WASHINGTON, 9 April 2021 (TON): Ethiopian Deputy Prime Minister Demeke Mekonnen held discussions telephonic with Jake Sullivan who is US President Joe Biden's National Security Adviser on phone call. US National Security Adviser expressed American concern over the continued humanitarian and human rights crisis in the Tigray region and chalked out strategies agaist various disputes and American involvement. Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed earlier announced hat his country will not welcome any international mediators pushing for talks with the Tigrayan rebel group.

The two discussed critical steps to address the crisis, including expanded humanitarian access, cessation of hostilities, departure of foreign troops, and independent investigations into atrocities and human rights violations.

Since September 2020, due to foreign intervention the Fashaga area along the Sudan-Ethiopia border has been witnessing rising tensions and deadly skirmishes between the two sides that led to thousands of locals to become Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and refugees. Western nations have launched sries of mersures against Sudan and are funding and arming Ethiopian armed forces and farmers in the area to illegally seize Sudanese lands along the border.

Fighting that erupted in November last year in Ethiopia's Tigray between the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) and the Ethiopian National Defense Forces which has left thousands of farmers killed and immigration of the local population.

Biden's National Security Adviser also developed grounds for Ethiopian support over the idea that the African Union to peacefully resolve current disputes related to the Fashaga border and the Grand Ethiopia Renaissance Dam (GERD). Ethiopia, which started building the GERD in 2011, to produce more than 6,000 megawatts of electricity from the dam project, while Egypt and Sudan, downstream Nile Basin countries have expressed reservation as it is affecting their share of the water resources.