Unidentified attackers killed aid workers returning from a refugee camp in western Ethiopia, their aid group and a UN organisation said.
The attack was on Thursday in Gambella region, which shares a frontier with South Sudan, when the staff of US-based Action Against Hunger were returning from a child nutrition centre at Nguenyyiel Refugee Camp.
“Team members were in transit from our paediatric Nutrition Stabilisation Centre when they were ambushed by armed individuals,” Action Against Hunger said in a statement.
“Two employees were killed. Action Against Hunger suspended operations in Gambella, but maintain provision of life-saving assistance.”
Nguenyyiel camp hosts 74 000 refugees from South Sudan, according to data from UNHCR.
The refugees are some of 2,3 million who fled South Sudan since 2013 when it descended into a civil war, two years after independence, sparked by a feud between President Salva Kiir and former deputy Riek Machar.
The conflict killed 400 000 and forced 1m8 million from their homes in South Sudan and crippled production of oil, the country’s main revenue earner.
“I am confident Ethiopian authorities will arrest and prosecute those responsible,” Steven Were, UN Resident and Humanitarian Co-ordinator in Ethiopia, said in a statement.
