World Tour - Unrest in Ethiopia, and floods in Mexico

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: WORLD Tour with Africa correspondent Onize Ohikere.

ONIZE OHIKERE, REPORTER: Mozambique ISIS beheadings—We start today here in Africa.

ISIS jihadists turned a soccer field in Mozambique into an execution ground last week. The militants beheaded more than 50 people in a village in the Cabo Delgado province. The latest attack is part of a violent campaign that has forced more than 400,000 people to flee the area. Insurgents loosely affiliated with ISIS have beheaded dozens of people over the past two weeks, wiping out whole families, and kidnapping women and children. The attacks have drawn international condemnation.

AUDIO: The situation is desperate. Those who remain have been left deprived of basic necessities and are at risk of being killed, sexually assaulted, abused, kidnapped, or forcibly recruited by armed groups.

Cabo Delgado is rich in oil. And its $60 billion dollar natural gas industry is heavily guarded by the nation’s military. But the region has become increasingly unstable, sparking fears that ISIS may be gaining dominance in the area. 

Ethiopia fires missiles at Eritrea—Next, we go to Ethiopia.

AUDIO: [SPOKESMAN, AMHARIC]

A spokesman for rebels in the Tigray region has confirmed firing missiles at neighboring Eritrea. The rockets targeted two airports in the country’s capital.

The Tigray spokesman threatened more airstrikes, and said the region would continue to fight efforts to, quote, “subjugate the Tigray people.” The rebels claim Eritrea sent tanks and troops into Tigray to support the Ethiopian government’s attempt to quell unrest. Eritrea denies those claims.

The attacks mark a huge escalation in Ethiopia’s brewing civil war. Fighting broke out two weeks ago when Tigray forces attacked a government military base. The conflict could lead to an all-out civil war, fracturing Ethiopia, and destabilizing the entire Horn of Africa. Thousands of Ethiopians have already fled to neighboring Sudan.

Mexico floods indigenous area—Next, we go to Central America.

AUDIO: [PEOPLE TALKING]

Mexico’s president is facing criticism for ordering a dam release into an impoverished region of the country.

Hurricane Eta brought record floods to the country earlier this month, submerging streets and homes. A dam in the Tabasco region quickly filled to capacity, and officials said they needed to strategically release some of the floodwater.

Instead of releasing the water into the region’s capital, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador ordered it released into nearby plains. They are home to about 83,000 indigenous people. López Obrador said more people would have suffered if he had flooded the city. The strategic flooding forced thousands of families from their homes.

U.S., Israel kill top al Qaeda leader—And finally, we end today in the Middle East.

Israel and the United States teamed up earlier this year to kill a senior al-Qaeda leader in Iran. Officials confirmed the operation over the weekend.

Abu Mohammed al-Masri was al-Qaeda’s second in command. The United States gave Israel intelligence on his location and alias. And Israeli assassins killed him on August 7th. That was the anniversary of the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Al-Masri was widely believed to have orchestrated those attacks.

That’s this week’s World Tour. Reporting for WORLD, I’m Onize Ohikere in Abuja, Nigeria.

(AP Photo/Felix Marquez) A resident navigates through a flooded street on a makeshift raft in Villahermosa, Mexico, Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2020. 

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