Ethiopia's Tigray crisis: Citizens urged to defend Addis Ababa against rebels

Officials in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa have called on residents to register their weapons and get ready to protect their neighbourhoods amid fears that rebels could advance on the city.

The appeal came days after the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) said it had captured two cites about 400km (250 miles) from Addis Ababa.

The government dismissed the TPLF's claims as "propaganda".

War broke out a year ago in the northern Tigray region.

The TPLF has since advanced into the neighbouring regions of Amhara and Afar.

Thousands of people have been killed and more than two million have fled their homes since the conflict began.

The TPLF says it wants to break a siege of Tigray, where the UN estimates 400,000 people are living in "famine-like conditions".

International efforts to broker a ceasefire between the government and the rebels, who initially fell out over Prime Minister Ahmed Abiy's political reforms, have so far failed.

The capital has a population of more than five million.

The head of the Addis Ababa's peace and security bureau gave residents two days to register weapons or to give them to the government or a relative who could use firearms, the state-linked Fana Broadcasting Corporation reported.

Kenea Yadeta added that people should "organise" themselves, and work with the security services to "control" their neighbourhoods, the report said.

He said landlords and hotel owners should check the IDs of tenants and guests.

The TPLF says it has captured the strategic cities of Dessie and Kombolcha and planned to advance towards Kemise, about 325km from the capital.

In a televised address on Monday, Mr Abiy said that foreign forces were fighting alongside the TPLF. He did not give details, while the TPLF denied the allegation.

Mr Abiy said that mobilisation so far had not had proper organisation.

"Battles can go wrong for different reasons but in the end the country will win the war," he added.

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