Ethiopian National Security Council (ENSC) on Wednesday said security situation in the East African country has improved in the past 45 days.
Siraj Fegessa, Defence Minister of Ethiopia and Coordinator at ENSC, said measures undertaken to prevent road blockage by protesters and illegal rallies were successful.
He said 270 rifles, 200 handguns, 65,000 rifle ammunition and 1,000 artillery ammunition were
intercepted in recent days, as they were about to be smuggled to Addis Ababa.
Ethiopia faced unrest in 2016 that killed hundreds dubbed by analysts as the gravest challenge to the ruling coalition, the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front in 25 years.
The unrest, which focused on the two most populous regional states Oromia and Amhara led to imposition of martial law in October 2016 which was only lifted in August 2017.
However, the Ethiopian Government became alarmed at growing signs of renewed unrest in the two regional states from September.
Many ethnic Oromos and Amharas who made about 33 and 27 per cent of Ethiopia’s estimated 100 million population, accuse ethnic Tigrayans who made up six per cent of the total population of unduly dominating the country’s political and economic scene. (Xinhua/NAN)
