Qilxuu Jaarsoo

Ethiopia rebels 'agree UN truce'

2007-09-04T11:30:00.000-07:00

Ethiopia rebels 'agree UN truce'

Ethiopia's Somali region is also known as the Ogaden
Rebels in south-eastern Ethiopia say they will observe a ceasefire for the week-long visit of a UN delegation.
The team is probing rights violations and humanitarian issues in the conflict between troops and the Ogaden National Liberation Front in the Somali region.

The ONLF has been fighting for independence for ethnic Somalis in the region for more than 20 years.

The conflict flared in April when the ONLF attacked a Chinese-run exploration team, killing 74 people.

In a statement, the ONLF said its fighters had been instructed to cease all offensive military operations to provide maximum security for the UN team.

See a map of the Somali/Ogaden region
Large parts of the region have been inaccessible to outside agencies in recent months as Ethiopian troops attempt to suppress the rebel insurgency.

The BBC's Elizabeth Blunt in Addis Ababa says there are reported to be food shortages, disease outbreaks and serious human rights violations in some areas.

In its statement, the ONLF urged "mission team members to visit all parts in order to investigate war crimes and not limit their mission to the few routes approved by the [governing] regime".

But our correspondent says it is hard to imagine that the UN team will be either willing or able to travel in central Somali region, also known as the Ogaden, without security clearance from the Ethiopian armed forces.

The 14-member UN team includes representatives of the World Food Programme, World Health Organization and the UN Commission for Human Rights.

The ONLF draws its support from Somali clans and accuses the authorities of imposing a blockade on five districts, choking off commercial trade.

Why the Pit is a Bull: The treat of Tigrean nationalism

2007-08-19T17:31:00.001-07:00

Kallacha Dubbi
August 14, 2007

In my previous writing entitled “TPLF and Tigrean Identity Politics” dated May 25, 2007, I expressed a view that Tigrean nationalism is overtly discriminatory, and it is therefore distinguished by negative manifestations of the Ethiopian integrative power. Instead of uniting multi-ethnic Ethiopia, the Tigrean Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) leadership has antagonized them, and as such, it has excluded even Tigreans from mainstream Ethiopian political discourse. In this follow up, necessitated by email feedbacks I received, I intend to provide some evidence without encumbering the reader with too much detail that such data would otherwise require.

My previous argument leads to a conclusion that the negative identity formation in which a group (TPLF) defines itself and also others in terms of what it is not, according to a famous sociologist, tends to lead into a "pathological situation of internal violence." This has occurred on a large scale in the Balkans, Sri Lanka, or the Middle East. The situation in Ethiopia is an even more fitting example with acutely rising consequences. Tigrean discrimination ignores individual merits based on the victim’s ethnic background, and this serves as a stifling factor for development, killing ideas in a poor country that requires mobilizing all its brain capacities to get rid of the ravaging poverty.

My previous view also suggests that Tigrean discrimination has paradoxically played a very important role of coalescing the discriminated people, pulling together victims who share the same abuse to a united powerhouse capable of undermining or perhaps even toppling the discriminator. Oromos, Somalis, Sidamas, and Amharas, etc. are united in wanting to dethrone the TPLF. In other words, even a negative integration, integration that is achieved for a reason of shared abuse - threats, hatred, tortures, arrests, and killings is integration of some sort. This natural coalition of the oppressed is as strong as it can effectively resist political opportunism as well as TPLF’s corruptive infiltration. There is tangible evidence, that creation of a country-wide united national opposition front to this Tigrean domination is targeted by infiltrators from the TPLF dominated regime. But the creation of a broad-based unity has its own weak points that expose it to such manipulations.

The weakest link

The Ethiopian political intolerance, exceptionally violent and intense in its makeup, is nourished by delusional tradition that borders with compulsive disorder. By and large, it assumes that every human being with opposing opinion, every political group with a dissenting view, is an enemy. This intolerance characterizes the individual activist’s manner so profoundly, that one can observe its manifestations in coffee bar debates, at community gatherings, and even at scholarly meetings. This is in major part the legacy of the Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Party (EPRP), the weakest link in the creation of a broad-based opposition against Tigrean domination, i.e., a hazard for political progress in the country.

