100 Eritrean soldiers desert to Ethiopia – police
By Tesfa-alem Tekle
October 25, 2008 (AFDERA) – Some 100 Eritrean army troops with all their weapons this week gave themselves up to the Ethiopian forces for what they said was in protest to the heavy -handed treatments they face by the government of Asmara, the Afar State Police Commission disclosed.
“A total of hundred Eritrean soldiers have surrendered to Ethiopian forces and authorities in the Afar state of Afdera and Bija district in defiance to massive oppression and ill-military policies” state police commander Commissioner, Allo Afkie said.
“A number of explosives, light and heavy weapons as well as military communication equipment were found in the hands of the Eritrean army members” he added.
The statement could not be immediately confirmed by independent sources, but the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that more than 280 Eritreans every month cross border to take refuge in Ethiopia.
The remote Afar region of Ethiopia is a vast, volcanic, lunar-like desert with nomadic life styles straddling the disputed Ethiopia-Eritrea border.
On 1 March 2007, a group of five Europeans (three British men, a British-Italian woman and a French woman) from the British embassy in Addis Ababa, and a dozen Ethiopian guides and helpers, were abducted near the village of Hamedali in the Afar region of Ethiopia.
(ST)