Ethiopia’s peace talks may be overtaken by battlefield advances

inauspicious start to ending a catastrophic war. The first official direct peace talks between the Ethiopian government and the leaders of Tigray, its rebellious northern region, were meant to have begun in early October in South Africa. When they at last opened on October 24th, the delegation sent from Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, had still not arrived. Its chief negotiator, Ethiopia’s deputy prime minister, Demeke Mekonnen, failed to show up at all. Thus the first scheduled day of talks slipped by without progress. There ought to be no time to waste. Hundreds of thousands are believed to have died in the war, which is about to enter its third year, either in the fighting or from hunger and disease. Millions of civilians in Tigray, the focus of the conflict, are under blockade and running out of food and medicine. Almost no aid has entered the region since late August, when a five-month humanitarian truce ended.