Ethiopia's parliament on Wednesday removed the rebel Tigray People's Liberation Front from the official list of terrorist groups, a major step in the peace process following a two-year war in the north of the country.

"The House of Representatives approved the decision to declassify the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) on the terrorist list by a majority of votes," Parliament said on Facebook, adding that the move would strengthen the November 2022 peace agreement between the Tigray Front and the federal government.

He added, "It was noted during the discussion of the draft decision to cancel the classification of the Tigray People's Liberation Front as terrorist, that it is indispensable to support the peace agreement concluded between the federal government and the Tigray People's Liberation Front."

The front that had been dominating Ethiopian politics was officially designated a terrorist organization in May 2021, six months after the outbreak of the war.

Under the terms of the peace agreement signed in Pretoria, the capital of South Africa, the TPLF agreed to disarm in return for access to Tigray, which was largely cut off from its surroundings during the war.

Since the agreement, the delivery of some basic needs and aid has resumed to Tigray, which has faced severe shortages of food, fuel, liquidity and medicine.

Access to the region of six million people remains restricted, and it is impossible to independently verify the situation on the ground.

The war led to the deaths of countless civilians, the displacement of more than two million Ethiopians, and the suffering of hundreds of thousands of people from conditions close to famine.

There is a great discrepancy in the estimate of human losses, as the United States estimates that about half a million people have died in the conflict, while the African Union envoy to the region, Olusegun Obasanjo, said that the death toll could reach 600,000 people.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 for ending 20 years of war with neighboring Eritrea, and was once considered the leader of a new generation of progressive African leaders before the war dealt a blow to his reputation in Washington.

And Monday, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken accused all parties to the conflict in Tigray, i.e. the Ethiopian and Eritrean forces and the rebels of the Tigray People's Liberation Front, of committing war crimes, but he specifically accused the Ethiopian Federal Army and its allied forces, i.e. the Eritrean army and the forces and militias in the Amhara region, of committing crimes against humanity. Among them are "murder, rape and other forms of sexual violence and persecution", without accusing the rebels in Tigray of that.

For its part, the Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs responded Tuesday in a statement, accusing the United States of adopting a "selective and divisive approach."

Since the conclusion of the peace agreement, telecommunications, banking and electricity services have slowly resumed in Tigray, with the Ethiopian national airline resuming commercial flights between Addis Ababa and Mekelle, the capital of Tigray, in December.

The war broke out in November 2020 when Abiy Ahmed sent forces to Tigray with the support of Eritrea, accusing the Tigray People's Liberation Front of attacking army bases in the region.