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Iran awaiting response from Trump on proposal to open strait of Hormuz in six days

Iran said it has told Donald Trump it is willing to open the strait of Hormuz in six days, and to start talks on its nuclear program the day after, so long as the US lifts sanctions on Iran’s oil exports in return, ends the war on all fronts – including in Lebanon – and releases some of Iran’s frozen assets. The proposal is designed to accelerate the steps first laid down in the memorandum of understanding signed by the US and Iran in June, particularly by helping the talks on Iran’s nuclear program start much more quickly than previously agreed. Iran says a deal on the temporary route through the strait of Hormuz has been agreed with Oman, describing it as a done deal, and is ready to register the details with the International Maritime Organisation. Abbas Araghchi, the Iranian foreign minister, said he was waiting to hear a response from the Americans to the proposal. He added that he had consulted on the plan with China, which fully supported the proposal. Saudi Arabia had been expected to endorse the Oman-Iran route through the strait last week, but pulled back partly due to anger that Iranian-backed Houthis had started attacking Saudi Arabia as part of their dispute over the future of Yemen. Iran claims it has urged the Houthis to cease the attacks on Saudi Arabia but that it does not have control over Houthi decision-making. Araghchi, speaking to reporters in New York, said: “We have introduced a plan to the US through the mediators that if certain conditions are met, the strait will be open within seven days and talks will start.” He said the Iranian preconditions were not new, and were contained in the Islamabad memorandum of understanding that was signed by Trump. The advantage of the proposal, apart from opening the strait and lifting the chokehold on the world economy, would be bringing the US to the talks on Iran’s nuclear program much more quickly. Talks on the nuclear program under the MoU would not have started for 60 days. Araghchi said he was staying in New York over the weekend to await an American response, but added he was not in a hurry. Privately, Iranian officials believe they could reach a deal with the Americans, and the Saudi hurdle over aspects of the route could be overcome, but fear Israel will use its influence to pull the US president away from the proposal. Araghchi added he would like the deal to go through before the midterm elections, by which he meant that the strait of Hormuz could be opened and energy prices thereby reduced, something Trump badly needs for the Republican party to survive a political mauling. For the US, there are difficulties in the plan related to forcing Israel to end the war in Lebanon. Israel may object to giving Iran such clear control over the route through which ships would travel through the strait of Hormuz. Iran also wants to retain control of shipping to prevent some US military shipping going through the strait. Issues such as whether tolls or navigational fees could be imposed by the littoral states Oman and Iran would be settled later in the process. Earlier in the day, the UK foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, met Araghchi, his Iranian counterpart, for the first time in New York. It was also the first meeting between UK and Iranian ministers for a year, and the first exchange since the UK in July proscribed the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organisation, a move that has worsened the already sour relations between the two countries. Miliband made clear that the UK was committed to freedom of navigation in the strait and wanted a diplomatic solution, also stressing support for Saudi Arabia, a UK ally in Yemen. He warned Iran about its behaviour in the UK, including threats to Jewish communities, and called for the UK to be given consular access to the British couple sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment in Tehran. Araghchi and the US’s special envoy Steve Witkoff also met earlier this week on the sidelines of the general assembly to discuss Iran’s terms for reopening the strait and the speed at which that may happen, as well as the time the US had been given to respond. A faction inside Iran is arguing that Tehran should seek to escalate the conflict with a vulnerable US president, rather than let the crisis drift in its current deadlock. Brent crude was trading at about $107 (£81) a barrel on Thursday. Some IRGC officers have also linked the strait of Hormuz issue to the closure of the Bab al-Mandab strait, the narrow waterway close to the south-west of Yemen now under control of Iranian-backed Houthis. Maj Gen Rahim Safavi, a senior Iranian military figure, said: “If the Americans start a new war, a new front centred on the Red Sea and the Bab al-Mandab strait may open before their eyes. Are they ready to enter the battle on this front? This is a question that they should pay more attention to.” Domestically, Pezeshkian’s defiant message to the UN general assembly on Wednesday was deemed a success overall in that it balanced a refusal to bend the knee to “the US bully” with a willingness to seek diplomatic talks. He also proposed a new security architecture for the future in partnership with Gulf states, including those it has been bombarding in an effort to dislodge the US from its military bases. Maj Gen Ahmad Vahidi, commander-in-chief of the IRGC, praised Pezeshkian’s speech, saying: “We are not afraid of war. It is the loud and firm call of the Iranian nation – a call that resonated from the United Nations podium, through the words of the esteemed president, and reached the ears of the world.”

