Does The Express Tribune's photo show “Eritrean troops deployed in Ethiopia's Tigray region”?

What was claimed

On 8 October, The Express Tribune, a Karachi daily, published an AFP report headlined “Eritrean troops deployed in Ethiopia’s Tigray region” A. Above the text is a large photo of a sand-coloured armoured vehicle with a roof turret, driving down a city street. The caption under it reads: “Eritrean troops deployed in Ethiopia’s Tigray region” A.

No photographer or agency is credited. A reader is told, in the caption, that this is what Eritrea’s deployment in Tigray looks like.

Where the photo comes from

The day before, News24 in South Africa ran the same AFP report under the same photo B. Its caption reads: “Members of the Ethiopian National Defense Force patrol after Tigray People’s Liberation Front army retreated from the regional capital Mekelle, in the Tigray Region”. News24 credits the picture to Reuters B.

The two images are the same picture: the same vehicle and turret, the same soldier standing at the rear door, the same parked cars and trees behind C. The Express Tribune’s copy is cropped more tightly.

The ENDF is Ethiopia’s army. Its forces entered Mekelle, the capital of Tigray, after the TPLF withdrew on 4 October; Reuters distributed pictures of their patrols there dated 6 October E.

The vehicle itself points the same way. It has the shape of the Calidus MCAV-20, an armoured vehicle built in the United Arab Emirates, which Ethiopia’s army received in large numbers in 2024 and again in early 2026 D.

What the article says

The article’s text is AFP’s report that “Eritrean troops have deployed in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region, multiple sources said Wednesday” A. We reviewed how unverified reports of Eritrean troops in Tigray became headlines in our fact checks of the BBC and AP. This fact check is about the photo, which was not part of AFP’s report.

Our verdict

False. The photo The Express Tribune captioned “Eritrean troops deployed in Ethiopia’s Tigray region” shows an Ethiopian army vehicle in Mekelle, according to the Reuters caption published with the same picture a day earlier. It is the army Eritrea is accused of fighting, not Eritrean troops. Readers who saw the photo were shown Ethiopian forces and told they were Eritrean.