In a familiarly condescending tone whose authorship must have a thing or two to do with EPRP mentality, one wrote, “The theory of the nation which decomposes Ethiopia by weaving the myths (emphasis mine) of Tigreanism, Eritreanism, Oromoism and so on goes counter to the core experience of the people, …” After reclaiming Eritrea, an independent country and replacing the well established Ethiopian myth with his own, the author attempts to guard the mythical “framework” by delivering another punch to its contents: “There can be no compromise on the Ethiopian and African framework for citizen expression and engagement.” The author forces all the Ethiopian cultural and ethnic diversities to either become Ethiopians or Africans of his personal definition of certainly chauvinistic preeminence, or face a wrath of his verdict and imagination – no compromise, we are told in no uncertain terms.

So, vaguely articulated malice of EPRP’s ideology still permeates through the deeds and words of the now senior or middle-aged activists who commenced politics in the 70s as infantile children. Their politics never stopped growing, but it grew crook! In the 70s, in a bizarre combination of feudal tradition with Marxism, the EPRP offered nothing else to the Ethiopian political roundtable other than winning by killing or dying, even when in its opposition stood a well-armed national army pronouncing its sure demise. There was no compromise then as now. Blinded by emotional ambition, traits of which are still glaring among its rank and file, the children were too young to fathom the essence of a military balance and too confused to comprehend the impact of a generation’s death. The military junta was driven insane by their obnoxious and unflinching ambition, and as a result, the junta passed a collective death verdict on the generation. This in part allowed the military to keep political power for one more decade, leaving behind a scar of historical magnitude. In this sense, the EPRP and the TPLF have little to distinguish them from Khmer Rouge, except that the TPLF, also a teen army that grew to power without growing to the society, is now terrorizing Ethiopia whereas the EPRP resides in old Diaspora minds as a political paranoia. They do share concealed hate and love for each other; they can’t go against each other, that can’t go for each other either. It is sad to see that neither the politics nor the social evolution of the last thirty years offered any cure to the survivors of the lost generation of Ethiopia that continue diffusing discord throughout all the political establishments of the region. There is little doubt that most of the destructive vectors and inward fighters in all political fronts and organizations can be traced to this futile ideology in a resistive or adaptive form. Their relentless propaganda for the unity of Ethiopia on one hand, and equally relentless objection to the unity of Oromos, Amharas, Somalis etc. when not on their own sadistic terms on the other, their objection to the very idea of the Alliance for Freedom and Democracy (AFD), is a synopsis of their fixation on winning, with extremely poor judgment of their capacity that would enable them to win. By betraying its own mission and stated goals, the EPRP is acclaimed to be the weakest link of the Ethiopian political opposition against Tigrean domination, and therefore the creation of a better tomorrow for the region.

TPLF’s Strength

Facing a disgruntled Ethiopian opposition forces is the TPLF, an organization that has an exceptional talent in further disgruntling opposition forces. The TPLF has two strong virtues that link it to the Ethiopian political power and shape its capacity to destabilize the opposition. They are its a) military, and b) economy.

a) The military: Strictly speaking, the Ethiopia armed forces are Tigrean no less than the TPLF is Tigrean. The following list makes this argument abundantly clear.

Ministry of Defense
Commander of Ethiopian armed forces - Melles Zenawi (Tigrean)
Defense Minister is a non-Tigrean, but this position is constitutionally manned by a civilian, not a military person
Chief of Staff - Samora (Mohamed) Yunis (Tigrean)
Department of Training - Major General Taddese Wored- (Tigrean)
Department of Logistics and Administration - Major General Gezahi Abera - (Tigrean)
Department of Operations - Brigadier General Gebrzgiabher Mebrhatu (Tigrean)
Department of Military Intelligence- Brigadier General Yohannes (John) Gebre
Meskel - (Tigrean) …. Recently appointed as Deputy Commander of Central Command. This Department will also be commanded by head of operations Brigadier General Gebrezgiabher Mebrhatu (Tigrean).
Commander of the Air Force - Brigadier Molla H. Mariam (Tigirean)

Under the Ministry of Defense there are 5 Ethiopian Army Commanders.
Northern Command (HQ Mekele) - Major General Seare Mekonnen (Tigrean)
North Western Command (HQ Baher Dar) - Brigadier General Abraham Gebre Mariam (Tigrean)
Special Army Command (HQ Dessie-Bure Front) - Birgadier General Teklai Ashebir (Tigrean)
South Eastern Army Command (HQ Harar) - Brigadier General Seyum Hagos (Tigrean)
Central Army Command (HQ Shire Indasilassie) - Major General Taddese Wored (Tigirean - Agaw). Recently, Brigadier General Yohannes G. Meskel also Tigrean.

