A second has died after a deadly grenade attack in Ethiopia’s capital on Saturday which injured 150 at rally in support of new Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, Health Minister Amir Aman said on Twitter on Sunday.
“I’m so sorry to learn that we have lost another Ethiopian victim of yesterday’s attack who was in ICU at Black Lion Hospital.
“My sincere sympathy and condolences to the family, friends & all Ethiopians,” Aman said.
The attack was launched moments after 41-year-old prime minister Abiy, who took office in April, finished his speech to tens of thousands of people gathered in the centre of Addis Ababa.
The attack was launched by an unidentified assailant moments after 41-year-old prime minister, a former soldier who took office in April, finished his speech to tens of thousands of people gathered in the centre of Addis Ababa.
A witness saw Abiy whisked away by guards. Another witness told Reuters the assailant with the grenade had been wrestled to the ground by police before it exploded.
Addressing the nation on television shortly after the blast and still wearing a green t-shirt he was handed at the rally, Abiy said the attack was an “attempt by forces who do not want to see Ethiopia united.”
Abiy had promised the crowd in his speech in Addis Ababa’s Meskel Square that he would bring more transparency to government and reconciliation to a nation of 100 million people that has been torn by protests since 2015.
Eritrea, which has long been at loggerheads with Ethiopia over a border row that Abiy has sought to resolve, condemned the incident, as did the European Union and the U.S.
Abiy took office after his predecessor, Hailemariam Desalegn, resigned in February following protests in which hundreds of people were killed between 2015 and 2017.
State-owned Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation said Abiy and his deputy Demeke Mekonnen visited Black Lion hospital, where 86 of the victims were being treated.
Eritrea, which seceded from Ethiopia in 1991 after a long war of independence, condemned the incident, as did the European Union and the United States.
Under the 2000 peace deal, Ethiopia is required to cede the border town of Badme to Eritrea.
But war veterans in Badme oppose the peace initiative, with some residents saying they will not leave the town.
Ethiopia’s ruling EPRDF is made up of parties representing the country’s four major ethnic groups.
Abiy hails from the Oromo ethnic group, making up roughly a third of the population.
Oromos, along with the Amhara ethnic group, led street demonstrations against the government from 2015 that began as protests against a development plan around the capital and which opponents said the state was using to grab land.
Protests broadened to cover other political and economic demands.
Abiy took office after his predecessor, Hailemariam Desalegn, resigned in February amid the protests.
In another of Abiy’s major policy shifts, the prime minister has said Ethiopia will open its state-run telecoms monopoly and state-owned Ethiopian Airlines [ETHA.UL] to private domestic and foreign investment, loosening the government’s grip. Reuters/NAN)
