Authorities in Ethiopia’s rebel-held Tigray region announced Sunday they would respect a ceasefire as fighting intensified in the country’s war-torn north, and the African Union called for an immediate ceasefire.

The fate of Shire, a town of 100,000 in north-west Tigray where Ethiopian and Eritrean troops have launched a joint offensive and civilian casualties have been reported, is growing internationally.

UN chief Antonio Guterres has joined the United States and other Western powers in sounding the alarm at the escalating violence and calling for a peaceful solution to “this catastrophic conflict”.

The government of Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and the Tigrayan authorities have accepted an invitation to talks from the AU, but talks scheduled for last weekend in South Africa have not materialized and no new date has been announced.

On Sunday, AU Commission Chair Moussa Faki Mahamat called on the warring parties to “recommit to dialogue in accordance with their agreement on direct talks to be convened in South Africa”.

“The leader urges an immediate, unconditional ceasefire and the resumption of humanitarian services” in areas cut off from the fighting, Faki said in a statement released on Sunday but dated Saturday.

Authorities in Tigray, which has been under rebel control since government forces were toppled in June 2021, welcomed the statement and said they would respect an internationally backed ceasefire.

“We stand ready to adhere to an immediate cessation of hostilities,” the statement said.

“We also call on the international community to force the Eritrean army to withdraw from Tigray, to take practical steps for an immediate cessation of hostilities and to urge the Ethiopian government to come to the negotiating table.”

An Ethiopian government spokesman did not respond to a request for comment when contacted by AFP.

International concern over the recent fighting arose when US special envoy Mike Hammer arrived in Addis Ababa to urge a peaceful solution to the nearly two-year war.

Fighting resumed in August after a five-month lull, dampening hopes for a resolution to a conflict that has killed scores of civilians and has been marred by atrocities on all sides.

“Working intensively with the African Union and other partners to initiate an AU-led peace process in the coming days,” the US State Department’s Africa Office wrote on Twitter on Sunday.

The talks were brokered by AU envoy to the Horn of Africa Olusegun Obasanjo, former South African Vice President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and former Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Diplomats suggested that logistical problems were partly responsible for the much-anticipated meeting in South Africa not taking place last weekend.

Fresh offensives on multiple fronts have halted much-needed aid in Tigray, where millions have fled their homes and hundreds of thousands are near starvation, according to the UN.

The International Rescue Committee (IRC), a relief organization providing aid to Tigray, announced on Saturday that one of its workers was killed and another wounded in an attack in the Shire, among three civilians.

The World Food Program (WFP) said on Sunday it had received reports of Friday’s attack near where the IRC was distributing food “to WFP beneficiaries, including vulnerable mothers and children”.

“WFP condemns any intentional targeting of humanitarian activities” and calls on all sides to respect international law, a WFP spokesman in Ethiopia told AFP in a statement.

The Shire had “been subjected to continuous heavy artillery and air raids throughout the week” and civilians had fled, a humanitarian worker in the town told AFP on condition of anonymity.

US Secretary of State Samantha Power said of the escalating conflict in northern Ethiopia that “the risk of further atrocities and deaths is increasing, particularly around the Shire”.

“The recent indiscriminate attacks by the Ethiopian National Defense Forces and the Eritrean Defense Forces in Shire and reports that Eritrean forces may soon take control of civilian population centers are deeply concerning,” Power wrote on Twitter on Sunday.

Eritrea sided with Ethiopia at the start of the war in November 2020 after Abiy Tigray’s dissident ruling party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), accused attacks on army camps.

Eritrea is a historic enemy of the TPLF, which dominated Ethiopia’s ruling coalition until Abiy took power in 2018, and its forces have been accused of gang rape and murder in Tigray.

Eritrea’s re-entry into the conflict “made the situation much worse” and they would have to leave Ethiopia, Hammer said.

Eritrea says it is being “scapegoated” and has accused the US and others of ignoring the TPLF’s atrocities.