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Tigray Region
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=== 20th century === In 1943, a rebellion [[Woyane rebellion|broke out]] all over southern and eastern Tigray under the slogan, "there is no government; let's organize and govern ourselves". Throughout Enderta Awraja, including [[Mekelle]], Didibadergiajen, [[Hintalo]], Saharti, [[Samre, Ethiopia|Samre]] and Wajirat, Raya Awraja, Kilte-Awlaelo Awraja and Tembien Awraja, local assemblies, called gerreb, were formed. The gerreb sent representatives to a central congress, called the shengo, which elected leaders and established a military command system. Although the first [[Woyane rebellion]] of 1943 had shortcomings as a prototype revolution, historians agree that it involved a fairly high level of spontaneity and peasant initiative. It demonstrated considerable popular participation and reflected widely shared grievances. The uprising was specifically directed against the central "Shoan Amhara" regime of [[Haile Selassie|Haile Selassie I]] to rile support, despite Tigrayan imperial elite being collaborators and beneficiaries of the regime. ==== Ethiopian Civil War ==== [[File:ET Mekele asv2018-01 img15 Martyrs Memorial.jpg|thumb|Memorial in Mekelle to more than 60,000 TPLF fighters who died and over 100,000 fighters who were injured in the overthrow of the Marxist [[Derg]] regime in 1991.]] Following the outbreak of the [[Ethiopian Revolution]] in February 1974, the first signal of any mass uprising was the actions of the soldiers of the 4th Brigade of the 4th Army Division in Nagelle in southern Ethiopia. The Coordinating Committee of the Armed Forces, Police, and Territorial Army, or the [[Derg]] ([[Ge'ez language|Ge'ez]] "Committee"), was officially announced 28 June 1974 by a group of military officers. The committee elected Major [[Mengistu Haile Mariam]] as its chairman and Major [[Atnafu Abate]] as its vice-chairman. In July 1974, the Derg obtained key concessions from the emperor, Haile Selassie, which included the power to arrest not only military officers but government officials at every level. Soon both former Prime Ministers [[Tsehafi Taezaz Aklilu Habte-Wold]] and [[Endelkachew Makonnen|Endalkachew Makonnen]], along with most of their cabinets, most regional governors, many senior military officers and officials of the Imperial court were imprisoned. In August 1974, after a proposed constitution creating a constitutional monarchy was presented to the emperor, the Derg began a program of dismantling the imperial government in order to forestall further developments in that direction. The Derg [[1974 Ethiopian coup d'état|deposed and imprisoned the emperor on 12 September 1974]]. [[File:Nest box for Columba guinea in Zerfenti.jpg|thumb|Nest box for ''[[Speckled pigeon|Columba guinea]]'' (considered a symbol of peace) in the wall of a homestead in [[Zerfenti]], a village in Tigray where hundreds were killed by Derg bombings.]] In addition, the Derg in 1975 nationalized most industries and private and somewhat secure urban real-estate holdings. But mismanagement, corruption, and general hostility to the Derg's violent rule, coupled with the draining effects of constant warfare with the separatist guerrilla movements in Tigray, led to a drastic fall in general productivity of food and cash crops. In October 1978, the Derg announced the National Revolutionary Development Campaign to mobilize human and material resources to transform the economy, which led to a Ten-Year Plan (1984/85–1993/94) to expand agricultural and industrial output, forecasting a 6.5% growth in GDP and a 3.6% rise in per capita income. Instead per capita income declined 0.8% over this period. Famine scholar [[Alex de Waal]] observes that while the [[1983–1985 famine in Ethiopia|famine]] that struck the country in the mid-1980s is usually ascribed to drought, "closer investigation shows that widespread drought occurred only some months after the famine was already under way". Hundreds of thousands fled economic misery, conscription, and political repression, and went to live in neighboring countries and all over the [[Western world]], creating an Ethiopian [[diaspora]]. Toward the end of January 1991, a coalition of rebel forces, the [[Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front]] (EPRDF) captured [[Gondar]], the ancient capital city, [[Bahar Dar]], and [[Dessie]].{{citation needed|date=July 2021}} ==== Postwar ==== John Young, who visited the area several times in the early 1990s, attributes this delay in part to "central budget restraint, structural readjustment, and lack of awareness by government bureaucrats in [[Addis Ababa]] of conditions in the province", but notes "an equally significant obstacle was posed by an entrenched, and largely Oromo and Southern-dominated, central bureaucracy which used its power to block government-authorized funds from reaching Tigray".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Young|first1=John|title=Peasant Revolution in Ethiopia: The Tigray People's Liberation Front, 1975–1991|date=2006|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-02606-2|page=197|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=S9LX8UpI97MC&pg=PA197|access-date=13 November 2020|archive-date=27 March 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230327025546/https://books.google.com/books?id=S9LX8UpI97MC&pg=PA197|url-status=live}}</ref> At the same time, a growing urban middle class of traders, businessmen and government officials emerged that was suspicious of and distant from the victorious EPRDF.{{citation needed|date=July 2021}} From 1991 to 2001, the president of Tigray was [[Gebru Asrat]]. In 1998, [[Eritrean-Ethiopian War|war erupted between Eritrea and Ethiopia]] over a portion of territory that had been administered as part of Tigray, which included the town of [[Badme]]. A 2002 [[United Nations]] decision awarded much of this land to Eritrea, but Ethiopia did not accept the ruling until 2018, when a [[2018 Eritrea–Ethiopia summit|bilateral agreement]] ended the [[Eritrean–Ethiopian border conflict|border conflict]]. The text of this agreement has not been publicly availed.
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