People walk towards the Ayder referral hospital in Mekele, on June 24, 2021, two days after the deadly airstrike. Photo: YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP via Getty Images
Ethiopia's military on Thursday took responsibility for a deadly airstrike on a marketplace in the country's Tigray region that killed at least 64 people, including children, AP reports.
The big picture: The airstrike, one of the worst of the war started last November, comes as fighting persists in Tigray.
- Ethiopians went to the polls on June 21 in what was being seen as a chance for Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to gain democratic legitimacy and conduct the country's first free and fair election, Axios' Dave Lawler reports.
Driving the news: A military spokesman said supporters of the Tigray region’s former leaders had assembled to celebrate Martyrs’ Day when the airstrike occurred, per AP.
- The strike wounded more than 100 people, at least half of them seriously.
- The military insists only combatants were targeted, according to AP.
What they're saying: "It was very traumatizing,” one doctor, who eventually reached the market after Ethiopian soldiers blocked medical teams from responding to the attack, told AP. “I think most of the patients, they died because we were late there, because care wasn’t available.”
- United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said Thursday that the U.N. has not been able to reach the scene. “Between the fighting and different groups on the ground we need clearance to go and we’ve just not been able to get it,”
Go deeper: Ethiopia holds a vital, flawed election