Ethiopia Authorities Arrest 255 Suspects After Weekend Attacks

(Bloomberg) -- Ethiopian security forces detained 255 people following attacks over the weekend in which five government officials died.

Those detained include 212 suspects in Ethiopia’s Amhara region and 42 in the capital, Addis Ababa, the Security and Justice Joint Task Force said in a statement read on state television Thursday. The arrests follow weekend violence that left the head of the army, the president of the Amhara region and three other high-ranking officials dead.

The killings mark the most serious assaults on Ethiopia’s leadership since the days of Derg, the military junta that ruled the country from 1974 until 1991. They come as Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed tries to implement political and economic reforms aimed at attracting more foreign investors to one of the world’s fastest-growing economies.

“There were plans to take similar actions on other high-ranking government officials,” according to the statement. “Investigations will show whether there were connections between the Bahir Dar and Addis Ababa attacks.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Samuel Gebre in Abidjan at sgebre@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: David Malingha at dmalingha@bloomberg.net, Paul Richardson, Karl Maier

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