Ethiopia says troopers stopped attackers earlier than they might ‘wreck havoc’ within the border city of Dollo.
Ethiopia says it foiled a suicide assault by the armed group al-Shabab at a border city with Somalia.
The Ethiopian military “stopped the attackers of their tracks earlier than they might wreak havoc” within the Ethiopia-Somalia border city of Dollo, the overseas ministry mentioned in a Twitter publish on Wednesday.
“The Ethiopian Nationwide Protection Forces neutralised suicide bombers and destroyed weapons for use by the terrorist group,” it added.
Al-Shabab, which has been linked to al-Qaeda, has been waging an armed riot in opposition to Somalia’s central authorities for about 15 years.
Ethiopia thwarted an assault by Al-Shabaab terror group:
Ethiopia earlier as we speak efficiently foiled an tried assault by the terrorist group Al Shabaab on the Ethiopia-Somalia border city of Dollo.
— The Ministry of Overseas Affairs of #Ethiopia 🇪🇹 (@mfaethiopia) June 7, 2023
The armed group, in the meantime, claimed by way of its communication channels that it performed two suicide bombings at an Ethiopian army base on the Somali aspect of the border, in accordance with america monitoring group SITE.
The primary assault focused “the headquarters of the native army command” whereas the second hit a weapons and ammunition warehouse, it mentioned.
“The 2 operations resulted in heavy casualties in deaths and accidents,” the group mentioned. Al-Shabab is thought to magnify claims of its battlefield success.
The alleged incident in Dollo comes days after Uganda introduced 54 of its troopers had been killed in an assault on a base housing African Union (AU) peacekeepers in Somalia.
Al-Shabab was pushed out of Mogadishu in 2011 by an AU pressure, however it nonetheless controls swathes of countryside and continues to wage lethal strikes on civilian, political and army targets.
It has focused Ethiopia in retaliation for Addis Ababa sending troops into Somalia as a part of the AU pressure – generally known as the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS) – to oust the armed group. In mid-2022, the armed group attacked a number of Ethiopian army camps on the border between the 2 international locations.
ATMIS, which has 22,000 troops, has been aiding Somalia’s federal authorities in its warfare in opposition to al-Shabab since 2022 when it changed the AU Mission in Somalia (AMISOM).
Al-Shabab additionally intermittently launches assaults in neighbouring Kenya as a part of reprisals for Nairobi sending troops to help Mogadishu’s insurgent pushback.