Netanyahu calls Israel’s war in Gaza ‘opposite of genocide’ in UN speech

Benjamin Netanyahu delivered an inflammatory address to the United Nations on Thursday, decrying what he said was a global anti-Jewish conspiracy and swatting aside criticism of Israel’s war in Gaza, as he faces down international isolation and a fight for political survival in upcoming elections in Israel. As planned protests erupted on the streets of New York City, Netanyahu took aim at critics of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, the international media, regional leaders such as Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the leftwing commentator Hasan Piker and the New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani in an address that doubled as a stump speech to ignite his rightwing base for the elections. Invoking his late brother Yonatan Netanyahu, a commando killed in a 1976 raid to free Israeli hostages from a hijacked airliner in Entebbe, Uganda, he repeated the lines: “We are going to win. We have no other choice.” Dozens of delegates, inspired by a Palestinian call, walked out of the General Assembly Hall of the UN headquarters as Netanyahu took the stage, leading a speaker to pound his gavel and announce: “I’m calling for order in the hall.” Palestinian representatives organising diplomatic missions to bring staff for a planned walkout of Netanyahu’s speech said they wanted to “send a clear message to Netanyahu and his government that no one is willing to aid, abet, or be complicit in its genocide and war crimes and illegal occupation, which all peace-loving states and peoples demand must come to an end”. “If there are any other moral cowards in the audience, I urge them to walk out,” Netanyahu said before launching into his prepared remarks. The speech revealed little new in terms of Israeli policy over the war in Gaza, militant settler violence in the West Bank, or Israel’s plans to end other regional conflicts including its joint war with the United States against Iran. But he argued that the world faced an existential threat from Iran, suggesting that several missiles from Tehran could have destroyed the UN, and cited quiet support from world leaders for Israel’s actions that could not be aired in public. “Devastating Iran’s nuclear facilities was … very hard to do,” he said of launching joint US-Israeli strikes in February. “But for me, it was one of the easiest decisions I’ve ever had to make as prime minister. Because if we hadn’t done it, we’d all be dead.” He branded Turkey’s Erdoğan as a “tyrant” who “hosts Hamas terrorists”, decried Mamdani as the “antisemitic mayor of New York”, and declared that Israel’s war in Gaza is not genocide – “it’s the opposite of genocide”. “So, to all those spreading these lies about my country and about our brave soldiers, whether they sit in this hall or in the office of the antisemitic mayor of New York, I say this: shame on you!” he said. Netanyahu delivered the controversial address to the United Nations on Thursday just hours after Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said his delegation was “unlawfully” denied visas by the Trump administration to attend the meeting of world leaders. In a video address from Ramallah, broadcast in the General Assembly Hall, Abbas condemned Israel’s policies in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem as a “malicious colonial plan” to establish a “‘Greater Israel’ and erase the Palestinian presence”. Citing the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the violent expansion of settlements in the West Bank, Abbas said that the Israeli government “now threatens the very life and existence of the Palestinian people in their homeland”. “Do not allow another Nakba and further massacres like those of 1948 to continue taking place,” he added, referring to the expulsion of Palestinians upon the founding of Israel. For the second year in a row, the US state department denied visas to Abbas and the Palestinian Authority delegation, arguing that they had failed to live up to their commitments to seek peace with Israel. “As a consequence of their failure to reform, contrary to their commitments to the United States, and their ongoing activities that undermine the prospects for peace, the United States will extend sanctions that deny visas to PLO members and PA officials,” the state department said last week in a statement. In his speech, Abbas said his delegation “[rejects] these unlawful punitive measures, as well as the accusations and justifications on which they were based”. He said: “Preventing the Palestinian delegation from reaching United Nations headquarters is inconsistent with the obligations of the United States as the host country.” As he spoke, protests were forming on the streets of New York near the United Nations headquarters in advance of Netanyahu’s arrival. Hundreds of demonstrators crowded into the street on Manhattan’s east side in midtown and held signs that said “End the Genocide” and wore shirts reading “Fund people not bombs”. By the end of Netanyahu’s speech, more than 100 demonstrators, including several local elected officials, had been arrested by New York City police. Earlier this summer, the mayor, Zohran Mamdani, had said that Netanyahu was “not welcome” in New York, and said he was reviewing whether Netanyahu could be arrested by city police under an international criminal court warrant for his arrest. He has since tempered that stance, saying this week that he wouldn’t attend the protests but promising to protect their “right to [protest] in this city”. Netanyahu is not expected to meet Donald Trump, who is in Washington to host the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, nor with other senior US officials, as he faces growing international condemnation over his hardline stance. Netanyahu has said that he needs to return to Israel quickly because of the election campaign and the holiday of Sukkot, which begins on Friday.

