Police in Tanzania released four senior opposition leaders who were arrested for their alleged role in deadly protests against last month’s general election, their party said late on Monday.
The protests plunged Tanzania into its biggest political crisis in decades. Opposition party CHADEMA and some human rights activists said more than 1,000 people were killed by security forces.
The government of President Samia Suluhu Hassan, who was declared the winner of the election with nearly 98 percent of the vote, said those numbers were exaggerated but did not offer its own death toll.
Among those released on bail were CHADEMA Vice Chairman John Heche, who was arrested on October 22 and questioned on suspicion of terrorism, according to his lawyer, and Amani Golugwa, the party’s deputy secretary-general who was arrested over the weekend, the party said on X late on Monday.
CHADEMA leader Tundu Lissu was charged with treason in April. His exclusion from the presidential ballot was one major trigger of the protests.
On Friday, prosecutors charged at least 145 people with treason over their alleged involvement in the protests. More than 170 more were charged with other protest-related offenses.
Hassan’s opponents have accused her government of suppressing dissent and carrying out widespread abductions of critics. In addition, observers from the African Union said the election was not in line with democratic standards.
Hassan has rejected criticism of her human rights record and defended the fairness of the election. Last year, she ordered an investigation into the reported abductions, but no findings have been unveiled.
Senior Tanzanian opposition leaders released on bail, party says
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Senior Tanzanian opposition leaders released on bail, party says
- Deadly protests against last month’s election plunged Tanzania into its biggest political crisis in decades
Ethiopia’s prime minister accuses Eritrea of mass killings during Tigray war
- Landlocked Ethiopia says that Eritrea is arming rebel groups, while Eritrea says Ethiopia’s aspiration is to gain access to a seaport
- Ethiopia lost sovereign access to the Red Sea when Eritrea seceded in 1993 after decades of guerrilla warfare
ADDIS ABABA: Ethiopia’s government Tuesday for the first time acknowledged the involvement of troops from neighboring Eritrea in the war in the Tigray region that ended in 2022, accusing them of mass killings, amid reports of renewed fighting in the region.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, while addressing parliament Tuesday, accused Eritrean troops fighting alongside Ethiopian forces of mass killings in the war, during which more than 400,000 people are estimated to have died.
Eritrean and Ethiopian troops fought against regional forces in the northern Tigray region in a war that ended in 2022 with the signing of a peace agreement.
Eritrea’s Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel told The Associated Press that Ahmed’s comments were “cheap and despicable lies” and did not merit a response.
Both nations have been accusing each other of provoking a potential civil war, with landlocked Ethiopia saying that Eritrea is arming and funding rebel groups, while Eritrea says Ethiopia’s aspiration is to gain access to a seaport.
“The rift did not begin with the Red Sea issue, as many people think,” Ahmed told parliamentarians. “It started in the first round of the war in Tigray, when the Eritrean army followed us into Shire and began demolishing houses, massacred our youth in Axum, looted factories in Adwa, and uprooted our factories.”
“The Red Sea and Ethiopia cannot remain separated forever,” he added.
Ethiopia lost sovereign access to the Red Sea when Eritrea seceded in 1993 after decades of guerrilla warfare.
Gebremeskel said the prime minister has only recently changed his tune in his push for access to the Red Sea.
Ahmed “and his top military brass were profusely showering praises and State Medals on the Eritrea army and its senior officers. … But when he later developed the delusional malaise of ‘sovereignty access to the sea’ and an agenda of war against Eritrea, he began to sing to a different chorus,” he said.
Eritrea and Ethiopia initially made peace after Abiy came to power in 2018, with Abiy winning a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts toward reconciliation.
In June, Eritrea accused Ethiopia of having a “long-brewing war agenda” aimed at seizing its Red Sea ports. Ethiopia recently said that Eritrea was “actively preparing to wage war against it.”
Analysts say an alliance between Eritrea and regional forces in the troubled Tigray region may be forming, as fighting has been reported in recent weeks. Flights by the national carrier to the region were canceled last week over the renewed clashes.
