Ethiopian Airlines suspends flights to three northern Tigray airports

Ethiopian Airlines has suspended flights to three airports in northern Tigray amid an escalation of conflict by an armed group in the region.

In a post on Telegram, the airline said that due to the “current situation in the Tigray region”, flights to Mekelle, Axum and Shire had been temporarily suspended from Wednesday.

“We sincerely apologise to our valued customers for any inconvenience caused by this suspension. We will inform you once flight operations resume,” the airline said.

Flightradar24, which tracks air traffic, also showed on Wednesday morning that the flight between Mekelle and the federal capital, Addis Ababa, had been cancelled.

The suspension comes after Tigrayan forces took control of the Mekelle airport from federal police overnight, according to local sources quoted by the Reuters and AFP news agencies.

An employee at Alula Aba Nega Airport in the Tigrayan capital, Mekelle, told AFP on Wednesday that while they were on their way to work, “our supervisor called the driver and told him that the airport had been taken over by Tigray forces”.

“Since there were no flights, he told us to return home,” the employee added, a development that was also confirmed to AFP by a foreign security source based in Ethiopia.

The suspension comes as tensions mount in the region. The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) announced on Sunday that it had allied with six other armed groups across Ethiopia to overthrow Abiy’s government. Rights groups have accused the TPLF of forced recruitment campaigns this year as it prepares for renewed conflict.

The TPLF ruled Ethiopia from 1991 to 2018 before being sidelined with the rise of Abiy’s premiership, triggering a devastating civil war from 2020 to 2022. The conflict killed about 600,000 people, according to estimates by the African Union, before the Pretoria Peace Agreement ended hostilities.

However, the region has not recovered, with about one million people still displaced and parts of the peace agreement unfulfilled. An uneasy calm held until late 2025, when clashes resumed, raising fears of a return to all-out war.

Compounding the crisis, Ethiopia also faces a myriad of other rebellions, including in its most populous regions of Oromia and Amhara.