AFP
June 9, 2007

ADDIS ABABA — Meles Zenawi said Saturday his government had launched a crackdown on a rebel group blamed for several attacks in the country’s eastern Ogaden region.

“We have launched a political and military operation to try to contain the activities of the Ogaden National Liberation Front [ONLF] in the region,” Meles told a news conference.

“As for the military plans, over the past few days they have started to be implemented,” he added.

Last month the ONLF and another rebel movement, the Oromo Liberation Front, said they had killed 157 Ethiopian troops in joint attacks in the eastern part of the country, but the government denied the claim.

In April, the ONLF carried out a lethal attack on a Chinese-run oil site in eastern Ethiopia in which 77 people died — 68 Ethiopians and nine Chinese.

The separatist group, formed in 1984, says the Ogaden people have been marginalized by Ethiopia and is fighting for the independence of ethnic Somalis in Ethiopia’s Ogaden region.

Ogaden, an arid area in the Somali state of Ethiopia, is believed to be contain large quantities of oil.