About 225 people – including children – have died of starvation in Ethiopia’s drought-hit and war-scarred Tigray region since last July, local officials have said.
Almost all the deaths – 209 – have been recorded in the rural area of Edga Arbi, health officials have been quoted by regional TV as saying.
In another area, 16 people, displaced by a brutal two-year civil war which ended in 2022, have lost their lives due to hunger, the officials added.
Tigray officials had previously warned that a famine similar to the one Ethiopia witnessed in the mid-80s, when hundreds thousands of children and adults died, could be on the horizon.
The federal government, however, denies that a famine is imminent, and says it is working to provide aid.
According to the UN, more than 20 million people require food aid in Ethiopia due to conflicts, drought, and flooding.
Source: BBC