Tigray Force Seizes Airport In Ethiopia

The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) has seized control of Alula Aba Nega Airport in Mekelle, the capital of Ethiopia’s Tigray region, according to security and local sources cited by AFP.

An employee at the airport reported that workers were instructed to return home after their supervisor was informed that Tigray forces had taken control of the facility. The information was confirmed by a foreign security source based in Ethiopia. A small number of federal police officers guard the airport, although their condition following the takeover was not immediately known.

Ethiopian Airlines said it had temporarily suspended flights to Mekelle, Axum and Shire because of the situation in the Tigray region.

Flight Radar showed that a flight scheduled to travel from Mekelle to the federal capital, Addis Ababa, on Wednesday morning had been cancelled. The TPLF controls Tigray and fought a devastating war against Ethiopia’s federal government between 2020 and 2022. The African Union estimates that about 600,000 people were killed during the conflict.

The Pretoria Peace Agreement ended the war and brought an uneasy period of calm to the region, but clashes resumed in late 2025. Fighting between federal forces and the TPLF has continued, according to several sources.

Tigray has struggled to recover from the previous conflict, with around one million people still displaced and several provisions of the peace agreement yet to be fully implemented. The TPLF governed Ethiopia from 1991 until Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came to power in 2018.

Ethiopia is also facing security challenges in other regions, including Oromia and Amhara.

SOURCE: AFP