In just 18 months the prime minister has transformed his country and the region
The road from Harar runs for more than 960km east towards the border with Somalia, penetrating deep into the desiccated badlands of the Ogaden desert, the dusty heart of Ethiopia’s war-torn Somali regional state. This is the land that the self-styled separatists of the Ogaden National Liberation Front claim as their own.
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/ 31 January 2008
African Union heads of state were set on Thursday to begin a three-day summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, focused on the deadly crisis in Kenya and the challenges facing the body’s peacekeeping missions. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was expected to address the organisation and call for a peaceful resolution of the post-poll dispute in Kenya.
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/ 17 January 2008
At least 13 people were killed and 75 wounded in heavy fighting in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, on Thursday in the latest confrontation between Ethiopian troops and Islamist-led insurgents, witnesses said. For more than a year, fighting has plunged the capital into bloodshed.
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/ 29 December 2007
Ethiopia’s Ogaden rebels on Saturday denied claims they had suffered heavy losses at the hands of the government forces. On Friday, the Ethiopian army said it had ”annihilated the remnants of the Ogaden National Liberation Front that were engaged in disrupting the peace and stability of the Somali region”.
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/ 24 November 2007
Insurgents fired a barrage of mortars into an Ethiopian army camp in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, on Friday, triggering heavy fighting, residents said. The clashes shattered a fortnight lull in the city after weeks of heavy fighting that had claimed dozens of lives, mainly of civilians, and displaced at least 200 000 people.
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/ 11 November 2007
The toll from some of the worst fighting in Somalia’s war-wracked capital climbed to 59 on Saturday, as thousands fled the city fearing more clashes between Ethiopian forces and rebels, witnesses said. Residents recovered bullet-riven bodies, ripped limbs and shattered skulls on the blood-streaked streets.
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/ 10 November 2007
Ethiopian troops shelled suspected Islamist hideouts on Friday in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, where some of the worst clashes in months have left at least 43 dead in two days, many of them civilians. The escalating violence came as the Ethiopian army tried to flush out pockets of insurgents in southern districts of the Somali capital.
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/ 8 November 2007
Civilians dragged the body of an Ethiopian soldier through the streets of Somalia’s capital on Thursday after fighting with insurgents killed a second soldier and civilian, witnesses said. In the grisly incident, more than 100 civilians stepped and spat on the scarred body as they dragged it for several kilometres on a pot-holed asphalt road.
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/ 28 October 2007
Hundreds of families fled Mogadishu on Sunday following an upsurge in violence pitting Islamist insurgents against Somali security forces and Ethiopian troops, it was reported. The latest bout of fighting in the Somali capital appeared to have prompted a fresh wave of displacement.
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/ 23 October 2007
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi on Tuesday dismissed claims that rebels from the restive Ogaden region had defeated the military and caused one of his top aides to flee. Addressing Parliament in Addis Ababa, Meles played down rebel claims that the army had been humiliated by the Ogaden National Liberation Front.
A Somali reconciliation conference aimed at ending 16 years of war and attended by thousands was due to wrap up on Thursday after six weeks of talks that were marred by relentless violence in Mogadishu. ”It was the first time such a large number of Somali delegates in favour of peace met,” said clan elder Bile Mohamud Qabowsade.