ADDIS ABABA: Several people have died during clashes between the armies of southern Ethiopia’s Somali and Oromia regions in recent days, against a backdrop of territorial disputes, sources told AFP on Saturday.
Fighting erupted on Tuesday after a Somali regional flag was hoisted in Moyale, a city near the border with Kenya jointly administered between the two Ethiopian regions.
That act sparked “a confrontation that resulted in the death of a 13-year-old girl,” according to the ACLED conflict monitor, which gave a toll of at least another five dead.
“Somali fighters are firing heavy weapons from large buildings in the town while Oromia forces are fighting back,” Wako Ganale, a resident, told AFP by telephone.
Another local, Hussein Halkeno, said that “several civilians had been killed and wounded in the clashes.”
Shots could be heard in the background of both telephone calls.
AFP was unable to independently verify the toll.
The federal government, led by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who is from the Oromia region, was yet to react to the clashes.
At least 10,000 people have fled the fighting over the border to Kenya, Malik Adan, who works for the Red Cross in Kenya, told the Kenyan NTV broadcaster on Friday.
Ethiopia, Africa’s second most populous country at some 130 million people, is the scene of various armed conflicts across its vast territory.
The borderlands of its various regions, whose tracing dates back to 1991, are often the source of clashes.
For several years, the federal government has been locked in conflict with rebel movements in the Oromia and Amhara regions, the country’s most populous.
After months of tensions, fighting has also broken out again in the northern Tigray region, already the scene of a devastating war from 2020 to 2022.
Diplomatic disagreements with neighboring Eritrea have likewise led to fears of another conflict between the fractious Horn of Africa neighbors.