Captured fighters and residents say that authorities in Ethiopia’s war-shattered Tigray region are forcing young people to join their army’s fight against the central government by threatening and jailing relatives. Reuters quotes Kindeya Gebrehiwot, from the Tigray external relations office, as saying that some low ranking government officials had detained family members to force their relatives to enlist but said such incidents were rare, the relatives had been released, and the officials punished. This, the news agency suggests, as some Tigrayans, who volunteered in droves earlier in the war, are becoming increasingly reluctant to fight in a conflict that has ground to a stalemate following a ceasefire in March.
