War in the caucuses and continuing protests in Belarus
My colleague Tom Rowley highlighted the “tragic” situation in war over Karabakh in the south caucasus. “At the end of September, Azerbaijani forces launched an offensive on Karabakh. That war has continued throughout October, until the weekend, and has led to thousands of people having to flee their homes, and thousands of deaths – we still don’t know how many people have died from the conflict,” he said.
Turkey, he explained, has aligned with Azerbaijan, forcing Armenia to give up territory in an agreement this weekend, which has been met by protests in the Armenian capital, including the occupation of the country’s parliament building and an assault on the speaker of the parliament. The events could mark the end of a period in Armenia which began with the overthrow of the previous corrupt regime two years ago, said Tom.
Meanwhile, he added, protests against the rigging of August’s election in Belarus continued, as the government cracked down with increasing violence.
War starts in Ethiopia, winds down in Libya
Our Middle East/North Africa editor Walid el Houri hailed positive signs of peace in Libya, “we’ve had a very important development – the agreement between warring parties to implement a cease-fire that they had agreed in October”. In what he called “an important step,” the different parties met in Libya, rather than abroad, and “agreed on actual practical steps to implement a ceasefire.”
However, he added that, while this “is a very important agreement” which “will affect the lives of thousands, not only Libyans, but also African migrants trapped in the country,” it’s also “too early to celebrate… only yesterday, there was the assasination of an opposition and prominent lawyer and activist.” She was killed by an unknown gunman soon after announcing she was about to expose corruption in the entourage of one of the main generals in the country.
Walid also raised concerns that “violence is mounting” in Ethiopia. “We have a new conflict that will likely be quite an important development in the region. The government “has gone to war with the Tigray province in the north of the country,” he said. “There is not much information from the ground, but we know that the two sides are heavily armed, and there are reports talking about hundreds of deaths”. He added that it was likely that the conflict would last for a while, and numerous refugees were arriving in Sudan already.
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Adam Ramsay | Radio Free (2020-11-12T06:00:06+00:00) What did you miss while you were following the US elections?. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2020/11/12/what-did-you-miss-while-you-were-following-the-us-elections/
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