ADDIS ABABA, July 6 (Xinhua) -- The Ethiopian government on Friday called for concerted efforts to rehabilitate internally displaced Ethiopians amid escalating inter-communal violence.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) report last week, close to 1 million Ethiopians are believed to be displaced due to escalating inter-communal violence since early June.
As many as 793,000 people have been displaced in Gedeo zone and at least 185,000 people in West Guji zone in Ethiopia, according to the latest figures from the UNOCHA.
Ethiopia's Deputy Prime Minister Demeke Mekonnen, who visited some of the internally displaced people together with regional leaders on Friday, stressed urgent concerted actions among federal and regional governments to rehabilitate the affected people in Gedeo and West Guji, state television EBC reported.
UNOCHA said last week that the massive influx in a relatively short period has created a grave humanitarian crisis. While the government and host communities have provided the majority of relief to affected communities so far, more support is required as needs rise.
Lemma Megerssa, President of Ethiopia's largest Oromia Regional State, attributed the root cause of the inter-communal dispute to a few individuals.
Violence involving ethnic Gedeos and Oromos has been ignited purportedly over a long running dispute over the utilization of resources along the shared borders of the two communities since April.
The Ethiopian government and the UNOCHA had on June 23 released a joint response plan, requesting for 118 million U.S. dollars to support over 818,000 displaced people in the two communities.
The number of displaced people has since then increased to 1 million as the inter-communal dispute escalated, according to UNOCHA.
