Ogaden National Liberation Front fighters show their readiness to fight Ethiopia in this file photo. The group said it attacked the oil field. NAIROBI, Kenya, April 24 — Separatist rebels stormed a Chinese-run oil field in eastern Ethiopia today, killing more than 70 people, including nine Chinese workers, in one of Ethiopia’s worst rebel attacks in years.
Witnesses said dozens of rebel gunmen crept up to the oil field at dawn and unleashed an intense barrage of machine gunfire at Ethiopian soldiers posted outside. After a fierce hourlong battle, the rebels rushed away, taking with them seven Chinese hostages.
Ethiopia, a close American ally, has been wracked by a number of separatist groups for years, but the severity of this attack seemed to unnerve Ethiopian officials, who usually play down any threats to their control.
“It was a massacre,” Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said in a televised address tonight. “It was cold-blooded murder.”
The Ogaden National Liberation Front, a militant group fighting for independence for eastern Ethiopia, immediately claimed responsibility, circulating an e-mail message that said, “We will not allow the mineral resources of our people to be exploited by this regime or any firm that it enters into an illegal contract.”
Ethiopian officials vowed to crush the rebel group, but the crisis comes at a precarious time for the country.
Thousands of Ethiopian troops are bogged down in Somalia where they face increasingly intense resistance. Today, a suicide bomber apparently targeting Ethiopian troops killed seven civilians in Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital, the second time in a week that suicide attacks were used.
Ethiopia’s intervention in Somalia may have spurred the rebels to attack the oil field. Ethiopian troops have recently rounded up dozens of separatist rebels captured in Somalia, including many members of the Ogaden National Liberation Front.
“This is the rebels’ response,” said Ted Dagne, a specialist in African affairs for the Congressional Research Service. “They are fighting a classic guerrilla war against the government and those widespread detentions became another one of their grievances.”
The Ogaden has been a contested area for decades, home to Somali-speaking people who identify with Somalia and who have accused the Christian-led Ethiopian government of persecuting them because they are Muslim. The Ogaden National Liberation Front, which has offices around the world and a Web site, contends that the Ethiopian government has targeted civilians and burned Ogadeni villages.
Western military analysts estimate that the separatist group has several thousand fighters who receive arms from Eritrea, Ethiopia’s neighbor and bitter enemy, and sanctuary in Somalia.
Xinhua, the state-run Chinese news agency, confirmed late today that at least nine Chinese workers were killed at the oil field, which is located about 75 miles away from Jijiga, a trading town in eastern Ethiopia near the Somali border. Xinhua reported that the rebels briefly seized control of the field before kidnapping seven Chinese workers, who were among the field’s 37 Chinese and 120 Ethiopian employees.
China has become increasingly involved in Africa as it hunts for oil and other resources to feed its booming economy. Chinese workers often operate in areas considered unstable and several have already been kidnapped in the volatile Niger Delta in Nigeria.
The Ogaden National Liberation Front sent send a message to the Chinese and others considering investing in eastern Ethiopia.
“We urge all international oil companies to refrain from entering into agreements with the Ethiopian government as it is not in effective control of the Ogaden,” the statement said. “Oil investments in Ogaden will result in a similar loss.”
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