Ethiopian Airlines, Africa’s biggest carrier announced this week it would resume flights to Tigray with the first charter to the region since June 2021.
This is coming following a ceasefire reached between the Ethiopian government and rebel forces last month and the gradual reopening of Tigray.
On Wednesday, passengers arriving from Mekele were received by relatives at Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa with hugs, bouquets, and tears.
The flight to Mekele departed around lunchtime, the government’s Ethiopian News Agency broadcast images of passengers aboard the plane.
Getachew Reda, a spokesman for Tigray’s regional government, said on Twitter that an Ethiopian Airlines passenger jet had landed at Mekele’s airport.
A high-level government delegation visited Tigray this week for the first time since the signing of the peace deal in November to end two years of bloodshed in Africa’s second-most populous country.
Aid has started dropping into Mekele and other parts of Mekele since the truce was signed, going some way to alleviating severe shortages of food, fuel, cash and drugs.
Mekele has been reconnected to the national grid, and the country’s biggest bank says financial services have resumed in some towns.
The restoration of telecom services, Ethio Telecom in Mekele was announced by the spokeswoman for Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed yesterday.
Services had been restored to 27 towns across Tigray and nearly 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) of fibre optic cable repaired, spokeswoman Billene Seyoum said on Twitter.
The war began in November 2020 when Abiy sent troops into Tigray after the region’s dissident rulers orchestrated attacks on army bases.