Wednesday November 10, 2021
Ethiopia is becoming too insecure
Great Britain calls on citizens to leave
Messenger services such as Whatsapp and Telegram have been blocked in Ethiopia since Monday evening, and the UN Security Council is watching the spreading civil war in the country with great concern. Britain urges its citizens to leave the country as soon as possible. The German government has not yet gone that far.
Because of the violent conflict in Ethiopia, Great Britain has asked its citizens to leave the country. The British should leave the East African country “as long as commercial flights are still available,” said the State Department in London. It will probably be much more difficult to get out in the coming days. For the British, with the exception of the capital’s airport, a travel warning is now valid for the entire country.
So far, Germany has only advised German citizens to check whether their presence is “absolutely necessary”. With almost 115 million inhabitants, Ethiopia is the country with the second largest population in Africa. The multi-ethnic state has long been considered the region’s anchor of stability. Now it threatens to disintegrate as a result of the fighting. The central government is weakened. The conflict between the Ethiopian central government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which began about a year ago, has now spread to other parts of the country. Together with rebels from the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), the TPLF is advancing on the capital Addis Ababa.
UN workers stipulated
Meanwhile, the United Nations is demanding the immediate release of more than a dozen UN workers from Ethiopia. A total of 22 local employees from various UN agencies were arrested in Addis Ababa without giving reasons, said spokesman Stephane Dujarric. 16 of them are still in custody. “It is imperative that they be released.”
Dujarric did not want to say whether the arrested persons were UN workers from the Tigray region. “You are Ethiopian. You are a UN worker, and we want you to be released regardless of what ethnicity is on your identity card.”
A few weeks ago, seven UN employees were expelled in an unprecedented action. Secretary General António Guterres accused Ethiopia of violating international law. Guterres is frustrated that the United Nations cannot provide the necessary humanitarian aid to hundreds of thousands of hungry people, said Dujarric. A high-ranking UN diplomat warned on Tuesday in the UN Security Council of a spreading civil war in which the East African country could “sink”. The messenger services Facebook, Telegram and Whatsapp have been blocked since Monday evening.