By ALI ABDI
Stadard Digital
August 02, 2012

Kenyan security personnel are on high alert to prevent spill over of tribal conflicts in Ethiopia.

The Government has ensured displaced people from Ethiopia do not mingle with Kenyans, with their movement restricted to camps and school halls.

Eighteen people have been killed and scores injured in Ethiopia’s Moyale in days of gun fighting between the Borana and Garre communities that started last Monday.

On Monday , Kenya Red Cross officials in Moyale said 24,000 families displaced by the conflict were camping on the two sides of the border while 12 wounded people are undergoing treatment at Kenya’s Moyale District Hospital.

On Monday, Marsabit County Commissioner Isaiah Nakoru said the Kenyan side had not been affected, adding residents were going on with their normal businesses.

“The Kenyan side of the border that includes Moyale town is calm and locals are carrying out their usual businesses. Security is good,” said Mr Nakoru on the telephone from his Marsabit town office.

He, however, said the Government was concerned about the conflict in Ethiopia, adding past trend had shown the rivals take their war to the two sides of the border.

“Our borders are secure and we are watching how the conflict is unfolding to ensure it does not spill over to our side,” he added.

Humanitarian aid

The administrator also said they had been informed by their Ethiopian counterparts that the fighting has subsided and the displaced were going back to their homes.

Officials from the Kenyan Red Cross had moved to the border of the two countries to give humanitarian aid to thousands of families displaced by the conflict.

The organisation’s upper Eastern Regional Disaster Management Coordinator Bitacha Sora said hundreds of displaced families enter Kenya on daily basis adding they had provided them with clean water, food, medicine and tarpaulins.

Primary schools and other Government buildings near the common border are used as temporary shelter by the IDPs from Ethiopia.

Towards the end of last year, the Borana and Gabra clashed in Ethiopia and the conflict later spread to Moyale and Sololo districts where 50 people were killed in four months.

Source: Standar Digital

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