Itang (woreda): History
At the start of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, Itang was part of the Administrative Zone 1; however between 2001 and 2007 it was separated from that Zone and became a special woreda.
In 1987, Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) soldiers massacred about 16 civilians (most of them women and children) and militiamen in the village of Akado in Itang, the site of a former American mission. Local Anuak militia and the SPLA clashed in Akado two years later, resulting in the deaths of 10 SPLA men and 14 local people. A 2002 United Nations Emergency Unit for Ethiopia assessment report mentions increasing conflict during the first part of that year between the Anuak and Nuer in this woreda over control of arable land along the rivers where the Anuak normally farm.