The current state of “no war no peace” in northern Ethiopia seems to be preserved only by the rainy season’s predictable afternoon showers and relatively chill air. Tigrayans are making anxious preparations—“stocking up on emergency supplies and withdrawing their savings from the bank”—before the rainy season winds down.

The Pretoria Agreement, signed in November 2022, silenced the guns between the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and the Ethiopian government and brought a formal end to the civil war that began in November 2020. But it is an uneasy peace. Not only does the risk of relapse into full-scale war loom, but the fragmentation of the TPLF leaves the region susceptible to proxy war between the Tigray Defense Forces (TDF, which were allied with the TPLF during the war) and the new Tigray Peace Forces (TPF).

Those interested in promoting a peaceful Tigray and stable Horn of Africa have a narrow window of opportunity to broker a more durable peace. But they must act quickly to bring potential spoilers to the table and address political rifts.

The Tigray War and the Pretoria Agreement

 There were a variety of causes—proximate and systemic—of the November 2020 war between the Ethiopian federal government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). The country’s political transition that began with the selection of Abiy Ahmed to serve as prime minister in 2018, for example, created friction within the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), the hegemonic party that the TPLF had helmed since 1991. Abiy was initially hailed as a reformer and greeted with optimism by both international observers and domestic audiences who had grown frustrated with the TPLF’s authoritarian tendencies.

These tensions led to a full break when Abiy announced the transformation of the EPRDF into the Prosperity Party (PP) in 2019. The TPLF was the only constituent party of the EPRDF that refused to join the PP. For the first time in modern Ethiopian political history, the TPLF was not calling the shots.

National elections were scheduled for spring and summer 2020. However, the Ethiopian federal government decided to postpone the vote in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. TPLF leadership claimed that this the delay was “a clear breach of the federal constitution.” In defiance of the federal government, Tigray held regional elections in September 2020. The federal government cut off funding to Tigray in response. One TPLF official described the decision as “tantamount to a declaration of war.” The budgetary war soon gave way to active fighting when the TPLF launched an attack on the Ethiopian military’s Northern Command.

The war between the federal government and the TPLF quickly drew in other armed parties. The federal government’s partners included the Eritrean government, as well as formal and informal security forces from several Ethiopian regions. Tigray’s regional security force quickly expanded and rebranded as the Tigray Defense Forces (TDF).

The war itself was marked by staggering levels of violence and galling human rights violations. There are credible accusations of Ethiopian and Eritrean forces perpetrating genocidal violence against Tigrayan civilians, including genocidal sexual violence. Getting accurate reports on the scale and characteristics of violence in wartime is always a challenge—during the war in Tigray, this was further complicated by the Ethiopian government’s severing of telecommunications services to Tigray and its refusal to allow sufficient humanitarian aid into the region. However, the toll of the violence is clearly enormous—African Union envoy and former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo estimated 600,000 casualties in just two years.

The Pretoria Agreement provided for a “permanent cessation of hostilities” between the federal government and the TPLF. This meant not only stopping the fighting but also refraining from supporting proxies or fomenting discontent through propaganda or hate speech. Furthermore, the agreement laid out a plan for cooperation on humanitarian aid, including the return of displaced communities. The agreement also required the demobilization, disarmament, and reintegration (DDR) of Tigrayan forces.

Though a promising first step toward peace, the Pretoria Agreement’s success has been hamstrung by its slow implementation and the exclusion of influential fighting forces (notably the Eritreans). The Pretoria Agreement has also reportedly contributed to the rupture of the relationship between the Ethiopian federal government and the Eritrean government.

Rising Tensions within the TPLF

 Since the Pretoria Agreement was signed, the TPLF has been riven by disagreements over the best path forward. The most noticeable fault line is between factions led by Getachew Reda and Debretsion Gebremichael. Journalist Fred Harter characterizes the fallout as centering on disagreements about the Pretoria Agreement and what is best for the future of Tigray. He writes that “Debretsion’s side accuses Getachew’s interim administration of selling out Tigray’s interests and mishandling the implementation of the peace deal” whereas “Getachew and his allies… portray themselves as democratisers—on a mission to open up Tigray’s politics and implement the ceasefire deal—and accuse Debretsion’s group of thwarting them at every turn.” Others note important differences in how Debretsion and Getachew understand the relationship between the TDF and the interim administration, with Debretsion claiming that the interim administration does not have authority over these forces.

