the new administrator of the region, in addition, the chief administrator will recruit and appoint heads to lead executives- an organ of the regional state from political parties legally operating in the region.
TPLF after its announcement of taking control of Tekeze dam on Sunday, on Friday November 13 has claimed that the federal government has bombed Tekeze Dam, however the state of emergency task force has said the information is false and accused them to peddle falsehood for international audience.
The UN and its partner organizations are committed to staying and delivering humanitarian assistance. A casted humanitarian response plan for Tigray region is currently being finalized under the coordination of UNOCHA.
According to UNHCR Sudan, at least 3,400 Ethiopian asylum seekers have crossed the Sudanese border through two border entry points in Gedaref State since the 9th November. Sudanese authorities are reportedly screened the asylum seekers for onward relocation to a reception center in Shagrab camp in Kassala State. 1,700 people have so far been screened and registered. No armed individual will be allowed to cross into Sudan, according to authorities.
On Friday, Prime Minister Abiy has told Members of the Tigray Special Forces to surrender to the Defense Forces within the next three days.
A statement on Saturday also confirmed that in the late hours of Nov. 13, a rocket was fired towards Bahir Dar and Gondar cities. As a result, the airport areas have sustained damages. Details of the incident is currently under investigation.
Tigray conflict swells as innocent causalities increase
The government stands its ground on trade sabotage
The government has announced that it will take decisive measure on those who may try to engage on trade sabotage in relation with the current situation in the country.
Ministry of Trade and Industry (MoTI) has disclosed that a taskforce has been established in every region up to Wereda level to control and evaluate the market activity.
Eshete Asfaw, State Minister of MoTI, disclosed that every evening the regions are reporting their daily report on the overview of the market activity in every corner of the country.
He recalled that since COVID 19 occurred in the country the government has been taking strong measures to stabilize the market. The government has taken different level of measures on more than 72,000 traders.
Similarly, in the first quarter of the budget year, different administrational and other strong measures including revoking a license and filed cases to the court have been endowed on more than 13,000 illegal actors.
He said that in the latest development there is a trend on hording products mostly basic needs, ganging up for price increment by group and dropping productivity. “We have taken different measures on this acts and some of the matters have been solved amicably,” he told Capital.
“In these regard there are water bottlers and other factories involved in underproduction and price increment on their production that is controlled by the government,” he remanded the latest attempt occurred in the market.
He added that in collaboration with illegal middlemen there were attempt to increase price on cereals that the government enabled to tackle.
Different market sources including those that evaluate the situation at Merkato, the biggest market center in the country, informed Capital that due to the latest situation artificial price hike has been observed not only at the market places but at industries.
One of the sources that Capital interviewed witnessed that since the government commenced offensive attack at the northern part of the country, that is, immediately after the TPLF forces surprise attack on Ethiopian Defense Force, some industries like food processing plants were found to deliberately slow down their daily sales and preferred to hoard the product at their warehouse.
“On one of the industry, who produce soybean products, that I know and located at Lege Tafo the company preferred to sale very limited amount of product on its daily basis,” one of the sources said.
He argued that the product has huge demand and there is scarcity in the market, while the company has huge stoke at its warehouse.
“Besides slow downing the daily sales the company has increased its price in this past week without any reason,” he added.
Some sources said that some are the traders may have relation with the illegal group of gangs that the government labeled as ‘Junta’ under TPLF.
Eshete said that there are attempts to use the opportunity from some traders but the government is closely following the situation in every region and the capital.
“We are also taking measures on those who tried to abuse the circumstance for instance today (Friday November 13) the Addis Ababa City have taken measures on those who tried to go illegally,” he added.
“We prefer to create awareness and now we do that but if anyone attempts to sabotage on the market the government will never forgive,” the State Minister added.
Ekos Steel Mill’s donation to farmers
Ekos Steel Mill, located in Dukem, has donated five manual threshing machines to the local community in the form of donations. Ekos Steel Mill PLC in collaboration with Yam workshop has developed multi crop threshers. The thresher will mainly be used in the shelling of teff, wheat, rice, sorghum, barley, millet and different types of crops.
The CEO said the machines had compact features in its structure, that is, good shape and reliable operation, featured by its high threshing rate, great performance and few losses of crop type.
As stated on the ceremony, the loss of grain during threshing is estimated to be from 15-25 percent depending on the crop type.
The ceremony was attended by State Minister of Foreign Affairs Tsion Tekle, State Minister of Trade Yohannes Dinkiayahu and other government officials.
Further in the future the company is planning to start producing these threshing machines for the local market.
UNIC uniquely soars despite global pandemic and national instability
The United Insurance Company (UNIC) in its gross written premium that includes both Life and general Insurance sector has registered massive improvement despite the effect of instability and the surge of the pandemic to the economy in the concluded budget year.
According to the report of UNIC, as from the concluded budget year of the 30th of June 2020, the gross written premium of both life and non-life stood at 597 million birr, a raise from 533 million birr with respect to the previous year.
Of the total premium, the non life or general insurance sector contributed to over 551 million birr whilst the life sector share was about 46 million birr. “The combined gross written premium grew by about 12 percent in the stated period,” the annual report explained.
The report indicated that on all the non life insurance businesses, the premium had climbed excluding the marine cargo/ inland transport business that dropped by 13 percent. This drop was attributed to foreign currency shortage that importers should access for importation.
As the sector tradition, the motor class business retained its top spot in terms of premium portfolio with 62 percent share but it has decreased from 63 percent of the preceding year.
Fire and general accident and engineering followed by 11 and 7 percent respectively.
Net claim incurred for both sector had shown an increment of 6 percent and reached 241 million birr. However, the corporate loss ratio has shrunk for the second consecutive year. This financial year, the loss ratio stood at 55 percent, the previous two years the percentages were 58 and 68.
The loss ratio for the non life sector has dropped to 56 percent in the reviewed year from 60 percent of the previous year. The motor sector loss ratio has continued at the upper with 66 percent share.
The life sector loss ratio was 22 percent that is far below from the industry average of 58 percent.
The corporate underwriting profit that includes life and general sectors has massive grown with more than one fifth of the preceding year.
The report indicated that the underwriting profit for both sectors is 210 million birr in the 2019/20 budget year. This is a 21 percent growth in comparison with the 2018/19 performance that was 173.5 million birr.
The non life sector underwriting profit was boosted by 27 percent and currently stands at 188 million birr. Meanwhile the motor sector took the lion share for claim and loss ratio since it contributed 43 percent for the year surplus.
In the reported year, the gross profit of UNIC has also climbed by 22 percent, while the net profit after tax has registered a 17 percent increment compare with the performance of a year ago.
According to the annual report of UNIC, the profit before tax for 2019/20 budget year stood at 148 million birr from 121 million birr of the preceding year.
At the same time the company after tax profit has surged to 124 million birr, up from 106.6 million birr in 2018/19 budget year.
Due to the company’s decision to climb the paid up capital that reached at 436 million birr as of June 30, 2020 the earning per share has shown decrement in the reported year compared with the preceding year. In accordance, the earning per share stood at 29.9 percent that was 33.8 percent in the 2018/19 year.
According to the decision of the extraordinary meeting that was held in November 2018, the paid up capital is expected to reach half a billion birr by November 2022.
The company asset has also risen to 1.6 billion birr up from 1.5 billion birr.
The insurer has 51 branches including 12 contact offices. It has four buildings including the new head quarter inaugurated in the past budget year that contributed to amass huge amount of revenue from rent. The company said that besides generating huge amount form rent income it also saved significant amounts from rent expense.
