Officials administering Ethiopia's Tigray region asked for federal help on Wednesday as a faction of the main regional party seized control of a town, stoking fears of a return to conflict in the war-scarred region.
The Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) runs Tigray's interim administration, established in 2023 as part of a peace agreement that ended a devastating two-year war between Tigrayan forces and the federal government.
The war ended with a truce signed in November 2022 after tens of thousands of people were killed and millions forced from their homes in northern Ethiopia.
Since then the TPLF has split into two factions, with each laying claim to control of the party.
On Wednesday Getachew Reda, who leads one faction and heads Tigray's interim administration, said his rival, Debretsion Gebremichael, had forcibly taken control of the administration of the northern town of Adigrat a day earlier.