The Ministry of Defense has 28 Division Commanders.
All but one are Tigreans

Division Commands have 106 Regiments.
98% of the Regiment Commanders are Tigireans

It can be safely argued therefore, that there is no Ethiopian national army but Tigrean.

b) The economy: The Ethiopian economy is controlled by two large conglomerates:
The Endowment Fund for the Rehabilitation of Tigray (EFFORT)
The Ethio-Saudi AI-Amudi-family - Midroc Ethiopia
Of interest to my ongoing argument is EFFORT. We will return to Midroc at another opportune time.
In 1978, the TPLF created the Relief Society of Tigray (REST), a financial umbrella organization of the TPLF, which acted as an NGO despite, headed by a TPLF Central Committee member. It collected donations from the international community and channeled it to the TPLF, playing a key role in the survival and ultimate victory of TPLF over the Derg.

After the rise of the TPLF to power in 1991, REST was formally registered with the governmental Relief & Rehabilitation Commission in Ethiopia as an NGO. As the TPLF’s financial backbone, it continued enjoying the state protection, and the restructured organization emerged as the richest “NGO” in the continent. In the summer of 1995, about four years after it took control of central power in Ethiopia, the TPLF established a stronger peer for REST - the Endowment Fund for the Rehabilitation of Tigray (EFFORT). Sources suggest that EFFORT started its business venture with a lofty investment volume of about 2.7 billion birr, - then just under US $1 billion (currently $1 US is about 9 birr).

Through EFFORT, the TPLF has considerably diversified its economic activities and expanded its outreach even to foreign countries. The European financial maneuver of the TPLF is based in UK where family members are trained and placed in key areas of Ethiopia’s financial institutions. In some cases, they are assigned to a now growing number of internationalized affiliates co-owned or owned by EFFORT, such as the Tower Trading Company (TTC) – a London-based TPLF owned company mandated with money laundering.

New companies continue to emerge, fully or partly owned by EFFORT through an intricate system of shares and investments. By controlling key growth areas, EFFORT has become the soul of the country's economy: agriculture (Hiwot Mechanized Agriculture), industry (Almeda Textiles Manufacturing Sc., Mesfin Industrial Engineering SC.), import-export (Guna Trading House), transport (Trans-Ethiopia SC.), insurance (Africa Insurance SC.), mining (Meskerem Investment SC.), communications (Mega-Net Corporation), banking (Wegagen Bank), just to mention some. Clearly, TPLF’s business enterprises cover numerous activities including textile, chemicals, pharmaceutical, and food industries. They also cover major service industries such as banking, insurance, transportation, printing, advertising, land developing, import/export, construction, mining, leather products, and farming.

EFFORT is divided into several sectors directed by members of the TPLF Central Committee, like Abadi Zemo for industrial activities, Arkebe Oqubay Mitiku for construction and transportation, and Tewodros Hagos for mining. The individuals may be moved around, but no non-Tigrean is appointed to EFFORT. In fact, no non-TPLF Tigrean is appointed to the ranks of EFFORT. Strategic positions of the Federal government that generate large amounts of cash are also led by Tigreans of EFFORT who hold multiple offices. For example, Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin is chairman of Ethiopian Air Lines, chairman of the Mugher Cement Factory, chairman of the Ambo Water Factory, chairman of EFFORT, and deputy-chairman of the TPLF at the same time. The more trusted individuals are usually offered the more strategic positions.

Although EFFORT is strictly controlled by the TPLF, it is not the only entity owned or controlled by high-ranking TPLF officials or favored Tigrean citizens. For example, although EFFORT controls WEGAGEN Bank, the TPLF encouraged the creation of DEDEBIT Credit and Savings Institution, headquartered in Meqele and administered by the local government of Tigray. The bank has numerous financial links with other TPLF controlled businesses of the country. DEDEBIT, as an extension of Rural Credit Program, acquired a near total monopoly over credit to rural areas, mostly farmers. The financial monopoly over rural Ethiopia has serious political ramifications. In the early 2000s, the main source of the bank was interest from fertilizer. Farmers were identified, registered, and forced to make a down payment of 25% on the price for the amount of fertilizer. The Bank estimated the amount of fertilizer the farmer supposedly needed. A credit agreement was written with each farmer, and after six months, the bank collected the debt from the farmers with 15% interest.