The disagreement is not theoretical. In March 2025, Debretsion and his allies ousted Getachew as the head of the interim administration. Getachew fled to Addis Ababa in the wake of the “coup.”

Since then, there are credible reports that each side is cultivating proxy forces and preparing for a resumption of fighting once the rainy season is over. There are credible claims that Getachew has allied himself with Abiy’s administration against Debretsion’s faction of the TPLF. Some are suspicious that the emergence of a new armed group, the Tigray Peace Forces (TPF), is a function of this partnership. During recent conversations in Tigray’s capital, Mekelle, several well-connected Tigrayans stated that the Ethiopian government is responsible for paying the monthly salaries of TPF fighters (reportedly north of 6,000 birr, or approximately $43 per month). Leaders of the TPF have adamantly denied that this is the case and claim that the Tigrayan diaspora pays for TPF salaries and that the Ethiopian government has only provided military rations. The TPF is reportedly populated by frustrated defectors from the TDF. If the word on the street in Mekelle is correct, the TPF is being mobilized to fight against Eritrea—a stunning reversal of the wartime alliance between the Ethiopian federal government and the Eritrean government.

Similarly, there are rumors that the Eritrean government has cozied up to Debretsion’s faction of the TPLF. Debretsion’s faction of the party is reportedly backed by the TDF (or at least the TDF’s leadership). One young Tigrayan characterized the TDF as acting as a “militia of the party.” Indeed, in late July the interim government orchestrated a leadership change in southern Tigray, relying on armed forces to replace existing leaders with allies. Critics of the move claim it was planned by factions of the TPLF with ties to Eritrea.

Though the rainy season has acted as a buffer against significant fighting, there have already been clashes between TPF and TDF fighters. In early July, the two factions butted heads in southern Tigray. Representatives from the TPF claim they are planning a major incursion into Tigray by mid-September. Though the TDF has initiated the process of demobilization, it has maintained fighting capabilities, putting both its fighters and Tigrayan civilians in limbo.

 There are also rumblings about a possible resumption of fighting between the federal government and TPLF. The National Election Board of Ethiopia revoked the TPLF’s status as a political party in May. In response, the TPLF issued a statement that “denying our legal recognition undermines the very foundation of the peace accord.”

Urgent Steps to Prevent Another War

The international community needs to act swiftly to prevent the region from sliding back into another destructive war. A critical first step is for a credible third party to broker talks between the various factions of the TPLF. De-escalating the situation between Debretsion and Getachew’s factions can reduce the possibility of warfare between the two. Settling on a mutually trusted third-party broker will be difficult, though regional bodies such as the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and the African Union may be a good place to start.

Simultaneously, representatives from the international community and regional bodies should encourage the Ethiopian government to withdrawal its support for the Tigray Peace Forces and other ethno-regional militias. This withdrawal of support must be paired with a DDR program to prevent rogue, disgruntled militias from becoming yet another security threat. Any new DDR programs should come alongside a renewed effort to demobilize fighters from the 2020–2022 war, many of whom are currently in limbo. The United States, its partners, and the international community at large must be willing to lend financial and technical support to that effort.

In addition to cooling off tensions within the TPLF, the African Union must press for both the TPLF and the federal government to fully implement the Pretoria Agreement. Without a clearly demonstrated good-faith effort to implement the deal, mutual suspicion makes further fighting all but guaranteed. Furthermore, the UN, AU, IGAD, and other multilateral actors should press for a more inclusive peace process that brings in important spoilers—notably Eritrean and Amharan militias (themselves riven with internal disputes)—even if they are not all around the same table.

Finally, humanitarian actors should begin making preparations to respond rapidly to an outbreak of violence, particularly in southern and western Tigray, particularly in light of tight budget constraints and a growing list of global crises that require their attention. Close collaboration between aid providers will be critical to marshal scarce resources as efficiently as possible should violence break out again. In an ideal world, such preparations would be unnecessary, but in the world we live in, “there are terrifying signs that Tigray is sliding inevitably, unstoppably, back towards war.”

Hilary Matfess is Assistant Professor at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver.