Ethiopia PM says negotiations with OLA set to begin this week

This is the first time that the Ethiopian government has formally announced that it will negotiate with the Oromo Liberation Army.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has said his government will begin negotiations with Tanzania’s Oromo Liberation Army (OLA) rebel group this week.

This is the first time that the Ethiopian government has formally announced that it will negotiate with the OLA, which has been at odds with the government for decades.

“Negotiations with Oneg Shene will begin in Tanzania the day after tomorrow,” Abiy said on Sunday, using a different name for the OLA.

There was no immediate statement from OLA.

The OLA is a banned splinter group of the Oromo Liberation Front, a formerly banned opposition party that returned from exile after Abiy took office in 2018. The group’s grievances are rooted in alleged marginalization of the Oromo people and neglect by the federal government.

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The OLA and the federal government have blamed each other for a number of attacks in Ethiopia’s Oromiya region, the country’s most populous region, that killed dozens of civilians.

In February, the state-appointed human rights commission said at least 50 people were killed in an attack the OLA said was to blame.

In October, the OLA and another Oromo group blamed the Ethiopian government for airstrikes that they said killed a number of civilians.

“The people of Ethiopia and the government desperately need these negotiations,” Abiy said at a ceremony marking an earlier peace deal between the federal government and the armed forces in the Tigray region, where fighting broke out in November 2020 and ended in November 2022 .

The fighting between the OLA and the federal government is separate from the fighting in Tigray, but the OLA forged an alliance with the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) in 2021.