From Nobel Hero to Driver of War, Ethiopia’s Leader Faces Voters - The New York Times

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed plunged Ethiopia into a war in the Tigray region that spawned atrocities and famine.

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — As war raged in northern Ethiopia, and the region barreled toward its worst famine in decades, a senior American envoy flew to the Ethiopian capital last month in the hope of persuading Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to pull his country out of a destructive spiral that many fear is tearing it apart.

Taking the wheel, the Ethiopian leader took his American guest, the Biden administration's Horn of Africa envoy, Jeffrey D.

Feltman, on an impromptu four-hour tour of Addis Ababa, American officials said.

Abiy, who faces Ethiopian voters on Monday in long-delayed parliamentary elections, was a shining hope for country and continent.

The civil war that erupted in the northern region of Tigray in November has become a byword for atrocities against Ethiopian citizens.

Elsewhere in Ethiopia, ethnic violence has killed hundreds and forced two million people to flee their homes.

Senior opposition leaders are in jail and their parties are boycotting the vote in Oromia, a sprawling region of 40 million people that is more populous than Kenya.

Abiy has put a brave face on his nation’s problems, repeatedly downplaying the Tigray conflict as a “law and order operation” and pushing his vision for a modernized, economically vibrant Ethiopia.

Blinken imposed visa bans on unnamed Ethiopian officials.

Pekka Haavisto, a European Union envoy who visited in February, told the European Parliament last week that Ethiopian leaders had told him “they are going to destroy the Tigrayans, that they are going to wipe out the Tigrayans for 100 years.”.

Abiy, 44, most recently at last week’s Group of 7 summit, represents a dizzying fall for a young leader who until recently was globally celebrated.

The whirl of reforms he instituted after being appointed prime minister in 2018 were a sharp rebuke to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, a party of rebels turned rulers who had dominated Ethiopia since 1991 in an authoritarian system that achieved impressive economic growth at the cost of basic civil rights.

Abiy also unleashed pent-up frustrations among ethnic groups that had been marginalized from power for decades — most notably his own group, the Oromo, who account for one-third of Ethiopia’s 110 million people.

Coons, a Democrat from Delaware, said he reminded the Ethiopian leader that the American Civil War and World War I had started with promises of swift military victory, only to drag on for years and cost millions of lives.

Days later, on the evening of the American presidential election, fighting erupted in Tigray.

Abiy told The New York Times in 2018, his mother whispered into his ear that he was “unique” and predicted that he would “end up in the palace.”.

Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, who told the Senate in 2018 how he first met Mr.

Abiy at a prayer meeting where “he told the story of his journey and faith in Jesus.”.

Abiy against the American sanctions.

Abiy is with the dictatorial leader of Eritrea, Isaias Afwerki.

Abiy has little choice — were the Eritreans to leave suddenly, he could lose control of Tigray entirely.

Abiy in February, warned the Ethiopian leader that the explosion of ethnic hatred could shatter the country, much as it did the former Yugoslavia during the 1990s.

Abiy responded that Ethiopia is “a great nation with a great history,” Mr.