The UN children’s agency UNICEF has categorically condemned the latest Ethiopian air strike that had reportedly “hit a kindergarten” in the rebel-held Tigray region, thereby killing at least four people including two children in the school.
The Ethiopian government had also openly denied the fact that they had targeted some of the civilian areas in Friday’s air raid and accused the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) of staging deaths.
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“UNICEF strongly condemns the air strike … (that) hit a kindergarten, killing several children, and injuring others,” the agency’s executive director Catherine Russell said on Twitter.
“Yet again, an escalation of violence in northern Ethiopia has caused children to pay the heaviest price. For almost two years, children and their families in the region have endured the agony of this conflict. It must end.”
The bombardment came just days after fighting erupted on Tigray’s southern border between government forces and TPLF rebels, ending a five-month truce and dashing hopes of peace talks. The TPLF had also revealed that the air strike, the first in many months on Tigray, demolished a kindergarten and hit a civilian residential area.
The government said only military sites were targeted and accused the TPLF of “dumping fake body bags in civilian areas” to maximise outrage.
Kibrom Gebreselassie, chief clinical director at Mekele’s Ayder Referral Hospital, told AFP four people died in the strike, including two children.
Nine others were receiving treatment for injuries, he said.