Business in Tigray is completely closed to non-Tigreans, and all walks of Tigrean businesses are exclusively owned by EFFORT or the local Tigrean government. For example, the trading company GUNA has a near monopoly in sesame and incense wholesale in Tigray whereas TRANS Ethiopia carries all goods designated as relief.

The TPLF also benefits EFFORT by ordering free transfer of funds from government accounts, often under a bogus claim of services that TPLF institutions offered to the public. It allows free flow of goods in the name of EFFORT, without customs and taxes, but EFFORT is allowed to compete with for-profit businesses of the country through its tentacle bureaus. Thus, Moseb Cement factory was built with public expenditure at a cost of 1.5 billion birr, and a Textile factory in Adwa at 1.2 billion. However, the incomes from these public investments are fully controlled by the TPLF through EFFORT.

EFFORT also makes extensive use of the credit opportunities offered by the state-owned Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) and other financial institutions controlled by the government. The generous provision of credits by CBE to EFFORT is clearly politically influenced and based upon directives issued by the TPLF controlled government of Ethiopia. When EFFORT defaults in the payment of loans CBE provides relieving credit, obviously upon directives from the Ethiopian government. In some cases, millions of birr loans obtained by EFFORT are unlawfully delayed or even cancelled. In a widely publicized case a few years ago, the Vice-Governor of CBE overruled an earlier decision by the credit department of CBE not to grant 40 million birr credit to SUR Construction, a subsidiary of EFFORT. There is no way escaping the conclusion that the loan was made possible by political intervention from the TPLF regime.

As an almost sole beneficiary of state contracts, EFFORT’s income continues to grow exponentially. For example, during the Ethio-Eritrean war, EFFORT became the financial wing of the war. MESFIN Engineering supplied water, fuel, and vehicles. TRANS-Ethiopia supplied trucks, and SELAM Bus was in charge of transporting militia. The income from the war propelled these companies to powerful monopolies of the country in their respective business domains.

EFFORT has now become a self-contained economic state operating on the call of the official government, formally serving the personal appetite of state officials, a phenomena witnessed nowhere in the world. Its assets are protected federally, and its under-the-table contracts are enforced by TPLF’s iron fisted militias. It has a favored access to government as well as to foreign aid contracts with profitable niches, dominating joint ventures with domestic and foreign investors. One of the strategic alliances is with Amoudi’s Midroc, which supplies the TPLF with billions of birr through investments. Midroc buys natural resources of the South including gold and other precious stones from the TPLF with cash, and service contracts at these sites go back to EFFORT.

At a policy level, the Financial Sector Steering Committee (FSSC) serves as an umbrella institute for justification of fund transfers, creating the legal framework for supporting even poorly performing EFFORT auxiliaries, or channeling funds to the Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) cash institutes. EPRDF is a bogus amalgam of Fronts populated with non-Tigrean renegades, created and dominated by the TPLF. FSSC defines policies and strategies for banks, appoints board of directors and executives for the banks, and routinely monitors their operations. Thus, the FSSC oversees all government banks, and has full power over their activities. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi chairs this committee. It is a public knowledge that he personally mandated EPRDF companies: Guna, Ambassael, Dinsho, and Wando to take over the sugar company when the plant was privatized. Interestingly Ato Sebhat who owns Guna, Ato Bereket who owns Ambassel, Ato Girma who owns Dinsho, and Ato Kassu who owns Wando are members of FSSC, and some of these same individuals seat on the Board of CBE that financed these companies. As a result, all privately owned enterprises competing for the privatization of the plant, Star, Abeba co. etc. were shut out of the competition.

The EFFORT companies are reported to owe billions of birr to Ethiopian banks. In fact, most of the EFFORT companies would not survive without government protection. In one case, CBE, the Construction and Business Bank, and the Ethiopian Development Bank collectively loaned 1.7 billion birr to EFFORT. According to insiders, the loan has not been paid to date. The 1.7 billion birr was distributed to Adigrat Pharmaceutical Factory, Adwa Textile Factory, Dashen Brewery, and Mesebo Cement Factory. These and other EFFORT or EPRDF affiliates including TESCO, Tikure Abay, Dansho Transport are constantly in deep financial crisis.

