Word: harar
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...Outside Harar, a major town in the Ogaden, Somali tanks and artillery fought for two months against Ethiopian defenders dug into the hillsides. Along the winding dirt road from Harar to the front, small huts of clay bricks and thatched grass roofs were burned by occupying Somali forces, then hit by rockets and bombs from Ethiopian warplanes. Now the rubble lies mixed with brass shell casings, shattered steel helmets and bodies left to rot when the war passed through...
Fedis, an agricultural center of 5,000, is deserted. The dirt streets of the village are strewn with torn clothing, bricks, pieces of tin roof and spent shells. When the rockets came, the people fled. A few hundred have turned up in Harar, a day's walk away, where they took shelter in warehouses, their bundles of belongings arranged in a circle around each family. The rest exist in the bush, watching the kites (scavenging hawks) circle their villages. Last week the Ethiopian air force dropped leaflets telling the villagers it was safe to return home. Most declined...
...wire boundaries of the tarmac, carrying jugs of water. The combatants themselves are hardly better off. There are indications on both sides that the greenest troops are pushed into the front lines. One captured Somali who said he was 13 years old was shown off by the Ethiopians in Harar. The youth claimed he had been forced into the army, given two months' training and sent to the front...
...bombing raids on the Somali city of Hargeisa and the port of Berbera, where the Soviets had a missile and naval base until the Somalis ousted them last year. The offensive began last week when Ethiopian armored columns, spearheaded by Soviet T-54 tanks, poured from the strongholds of Harar and Dire Dawa. Air cover was provided by MiG-21s and American-made F-5s left over from the days when the U.S. was Ethiopia's chief arms supplier...
Since November, Ethiopian troops have held the Somalian soldiers, just short of Harar, where Ethiopia has amassed its new Soviet weaponry for a counter-offensive it hopes will reverse the losses of the last six months...