By Philip Buda Ladu
The Ethiopian Ambassador to South Sudan, Nabil Mahdi has accused some international media houses of tarnishing the image of Ethiopia in regards to the Tigray crisis adding that other western nations want to see a weak government in Ethiopia.
The Ethiopian Diplomat said the current crisis in Ethiopia was brought as result of the Tigray people’s Defense Forces’ (TPLF) aggression backed up by anti-Ethiopian elements against the reforms in Ethiopia that brought in Prime Minister Dr. Abbey Ahmed.
“The main agenda and objective of reform in Ethiopia in 2018 is due to public pressure against the former government and the brutal rule of the former ruling party in Ethiopia, the objective was to only to have an inclusive and prosperous Ethiopia but the TPLF rejected the reforms and finally attacked the government in 2020” he said.
Ambassador, Nabil said the Ethiopian Federal Government responded to the TPLF aggression by counter attacking the TPLF rebels, freed the Tigray’s capital Mikelle from the rebels and the Ethiopian government decided to withdraw the federal forces allowing the Tigray people to cultivate.
Nabil, however underscored that the TPLF failed to reciprocate the unilateral ceasefire declared by the Ethiopian Federal Government and instead the rebels continued launching attacks outside the Tigray region, currently attacking some areas in the Afar and Amhara regions.
The Ethiopian Envoy to South Sudan said the Tigray offensive has displaced over five hundred thousand people and the government is trying its best even to have negotiation in some of the issues and to deliver humanitarian assistance to the displaced people of Tigray, Amhara and Afar regions.
He underlined that out of one hundred and eleven thousand trucks that delivered humanitarian assistance to the Tigray region and only less than two hundred and fifty trucks retuned to the head office arguing that the rest have been illegally used for military purpose by the TPLF rebels but the international community kept quiet about it.
Ambassador Nabil stressed that the Ethiopian Government is currently being challenged by the TPLF other anti-Ethiopian government is because the current federal government created peace with Eritrea after a 20 years’ conflict and they now had a democratically elected government.
“Currently Ethiopia has a legitimate government as a result of the elections that represent the popular will of the Ethiopians. Ethiopians, their willingness that they don’t allude to be puppets the agenda is some countries expect Ethiopia to be a puppet government, Ethiopia will never do that” he said.
“They know that unless they rule Ethiopia they plan to disintegrate Ethiopia this is their agenda but currently a hundred million Ethiopians stood against the TPLF and its allies not against the Tigray people and some western countries even want to see weak government in Ethiopia but that’s impossible to happen” Amb. Nabil asserted.
He accused some of the major western media of spreading fake news about the Ethiopian government to portray bad image of the country to the world.
“The international media campaign role in tarnishing the image of the Ethiopian government, media house such as the BBC, CNN and Aljazeera English, Reuters and Agency France Press have relentlessly been engaged in circulating fake news against Ethiopia with regards to the Ethiopian conflicts” Nabil said. The Ethiopian Diplomat said as a result of the international media reports, Ethiopia has become an agenda in the UN Security Council and other fora but said that has proven that Ethiopia has a lot of friends that always side with her.