Ethiopian army 'kills' 19 in Sudan

2008-07-08 12:30

Khartoum - Sudan's army accused Ethiopian troops on Tuesday of attacking a military camp in northern Sudan and killing about 19 people.

Ethiopian officials were not immediately able to comment on the attack, which Sudan's army spokesperson said happened early on Monday in the Jabel Hantub area of Sennar state.

"They hit a camp belonging to the central reserve police and they killed about 19 people," the army spokesperson said. He did not know how many people were injured.

The central reserve police were a heavily armed military unit and were often deployed along border areas or to defend the capital Khartoum.

"This was an attack and we don't know the reason - we have no problem with Ethiopia and there are no border disputes or tribal clashes in that area," said the army spokesperson.

Sudan signed a north-south peace deal in 2005, which ended Africa's longest civil war and also improved relations with its east African neighbours.

One Sudanese security source and another government official said the attack might have been because Sudan had given refuge a few weeks earlier to local Ethiopian officials and refused to hand them over to Addis Ababa.

It was not clear why they had sought refuge in Sudan. Ethiopia was fighting rebels from the Oromo region, which bordered Sudan and who wanted greater autonomy for their areas.

The Sudan army spokesperson said a joint Ethiopian-Sudanese committee had been formed to investigate the attack.

- Reuters