ADDIS ABABA, March 22 -- Ethiopia has returned home 455,449 internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the last few years, a local official said Friday.

Speaking to state-run media Ethiopian News Agency, Abdulaziz Mohammed, head of the Benishangul-Gumuz Regional State Disaster and Risk Management Commission, said 455,449 out of 475,380 IDPs in the region have been able to return home in recent years.

The IDPs had been displaced from their home areas by a combination of natural and manmade disasters that affected large parts of Ethiopia's western region, said Mohammed.

The commission chief also said that the regional administration is helping the returnees find new job opportunities including in the agriculture industry.

In recent years, inter-communal violence and rebel attacks have led to the deaths of thousands of civilians and the displacement of hundreds of thousands in western Ethiopia.

Benishangul-Gumuz region, located in northwestern Ethiopia bordering Sudan, hosts the 5,150-megawatt Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, the largest hydropower plant in Africa on completion.

  - Xinhua