The Accusations and the Limits of Verification
Ethiopia's federal government and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) trade charges of new offensives. Addis Ababa says Tigray forces attacked federal positions. Mekelle says the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF) and its allies launched drone strikes and ground assaults. Neither claim comes with independent verification. Monitors from the African Union (AU) and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) have not published forensic evidence. The result is an information war: each side uses the language of defensive warfare while preparing the ground for a wider fight.
The Pretoria Agreement, signed in November 2022, was meant to end the two-year war. It set timelines for disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR), for restored federal services, and for aid access. Those timelines slipped. Tigray's forces did not fully disarm. Federal authorities did not fully restore banking, electricity, or civil administration. The Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (CoHA) became a document cited in press statements rather than a framework enforced on the ground. The current accusations are not a sudden rupture. They are the sound of a deadlock that never resolved.
Aid as a Weapon and the Famine Risk in Tigray
Reports of drone strikes on food aid convoys carry a specific meaning in Tigray. Aid is not a neutral input. It is a lifeline. When convoys are hit or blocked, clinics lose therapeutic food, bakeries lose wheat, and households lose the monthly ration that keeps them from selling assets. The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) had already placed parts of Tigray in Phase 4 and, in some pockets, Phase 5. Renewed conflict pushes more people toward catastrophe.
Under international humanitarian law (IHL), starvation as a method of warfare is prohibited. The Rome Statute treats intentional starvation of civilians as a war crime. The question is not whether each side denies targeting aid. The question is whether the threat of renewed fighting makes aid delivery impossible. When access depends on checkpoints controlled by armed actors, every accusation of an offensive becomes a reason to close a road. Every closed road becomes a reason for famine to spread. The weaponization of aid does not require a formal order. It requires only enough insecurity to stop the trucks.
The Missing Civilian Voice
Official statements from government advisers and TPLF leaders dominate the news. Civilians appear as numbers: displaced, wounded, killed. Their own accounts rarely reach the negotiating table. In Alamata, a contested town in southern Tigray, residents have lived for years under competing authorities. They know which checkpoint to avoid and which document to carry. They do not know whether the next offensive will come from the ENDF, Amhara regional forces, or Tigrayan units. That uncertainty is not abstract. It shapes where people sleep, whether children attend school, and whether farmers plant.
Displaced persons in Tigray face a second layer of vulnerability. Many live in camps or informal settlements with no secure land tenure. A new round of fighting would scatter them again. Psychological trauma from the last war remains untreated. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression are widespread, but mental health services are scarce. The panic reported in Mekelle and Addis Ababa is not only a reaction to rumors. It is a learned response from a war that killed hundreds of thousands and left bodies unburied.
Defensive Warfare or Political Theater?
Both sides describe their actions as defensive. Ethiopia's federal government says it is protecting constitutional order. The TPLF says it is protecting Tigray from encirclement. These claims lack independent verification, and they serve specific political narratives. For Addis Ababa, the threat of a Tigrayan offensive justifies military spending and centralizes power. For the TPLF, the threat of a federal assault justifies its continued armed presence and its claim to represent Tigray. Neither narrative leaves room for compromise on disputed territories such as Western Tigray or Alamata.
The language of defensive warfare also hides the mechanics of escalation. A defensive drone strike is still a drone strike. A defensive mobilization still pulls fighters from farms and factories. A defensive checkpoint still blocks aid. The Pretoria Agreement did not settle the status of contested areas. It did not resolve the Amhara claims to land that Tigrayan authorities say is theirs. It did not create a joint security mechanism with real authority. Without those pieces, every defensive claim becomes a trigger for the next offensive.
Regional Spillover: Amhara, Afar, and the Wider Horn
Tigray's conflict cannot be separated from Amhara and Afar. Amhara regional forces and Fano militias fought alongside the ENDF in the last war, then fell out with Addis Ababa over Amhara territorial claims and disarmament. Afar regional forces control roads that lead into Tigray. When Tigray accuses the federal government of launching offensives, it often means federal forces moving with Amhara or Afar units. When Addis Ababa accuses Tigray of aggression, it often points to TPLF attempts to reclaim land in Alamata and Western Tigray.
The overlap between Tigray, Amhara, and Afar turns local disputes into regional flashpoints. A skirmish in Alamata can draw in Amhara militias. A drone strike near the Afar border can close the road to Djibouti. The Horn of Africa already carries conflicts in Sudan and Somalia, and the Red Sea corridor is militarized. A new Tigray war would not stay inside Tigray. It would pull in Eritrea, which fought alongside the ENDF in the last war. It would unsettle Djibouti's port traffic. It would give armed groups across the region a new model for using starvation and displacement as leverage.
Gendered Risks: Recruitment and Violence
Women who fought in the last war now face a particular risk. Many served in Tigrayan forces as fighters, medics, and logisticians. Some returned to civilian life with injuries and without pensions. If mobilization resumes, forced recruitment can target them again. Armed groups also use women for cooking, cleaning, and sexual labor. The threat of gender-based violence (GBV) rises when camps are militarized, when checkpoints multiply, and when impunity grows.
Gender-based violence in conflict is not incidental. It is a tactic. Rape, sexual slavery, and forced marriage are used to terrorize communities and to break social ties. Women and girls in displacement sites face higher risks of trafficking and exploitation. Female ex-combatants face stigma and lack access to reproductive health care. A new offensive would strain already weak services. It would also silence women's participation in peace talks. The Pretoria Agreement included few women at the table. That absence shapes what gets counted as harm.
What the Pretoria Agreement Did Not Fix
The Pretoria Agreement paused the war. It did not build a political settlement. It did not create a credible joint monitoring body. It did not return displaced people to contested land. It did not demilitarize the economy or the border. It did not address the Amhara and Afar disputes that fed the original conflict. The current accusations are a symptom of those gaps. Each side can claim the other violated the agreement because the agreement left so much undefined.
Aid disruption, civilian silence, and gendered violence are not side effects of this deadlock. They are the deadlock's most direct consequences. When political leaders speak of defensive warfare, they are speaking about territory and authority. When civilians in Tigray speak of fear, they are speaking about whether they will eat tomorrow. Those two conversations rarely meet. Until they do, the Pretoria Agreement will remain a ceasefire in name only.
Human Survival as the Measure
The measure of any new talks should be whether aid convoys can move without drone strikes. Whether displaced people in Alamata can return or rebuild. Whether women can report violence without reprisal. Whether mental health care reaches those with PTSD. Whether farmers can plant without stepping on a landmine. These are concrete tests. They do not require a grand bargain. They require checkpoints that open, roads that stay safe, and a monitoring mechanism that publishes what it finds. Without those, the next offensive will not need a formal declaration. It will arrive as a closed road, a silent clinic, and a family that leaves home for the third time.
