Thousands have been killed - millions displaced. Human rights groups have accused Amhara militias of ethnic cleansing. And then Amhara militias and their allies made a move for the fertile lands of western Tigray. The TPLF attacked the federal government's northern command. PERALTA: Instead, the Amharas blockaded roads to Tigray. PERALTA: Irredentism - when political groups, usually nationalists, fight over land they believe is historically theirs.ĪWET: And this is exactly where any responsible federal government or central government would have carefully negotiated a peaceful, amicable resolution. These lands are vast and fertile, and everybody wants them.ĪWET: We are in what I call domestic irredentism. Awet has a simpler explanation for the fighting. PERALTA: Even as this war started, Tigrinya and Amharic and Arabic were spoken side by side. But this narrative that they tried to change the ethnic makeup of Western Tigray is exaggerated.ĪWET WELDEMICHAEL: Demographically, Western Tigray was a cosmopolitan sort of melting pot. He says, yes, the Tigrayan-led coalition government was oppressive. PERALTA: Awet Weldemichael is a professor of history at Queen's University in Canada. So there was no - any viable way to peacefully resolve the issue. They did so, he says, to stack the deck against the potential referendum, which would decide the fate of those disputed lands.ĭESALAGNE: They have settled almost 60,000 former fighters. PERALTA: Desalagne claims the TPLF tried to change the ethnic makeup of the region, which he claims is historically Amhara. Prominent activists and politicians were continuously persecuted. They were not allowed to express their culture. In his telling, when Tigrayans seized the government in 1994, they re-drew state boundaries and marginalized the Amharas.ĭESALAGNE: People were not allowed to speak Amharic. PERALTA: That is Desalagne Chanie, who leads a nationalist movement of ethnic Amharas. If you talk to the political elites here in the Amhara region, they frame the conflict like this.ĭESALAGNE CHANIE: It's about the issue of Amhara's basic existence. Their emperors have contested these lands since biblical times. But ethnic and historical grievances added the fuel, which turned it into a civil war - specifically, ethnic Amharas against ethnic Tigrayans. PERALTA: This conflict started as a power struggle between the former rulers of Ethiopia and the new ones. MULU: (Through interpreter) I will explain to them all the pain I am going through. PERALTA: If you could talk to the men who are leading this war, what would you tell them? He doesn't know anything, but they killed him and they left. MULU ENDALE: (Through interpreter) He knows nothing. He was only a farmer, she keeps repeating. He didn't even know what this war was about. She wipes her tears with her black headdress. Dozens of villagers stand around the graves, looking at the rocks that keep the bodies safe from hyenas. They estimate about 200 civilians were killed here. PERALTA: When we get to the church, we see more graves. And just before they retreated, he says, they looted the church and killed indiscriminately.ĪBERA DEMAS: (Through interpreter) They don't have any respect, and they are, like, wild. He says rebels from the Tigray People's Liberation Front took over the town, and then a counterattack from the government pushed them out. He says the town, Chena, in the Amhara region of Ethiopia saw intense fighting. So many soldiers died that they were buried in a hurry.Ībera Demas is one of the town's Ethiopian Orthodox priests. Out of one mound, there's a skull dragged out by wild animals so all that is left are teeth and bones. We see them everywhere we walk - under trees, on the side of the road. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Someone is buried here. And no matter where we turn, we smell decomposing bodies. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: This is a burial place. And a warning - this story does contain graphic descriptions of violence.ĮYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: In the middle of all the green vegetation, villagers show me a clearing dotted with mounds of dirt. NPR's Eyder Peralta has traveled near the front lines to report. And a dispute over land has spiraled into a brutal conflict within the region. It's a complicated conflict with origins that are centuries old. Ethiopia's civil war is entering a second year.
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