The Ethiopian national airline, Ethiopian Airlines, plans to restore its connections with Mekelle, the capital of the Tigray state, this Sunday after the city has once again fallen into the hands of forces aligned with the central Government, which have managed to expel the fighters of the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF).
"Ethiopian Airlines is pleased to announce that its regular flights to Mekelle, temporarily suspended, will resume on October 11, 2026" after a three-week interruption caused by the security crisis in the region, the company stated in an official note.
In recent days, militias aligned with the Ethiopian Executive entered Mekelle after the departure of the rebel forces, which publicly announced their strategic withdrawal from the city on Saturday night.
"The Government of Tigray decided to temporarily withdraw from Mekelle to allow our Army to destroy the enemy in the face of possible attacks that this genocidal regime may launch against our people and our city," explained the TPLF in a message posted on its social media.
The tensions that had built up over months between the federal Government and the regional authorities of Tigray, combined with internal disputes within the latter, led to a new escalation of hostilities in mid-last month that blew up the Pretoria agreements (South Africa), signed in 2022 to end the devastating conflict that, according to estimates from the Ethiopian Executive and the African Union, caused between 100,000 and 600,000 deaths in just two years.