Democratic lawmakers accuse Trump administration of interference in Brazilian elections

A group of 31 Democratic members of the US Congress has sent a letter to the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, criticising the Trump administration over “an apparent effort to interfere with, and potentially undermine” Brazil’s elections. Latin America’s largest country will hold the first round of its presidential election on 4 October, with polls showing a technical tie between the incumbent leftist president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and the far-right senator Flávio Bolsonaro. In the letter sent to Rubio on Thursday, 30 members of the House of Representatives and the senator Bernie Sanders listed a series of measures the US government took that they interpret as attempts to secure a victory for Flávio Bolsonaro, the son of former president Jair Bolsonaro. They wrote that those actions “reflect a broader and deeply troubling pattern of interference by the Trump administration in recent electoral processes across Latin America”, citing the recent midterm elections in Argentina and presidential elections in Honduras and Colombia. In July, a group of 11 Democratic members of Congress sent a similar letter arguing that Trump was trying to interfere in Colombia’s election in favour of the far-right millionaire and former lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella, who went on to win the second round. In Thursday’s letter, the lawmakers wrote that US officials under Trump have engaged in a “sustained, multifaceted campaign of interference and destabilization in Brazil”. They noted that when Trump imposed his first tariffs on Brazil last year, he made clear that one reason was Bolsonaro’s trial over his attempt to stage a coup after losing the 2022 election to Lula. The former president was ultimately convicted and, unable to run because he is under house arrest, named his son to take his place. They also cited new tariffs that Trump imposed on Brazil in July under section 301 of US trade law, as well as plans by the US government to send two officials to Brazil to “cast doubt on the integrity of the country’s voting system, considered by many experts to be among the most reliable in the world”. The Lula administration ultimately denied the US delegation visas. The Brazilian president has repeatedly complained that Trump is trying to interfere in Brazil’s elections and, in his speech opening the UN general assembly this week, said, without naming anyone: “We will not allow the enemies of democracy, internal or external, to act against the will of the people.” In the letter sent to Rubio on Friday, the Democratic lawmakers wrote that “rather than helping defend Brazilian democracy”, the US is “acting as an agent of interference and destabilization – using diplomatic, economic and political pressure in ways that risk weakening the country’s democratic institutions, undermining confidence in Brazil’s electoral process, and inflicting further damage on our relationship with a strategic US ally and trading partner”. They asked Rubio if Trump’s administration would commit to respecting Brazil’s electoral process and requested a response by 1 October. The state department has not yet responded to a request for comment.

