A 27-member Cabinet for Ethiopia’s war-scarred Tigray was unveiled on Wednesday, official media in the region reported, the latest step in a peace process to end two years of brutal conflict.
The Cabinet includes members of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and military commanders who fought federal forces during the war, Tigrai TV reported.
The establishment of an interim administration was a key tenet of a peace deal signed in South Africa’s capital, Pretoria, in November last year by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s government and the TPLF.
Last month, the Ethiopian government said TPLF spokesman Getachew Reda, the public face of the rebels during the war, had been appointed head of the interim government.
That followed the Ethiopian parliament’s move to remove the TPLF from an official list of terrorist groups in line with the November deal.
Debretsion Gebremichael, who had been president of the Tigray region since 2018, formally handed over the reins to Getachew during a ceremony on Wednesday, Tigrai TV reported.
“Members of the interim administration of Tigray, you have been given a responsibility to play your part in this peaceful stage of the struggle to ensure the security and the interests of the people of Tigray,” said Debretsion, who does not figure in the new lineup.
General Tadesse Worede, commander of Tigrayan forces during the war, has been named regional vice president, in charge of peace and security.
Former Nicaraguan president Violeta Chamorro, who brought peace to Nicaragua after years of war and was the first woman elected president in the Americas, died on Saturday at the age of 95, her family said. Chamorro, who ruled the poor Central American country from 1990 to 1997, “died in peace, surrounded by the affection and love of her children,” said a statement issued by her four children. As president, Chamorro ended a civil war that had raged for much of the 1980s as US-backed rebels known as the “Contras” fought the leftist Sandinista government. That conflict made Nicaragua one of
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