Ten people were killed in a second day of air strikes on Ethiopia’s Tigray region Wednesday, a hospital official said, in attacks that came after authorities there expressed readiness for a ceasefire, IgbereTV reports
Twin drone attacks hit a residential neighbourhood in the regional capital Mekele, killing 10 people and injuring others, said Kibrom Gebreselassie, a senior official at Ayder Referral Hospital, the biggest in Tigray.
“Death toll raised to 10,” Kibrom told AFP via text message, after earlier reporting six killed and more than 10 injured in the two blasts around 7:30 am (0430 GMT).
Fasika Amdeslasie, a surgeon at the same hospital, said the first bombing injured two women, followed by a second “drone strike on the people gathered to help and see the victims.”
“Among the victims, a father was dead and his son is taken to surgery”, he said on Twitter.
Earlier a spokesman for the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which has been fighting Ethiopia’s government for nearly two years, said civilians had been killed and wounded in the strike but did not provide further details.
AFP was not able to independently verify the claims. Access to northern Ethiopia is severely restricted and Tigray has been under a communications blackout for over a year
