Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs denied media reports of additional military attacks inside Eritrea.
It is to be recalled that on Thursday Ethiopian government announced its troops carried out earlier that day military raids on three camps located 14-18 kms inside Eritrea.
On Saturday afternoon, Reuters’ correspondent in Addis, Aaron Maasho, claimed that:
Ethiopia again attacks rebel targets in Eritrea
(Sat, Mar 17, 2012 – Reuters) – Ethiopian troops carried out more attacks on rebels inside Eritrea on Saturday, a government source said, a day after its neighbour called for U.N. action over a similar incursion earlier in the week.
The attacks are the first on Eritrean soil that Ethiopia has admitted to since the end of a 1998-2000 war that killed 70,000 people and left a border dispute unresolved. Eritrea says there have been others.
"We’ve carried out further attacks on targets inside Eritrea. This time it’s in the north section around Badme," a senior Ethiopian government official told Reuters on Saturday.
"We were once again successful. This strike was part of our plan to take proportional measures that included the (earlier) attacks in Eritrea’s southeast." He did not specify who had been targeted in the latest attack.
On Thursday Ethiopia said it had raided three military bases inside Eritrea that it said were being using to train an Ethiopian rebel group it blames for killing five foreign tourists and kidnapping two others in its remote Afar region in January.
Eritrea responded by saying it would not be "entrapped" by the military incursion, signalling its determination to avert another conflict with its bitter foe, and it called on the United Nations to act against the aggression.
However, Ethiopia’s Foreign Ministry’s public diplomacy and communications director dismissed the report later on Saturday.
Bloomberg’s correspondent in Addis, By William Davison , reported that:
Ethiopian officials denied the news was Ethiopia Denies Report That It Made More Attacks Inside Eritrea
(March 17 – Bloomberg) – Ethiopia’s government denied a Reuters report that it made further attacks inside Eritrea.
“That’s not correct,” Getachew Reda, the Foreign Ministry’s public diplomacy and communications director, said by phone from Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa, today. “There’s been no further attacks” after a raid two days ago inside Eritrea’s territory, he said.
Ethiopian troops today carried out more attacks on rebels in the north of Eritrea around Badme, Reuters said, citing an unidentified Ethiopian government official.
Three military posts where the Eritrean government trained rebels hostile to Ethiopia were targeted on March 15, State Minister of Communications Shimeles Kemal said.
“The information is false,” he said by phone today about the Reuters report. “It’s an absolute lie.”
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Check the Eritrean terrorism archive for previous and forthcoming posts.
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