ADDIS ABABA, May 30 (Reuters) - Flash floods following torrential rain in Ethiopia's eastern town of Jijiga killed 25 people while they slept, a government official said on Friday.

The underdeveloped area in the Somali region is usually battered by a succession of droughts and floods. Last year, scores of people there died from weeks of heavy rainfall and the waterborne diseases that followed it.

Ministry of Information spokesman Zemedhun Tekle told Reuters the Jijiga airport was also flooded from the downpour on Thursday night and rescue mission teams were being ferried by helicopter. (Reporting by Tsegaye Tadesse, writing by Helen Nyambura-Mwaura; Editing by Ibon Villelabeitia)

AlertNet news is provided by