Although the main focus of this paper is private business ventures of the TPLF, it must be noted that Tigray, the TPLF’s home region has inequitably benefited from federal funds. For example, a recently published paper presents comparative welfare analysis of four Ethiopian regions: Oromia, Amhara, Southern States, and Tigray. A 2001/2002 data of these regions shows that 42% of children in Tigray are fully vaccinated, where as the percentage is - 10% for Oromia, 15% for Amhara, and 11% for Southern States. Population to physician ratio is 28,600 for Tigray. This jumps to 60,800 for Oromia, 60,700 for Amhara, and 44,000 for Southern States. Secondary education enrollment for Tigray is about 25% (a six-fold increase in just a decade), but Oromia has 11.6%, Amhara 9%, and Southern States 11%. According to World Bank report “Ethiopia Public Expenditure review” the Federal government never transferred more than 6% of the country’s cash revenue to the states, which leaves more than 94% of the federal budget at the discretion of the TPLF, appropriation of which is apparent from the above numbers.

In conclusion, the TPLF has clearly violated international business rules and practices, and as a ruling political party, it not only owns large amounts of properties and engages in commercial and trading activities whereby it places competing private sectors in a hopeless situation, but it also uses this economic dominance to incarcerate, harass, dominate, and control political opposition forces to stay in power. This injustice justifies continued armed struggle of the people against the TPLF domination, and rejection of foreign expeditions to exploit natural resources of the country on behalf of the TPLF.

KD

Why the pit is a Bull

2007-08-19T17:31:00.000-07:00

Why the Pit is a Bull: the threat of Tigrean nationalism
Kallacha Dubbi
August 14, 2007

In my previous writing entitled “TPLF and Tigrean Identity Politics” dated May 25, 2007, I expressed a view that Tigrean nationalism is overtly discriminatory, and it is therefore distinguished by negative manifestations of the Ethiopian integrative power. Instead of uniting multi-ethnic Ethiopia, the Tigrean Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) leadership has antagonized them, and as such, it has excluded even Tigreans from mainstream Ethiopian political discourse. In this follow up, necessitated by email feedbacks I received, I intend to provide some evidence without encumbering the reader with too much detail that such data would otherwise require.

My previous argument leads to a conclusion that the negative identity formation in which a group (TPLF) defines itself and also others in terms of what it is not, according to a famous sociologist, tends to lead into a "pathological situation of internal violence." This has occurred on a large scale in the Balkans, Sri Lanka, or the Middle East. The situation in Ethiopia is an even more fitting example with acutely rising consequences. Tigrean discrimination ignores individual merits based on the victim’s ethnic background, and this serves as a stifling factor for development, killing ideas in a poor country that requires mobilizing all its brain capacities to get rid of the ravaging poverty.

My previous view also suggests that Tigrean discrimination has paradoxically played a very important role of coalescing the discriminated people, pulling together victims who share the same abuse to a united powerhouse capable of undermining or perhaps even toppling the discriminator. Oromos, Somalis, Sidamas, and Amharas, etc. are united in wanting to dethrone the TPLF. In other words, even a negative integration, integration that is achieved for a reason of shared abuse - threats, hatred, tortures, arrests, and killings is integration of some sort. This natural coalition of the oppressed is as strong as it can effectively resist political opportunism as well as TPLF’s corruptive infiltration. There is tangible evidence, that creation of a country-wide united national opposition front to this Tigrean domination is targeted by infiltrators from the TPLF dominated regime. But the creation of a broad-based unity has its own weak points that expose it to such manipulations.

The weakest link

The Ethiopian political intolerance, exceptionally violent and intense in its makeup, is nourished by delusional tradition that borders with compulsive disorder. By and large, it assumes that every human being with opposing opinion, every political group with a dissenting view, is an enemy. This intolerance characterizes the individual activist’s manner so profoundly, that one can observe its manifestations in coffee bar debates, at community gatherings, and even at scholarly meetings. This is in major part the legacy of the Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Party (EPRP), the weakest link in the creation of a broad-based opposition against Tigrean domination, i.e., a hazard for political progress in the country.

In a familiarly condescending tone whose authorship must have a thing or two to do with EPRP mentality, one wrote, “The theory of the nation which decomposes Ethiopia by weaving the myths (emphasis mine) of Tigreanism, Eritreanism, Oromoism and so on goes counter to the core experience of the people, …” After reclaiming Eritrea, an independent country and replacing the well established Ethiopian myth with his own, the author attempts to guard the mythical “framework” by delivering another punch to its contents: “There can be no compromise on the Ethiopian and African framework for citizen expression and engagement.” The author forces all the Ethiopian cultural and ethnic diversities to either become Ethiopians or Africans of his personal definition of certainly chauvinistic preeminence, or face a wrath of his verdict and imagination – no compromise, we are told in no uncertain terms.