France says EU’s ‘Made in Europe’ law should not include the UK

France is leading a push to exclude the UK from the EU’s “Made in Europe” policy that could result in British companies losing out in the race to supply European countries with low-carbon technologies and electric cars. The plans were raised by Andy Burnham when he met the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, on the sidelines of the UN general assembly earlier this week. The policy, still under negotiation, aims to protect European companies from intense and “unfair” state-subsidised competition from China. But the government fears British companies risk being collateral damage and resolving the issue has become one of Burnham’s top priorities for the EU-UK relationship. One key EU proposal is the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA), which would require authorities spending public money – awarding subsidies or public contracts – to favour European products in sectors such as renewable technologies and electric cars. But there is an intense debate inside the EU on how to define “made in Europe” and how far to include countries such as the UK, Canada and Japan. At a meeting of EU industry ministers in Brussels on Thursday, France pushed for a narrow definition, starting with the EU27. “European taxpayers’ money should support [European] workers and European factories,” the French industry minister, Sébastien Martin, told reporters. Asked about the UK, he said: “The United Kingdom made a choice a few years ago to leave the European Union. “That doesn’t mean that we don’t discuss things or that we don’t trade, it doesn’t mean that there can’t be agreements in certain sectors, but fundamentally there are those who have chosen the European project and those who have decided to leave.” France’s Europe minister, Benjamin Haddad, speaking in London, had few assurances to offer the Burnham government either. Asked about the risks of pushing the EU’s like-minded trading partners away, Haddad said: “At the end of the day, if you are not part of the internal market and if you are not contributing to the financial capacity of the internal market, you don’t get the same kind of protection.” Germany wants a broader “Made with Europe” policy that would include the UK and other allies. Germany’s economic affairs minister, Katherina Reiche, told her counterparts: “We must reduce unilateral and critical dependencies, but we must not isolate ourselves from the rest of the world. This means that partner countries must be included in the union-origin principle, in general and on the condition of reciprocity.” This position gets broad support from Nordic countries, which traditionally favour open trade. Sweden’s outgoing deputy prime minister, Ebba Busch, who leads on business policy, said “we always miss the Brits”. Sweden wanted “a good solution where there is balance, given that some European countries are not members of the European Union but still completely essential for a functioning European market”, she added. The charged internal EU27 debate on Made in Europe raises questions about the timing of the EU-UK reset summit, which was postponed when Keir Starmer stood down as prime minister. Since Burnham took office, no date has been fixed for the talks which are meant to happen in 2026. British officials expect the summit will take place in November, although an earlier 6 November date has been scratched out. By December the EU is expected to be embroiled in deeply difficult internal negotiations on the bloc’s next seven-year budget, which are likely to consume the political bandwidth of EU leaders. EU insiders believe that a Made in Europe agreement is a top priority for the UK, but have cautioned this cannot happen before the union has finalised its own position. One EU diplomat said it was a “big risk” if the UK government were to insist on a deal at an autumn summit. “It puts [the UK] in a corner, because this [Made in Europe criteria] is a process that is very difficult for the EU27 [to agree internally].” The Republic of Ireland, which is chairing EU ministerial negotiations, hopes for an agreement in December on the IAA, including the Made in Europe provisions, between the EU Council and the European parliament. “There are a divergence of views on the Industrial Accelerator Act, on European preference, on working with trusted partners and third countries,” said Ireland’s enterprise minister, Peter Burke. “It is difficult, but we have a pathway in sight.” Poland’s economic development minister, Michał Baranowski, said it was too early to say whether countries such as Switzerland, the UK, Japan, Australia and Canada would be in or out, adding: “All these countries are in the mix of the discussion.” The UK, he said, should have clarity on its status when the EU act is passed, he said, adding: “We are in the last stretch, but this last stretch might take a while.” A UK government spokesperson said: “The UK is a close and trusted European partner, committed to our shared security and economic cooperation. “We will continue to engage with the EU on Made in Europe and work together, as like-minded partners, to boost growth and open up trade.”

Russia could attack a Nato country within months, Danish intelligence says

Russia could launch a limited military attack against a Nato country in the coming months, Danish intelligence said, in one of the starkest warnings yet by western security services. In a report published on Thursday, the Danish defence intelligence service warned of a “low but growing risk” that Russia could launch long-range strikes on Nato infrastructure supporting Ukraine, or carry out a limited incursion into a neighbouring country with a small number of troops, potentially operating without insignia. The report came hours after a fire at a Starlink satellite station in central Poland that local authorities described as an “act of sabotage”. Krzysztof Gawkowski, the deputy prime minister of Poland, said the blaze, which broke out overnight in the Masovian voivodeship, had been “deliberately designed to disable the station”, disrupting internet access for a number of institutions, including the Ukrainian military. Gawkowski said it had not been established who was responsible for the fire, but that “many signs suggest this aligns with Russia’s new ‌doctrine ⁠of attack. “While everything is operational today, we must recognise, as prime minister [Donald] Tusk recently noted, that this is an element of hybrid warfare,” he said. Starlink has become a key part of Ukraine’s military communications, and the incident comes amid a spate of suspected Russian sabotage operations across European infrastructure supporting Ukraine. Earlier this month, Germany publicly blamed Russia for an attempted drone attack on Leipzig/Halle airport, while a series of other incidents – including fires at drone factories and sabotage targeting rail infrastructure – have also been investigated for possible links to Moscow. Russia has denied involvement in such attacks. In recent weeks, several European intelligence chiefs have warned that Russia may be preparing more assertive actions to test Nato countries’ commitment to supporting Ukraine, though officials differ over how imminent such a move may be. Russia is expected to intensify its hybrid attacks against European countries with “greater consequences” for those targeted in the coming months, the Danes warned, including “destructive cyber-attacks that cripple societal functions as well as sabotage attacks that carry a high risk of casualties”. A source familiar with Moscow’s thinking agreed that Russia was likely to step up its hybrid attacks. “Russian military top command is convinced some Nato countries are directly involved in the war against Russia – not just by supplying Ukraine with weapons and intelligence, but by helping to guide missiles and drones,” the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “They therefore believe Nato is already waging a hybrid war against Russia, and that Russia has the right to respond in kind,” the source added. “Hybrid attacks” are broad terms generally used to describe non-military tactics aimed at pressuring or destabilising an adversary, including cyber-attacks, sabotage and disinformation. The aim of Russia’s actions would be to divert European resources away from supporting Ukraine, and deepen divisions within Nato if the alliance failed to agree on a collective response, the report added. The service believes it remained “highly unlikely” that Russia would launch an outright invasion of a Nato country, but notably said it “cannot be ruled out”. The Danish services said Russia could seek to test Nato’s article 5, which commits members to collective defence. They warned there was “a risk that Russia assesses that the Nato countries will not respond collectively”, particularly if Moscow believes the US is unable or unwilling to support its European allies in a potential war with Russia. There have been ongoing jitters among Nato members over whether the alliance’s most powerful member, the US, would come to Europe’s defence under Donald Trump in the event of a Russian attack. Questions over unity within Europe are also growing. Last week, Slovakia’s prime minister, Robert Fico, who has maintained close ties with the Kremlin, cast doubt on his country’s commitment to Nato’s collective defence principle, saying he did not want Slovakia drawn into a military conflict “because of some article 5”. Speaking at the UN general assembly on Wednesday, Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that Russia continued to threaten countries beyond Ukraine, including Moldova, Poland and the Baltic states, while showing “no respect” for the sovereignty of countries in the south Caucasus and central Asia. “The more freedom Putin has to act, the more dangerous the world becomes for everyone else,” he said.

