According to an AFP report, two humanitarian sources and a foreign security source confirmed clashes in Abala and Erebti, with fighting reported to have started on Tuesday night.
The developments come amid months of sporadic clashes and heightened tensions between the Ethiopian government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front.
Quoting a humanitarian source said aid workers had sent a truck carrying food to assist people displaced by the latest fighting, amid fears that the violence could spread.
Abala is in the mountain ranges along the border between Afar and Tigray, while Erebti is about 100 kilometres by road from Abala, within Afar territory.
The latest clashes come three days after the TPLF was announced as a member of a new alliance of anti-government armed groups operating across Ethiopia.
The TPLF fought federal forces in a two-year conflict that ended with a peace agreement in November 2022. The war killed about 600,000 people, according to estimates by the African Union.
The renewed fighting has heightened concerns over the durability of the peace deal and the possibility of wider conflict in the region.
A former senior TPLF member claimed the group had taken control of several areas in Afar, including Berhale, Erebti, Abala, Megale, Dalul and Konoba, and said federal forces were retreating.
The claims could not be independently verified.
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