City Detail

Dire Dawa (Amharic: ድሬዳዋ, Oromo: Dirree Dhawaa, lit. 'Place of Remedy'; Somali: Diridhaba, meaning "where Dir hit his spear into the ground" or "The true Dir", Arabic: ديري داوا,) is a city in eastern Ethiopia near the Oromia and Somali Region border and one of two chartered cities in Ethiopia (the other being Addis Ababa, the capital). Dire Dawa alongside present-day Sitti Zone were apart of the Dire Dawa autonomous region stipulated in the 1987 Ethiopian Constitution until 1993 when it was split by the federal government into a separately administered chartered city. This was due to the ongoing clashes between the OLF and IGLF and prevented any further escalation. It is divided administratively into two woredas, the city proper and the non-urban woreda of Gurgura. Dire Dawa lies in the eastern part of the nation, on the Dechatu River, at the foot of a ring of cliffs. The western outskirts of the city lie on the Gorro River, a tributary of the Dechatu River.