Rick Wakeman performs piano concert to 150 rescued moon bears in Vietnam

Rick Wakeman has played to all kinds of people around the globe, but he has now performed to an audience he had never encountered before – an enclosure of 150 bears. The former Yes musician, who has gone on to have a prolific solo career, played the piano at a Vietnamese bear sanctuary. “Before you ask, I won’t be playing the teddy bear’s picnic,” he joked ahead of the performance. Wakeman, who is a supporter of animal welfare causes and has rescue dogs and cats of his own, is conducting the concert to raise awareness of moon bears kept in cruel conditions for the extraction of their bile. He said he was a bit worried about how hot it is going to be. “You know the heatwave we had in England? It’s double that,” he said. “They offered to rig up a fan for me, but I figured that will just blow more hot air around.” His concert was performed live on a Yamaha grand piano positioned in Animals Asia’s bear sanctuary in the Tam Dao national park, and Wakeman had written some new compositions especially for rescued bears. Asked whether the bears would enjoy the music, he said: “They’ve not got much choice, really. It’s a well-known fact that all animals react to music, especially gentle melodic music. So what I am going to do is piano music that is melodic, and I can only hope that they will come up to the perimeter of the sanctuary and have a listen.” Wakeman has been sponsoring rescue bears since 2016 and recently adopted a new one: “He’s only 20 months old, a big fella, I went to see him today. He came out right to the edge and stood on his back legs and just stared at me, it was brilliant.” Bile is extracted from bears for traditional Chinese medicine by putting a needle into their gall bladder and drawing it out. The bears are kept in poor conditions in countries including China and in Vietnam, where it has just been banned, but where some bears are still in captivity in cramped enclosures. It is the fourth-biggest market in the illegal wildlife trade in east Asia, resulting in a dramatic decline in the Asiatic black bear populations in Vietnam, with nearly a third of their numbers lost around the world in just 30 years. Of the sanctuary, which he has been visiting this week, Wakeman said: “To see the bears be rehabilitated, having a life they never had before, some have never put their feet on grass before. They are so wonderful, that we can do such horrendous things to animals is beyond belief. Before this, they were chained in cages sometimes for 10 or 20 years in conditions where they couldn’t even turn around.” He is playing to raise awareness for the bears still stuck in cages in Vietnam and to urge the government to get them released: “We have 150 bears at the sanctuary, but there are 125 bears left in cages in the old bear bile farms, and there are four dying a month. We have to get them out quick and into the sanctuary.” He treats his rescue dogs and cats to music back at home in Suffolk. “I had one cat who used to jump on the grand piano, and if I stopped playing he would put his paw in the strings and rattle them until I played again. I know if my dogs don’t like it, they will get up and walk out, and my cats don’t like metal, grunge or rap. They want a melody.” Wakeman spends hours watching the bears. “If you see these bears it is hard to put into words, they are almost human the way they look at you,” he said. “If you see them, you can’t help but be moved. They aren’t tame but they are very safe, very happy, they play, they romp. I witnessed two today jumping in a bubble bath and playing. They’ve got a life back.” Dr Jill Robinson, the founder and CEO of Animals Asia, said: “We are beyond blessed to have Rick’s support for Animals Asia and the bears. His love for them is immeasurable and can be heard in the beautifully haunting music he has written for them. We’re all so excited to hear his performance in the open air at our sanctuary in the stunning setting of Tam Dao national park. I can’t wait to see how the bears respond.” Wakeman added: “I hope they lay down and have a listen, that would make my day. I would have a big grin on my face.”

