ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) -United Nations aid chief Martin Griffiths said on Tuesday 100,000 people have been displaced by fighting in Ethiopia’s Amhara region and 8,000 in its Afar region.
In recent weeks fighting has spread into the two regions neighbouring Tigray, where a war erupted eight months ago between Ethiopia’s central government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF).
“We need 100 trucks a day going into Tigray to meet humanitarian needs,” Griffiths told reporters in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa, adding that the number was a “calculated need” and not “over estimated.”
The U.N. aid chief said also 122 trucks made it into Tigray in recent days.
The U.N. says that around 400,000 people are living in famine conditions in Tigray, and more than 90% of the population needs emergency food aid.
The United Nations children’s agency warned last week that more than 100,000 children in Tigray could suffer life-threatening malnutrition in the next 12 months, a 10-fold increase in normal numbers.
Afar regional spokesperson Ahmed Koloyta and Amhara spokesperson Gizachew Muluneh did not respond to requests for comment.
Spokespeople for the prime minister and a government task force on Tigray did not respond to a request for comment.
(Reporting by Addis Ababa newsroom; Writing by Giulia Paravicini; editing by Jonathan Oatis and Steve Orlofsky)
