July 1 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Ethiopian authorities have brought to nearly 340 civilians massacred in an attack carried out in mid-June by alleged members of the rebel Oromo Liberation Army (OLA) against the town of Tole Kebele, located in the Oromia region, in the middle of the worsening of the security situation in the African country.
Billene Seyoum, press secretary for Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s office, has indicated that a total of 338 people were killed in the attack on the town, located in the Gimbi area, after some local media pointed to even more than a thousand victims, according to the Ethiopian news portal Borkena.
Thus, he has indicated that the authorities are investigating what happened, which he has branded as “barbaric” and “an act of terrorism”, while accusing the OLA of “fostering divisions between the Oromo and the Amhara”. The attacked locality was inhabited mainly by Amhara, who make up all of the victims.
“It is mandatory to put these incidents in a context of those that flourish creating instability in Ethiopia,” he explained, while stressing that the “partners” of the rebel group obtain “foreign funds” to “destabilize the region”, as as reported by the Ethiopian television network Fana.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, called on June 23 for a “quick” and “impartial” investigation into the attacks. “I am horrified by the senseless killings and forced displacement of local people in the attack on the town of Tole,” she said.
The area of Oromía in which the attack was carried out is close to the Gambela region, where dozens of people have died in recent days in an attack also blamed on members of the OLA, which has increased its activities in recent months. The group has dissociated itself from the attack in Oromia.
The OLA, split from the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) after the 2018 peace agreement, has claimed responsibility for several attacks –especially in Oromia– in recent months. The OLF fought for decades for the secession of the Oromia region, but in 2018 it announced that it was giving up the armed struggle, accepting the prime minister’s offer of amnesty.
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