Rebel offensive against Ethiopian army stokes fears of return to civil war

There are growing fears of a return to civil war in Ethiopia after an offensive by fighters from Tigray into the neighbouring states of Afar and Amhara and the formation of a new rebel alliance aimed at overthrowing the government of the prime minister, Abiy Ahmed. About 600,000 people died between 2020 and 2022 during a devastating war between the Ethiopian army and the political party and paramilitary group the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). Both sides are now accusing the other of triggering a return to open conflict. On Sunday, seven armed groups from around the country, including the TPLF, announced the formation of the Ethiopian Peoples’ Forces Alliance for Survival, aimed at deposing the government in Addis Ababa. Then, on Wednesday, the TPLF seized control of three airports from federal police. The state-owned carrier, Ethiopian Airlines, said it had suspended flights to the region “due to the current situation”. The TPLF also launched attacks into Afar and Amhara. A humanitarian source in Afar told Agence France-Presse there were heavy artillery attacks by the group on Thursday as they attempted to take control of the town of Yallo, near the Tigrayan border. Flights to the historic Ethiopian town of Lalibela were also suspended on Thursday because of nearby fighting, while people in Tigray stocked up ⁠on food and cash, with one resident telling Reuters that people there feared they could face siege conditions similar to those during the previous war. A resident of Adigrat, a city close to the Eritrean border, ‌described panic-buying and shops emptying. “Food shortages are worsening as market shelves sit empty … Essential medicines remain scarce and astronomically expensive,” he told Reuters. “Daily survival has become a constant calculation.” The TPLF’s vice-president, Amanuel Assefa, told AFP: “We are in the situation of full-blown war now.” He confirmed Tigrayan forces were fighting alongside local armed groups in Afar and Amhara. The group took control of Abala, also on the Tigray-Afar border, on Wednesday, a foreign security source based in Ethiopia told AFP, while a TPLF source said they had seized several other towns in Afar. The foreign security source also said there was fighting around the Amhara town of Weldiya – one of the few routes to the capital. In its first public comments on the fighting, Ethiopia’s army said on ⁠Thursday it had foiled the attacks and killed, wounded or captured more than 500 enemy fighters. Analysts say the TPLF has support from Ethiopia’s neighbour and historic adversary Eritrea, which fears landlocked Ethiopia is planning to invade its territory to gain access to the Red Sea. The TPLF’s Assefa told AFP “we have no information about Eritrea’s plan”. Asked if they would request Eritrean intervention, he said: “Not yet.” The current fighting reflects shifting dynamics from the civil war, when Eritrea and Fano, an insurgent group that is now part of the new alliance, both fought with the government against the Tigrayans. Speaking at the UN general assembly on Wednesday, the Ethiopian president, Taye Atske-Selassie Amde, decried “the forces of destruction and mayhem” and “interference in our internal affairs by adversarial elements”. He said Ethiopia had exercised “immense restraint” and made progress with its neighbours. Abiy’s spokesperson, Billene Seyoum, said members of the alliance had been collaborating for a while with the financial backing of Eritrea. Eritrea has repeatedly denied similar accusations. The TPLF ruled Ethiopia from 1991 to 2018 before being sidelined by the rise of Abiy, eventually triggering the civil war. The renewed fighting marks the most serious challenge yet to the 2022 Pretoria agreement, which ended the civil war and maintained an uneasy calm until late last year, when clashes resumed. It raises fears of a broader regional conflict that could draw in armed groups from across and further destabilise a region already strained by war in neighbouring Sudan and tensions along the Red Sea. On Wednesday, the African Union chair, Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, urged “utmost restraint” from the warring parties and resumption of direct talks. An EU spokesperson called for “immediate de-escalation” and a recommitment to the Pretoria agreement. In the 2020-22 war, Tigray was largely cut off from the outside world as communications were severed, and access to food, cash and medicines was severely restricted, pushing hundreds of thousands of people into famine-like conditions. AFP and Reuters contributed reporting