So, vaguely articulated malice of EPRP’s ideology still permeates through the deeds and words of the now senior or middle-aged activists who commenced politics in the 70s as infantile children. Their politics never stopped growing, but it grew crook! In the 70s, in a bizarre combination of feudal tradition with Marxism, the EPRP offered nothing else to the Ethiopian political roundtable other than winning by killing or dying, even when in its opposition stood a well-armed national army pronouncing its sure demise. There was no compromise then as now. Blinded by emotional ambition, traits of which are still glaring among its rank and file, the children were too young to fathom the essence of a military balance and too confused to comprehend the impact of a generation’s death. The military junta was driven insane by their obnoxious and unflinching ambition, and as a result, the junta passed a collective death verdict on the generation. This in part allowed the military to keep political power for one more decade, leaving behind a scar of historical magnitude. In this sense, the EPRP and the TPLF have little to distinguish them from Khmer Rouge, except that the TPLF, also a teen army that grew to power without growing to the society, is now terrorizing Ethiopia whereas the EPRP resides in old Diaspora minds as a political paranoia. They do share concealed hate and love for each other; they can’t go against each other, that can’t go for each other either. It is sad to see that neither the politics nor the social evolution of the last thirty years offered any cure to the survivors of the lost generation of Ethiopia that continue diffusing discord throughout all the political establishments of the region. There is little doubt that most of the destructive vectors and inward fighters in all political fronts and organizations can be traced to this futile ideology in a resistive or adaptive form. Their relentless propaganda for the unity of Ethiopia on one hand, and equally relentless objection to the unity of Oromos, Amharas, Somalis etc. when not on their own sadistic terms on the other, their objection to the very idea of the Alliance for Freedom and Democracy (AFD), is a synopsis of their fixation on winning, with extremely poor judgment of their capacity that would enable them to win. By betraying its own mission and stated goals, the EPRP is acclaimed to be the weakest link of the Ethiopian political opposition against Tigrean domination, and therefore the creation of a better tomorrow for the region.

TPLF’s Strength

Facing a disgruntled Ethiopian opposition forces is the TPLF, an organization that has an exceptional talent in further disgruntling opposition forces. The TPLF has two strong virtues that link it to the Ethiopian political power and shape its capacity to destabilize the opposition. They are its a) military, and b) economy.

a) The military: Strictly speaking, the Ethiopia armed forces are Tigrean no less than the TPLF is Tigrean. The following list makes this argument abundantly clear.

Ministry of Defense
Commander of Ethiopian armed forces - Melles Zenawi (Tigrean)
Defense Minister is a non-Tigrean, but this position is constitutionally manned by a civilian, not a military person
Chief of Staff - Samora (Mohamed) Yunis (Tigrean)
Department of Training - Major General Taddese Wored- (Tigrean)
Department of Logistics and Administration - Major General Gezahi Abera - (Tigrean)
Department of Operations - Brigadier General Gebrzgiabher Mebrhatu (Tigrean)
Department of Military Intelligence- Brigadier General Yohannes (John) Gebre
Meskel - (Tigrean) …. Recently appointed as Deputy Commander of Central Command. This Department will also be commanded by head of operations Brigadier General Gebrezgiabher Mebrhatu (Tigrean).
Commander of the Air Force - Brigadier Molla H. Mariam (Tigirean)

Under the Ministry of Defense there are 5 Ethiopian Army Commanders.
Northern Command (HQ Mekele) - Major General Seare Mekonnen (Tigrean)
North Western Command (HQ Baher Dar) - Brigadier General Abraham Gebre Mariam (Tigrean)
Special Army Command (HQ Dessie-Bure Front) - Birgadier General Teklai Ashebir (Tigrean)
South Eastern Army Command (HQ Harar) - Brigadier General Seyum Hagos (Tigrean)
Central Army Command (HQ Shire Indasilassie) - Major General Taddese Wored (Tigirean - Agaw). Recently, Brigadier General Yohannes G. Meskel also Tigrean.

The Ministry of Defense has 28 Division Commanders.
All but one are Tigreans

Division Commands have 106 Regiments.
98% of the Regiment Commanders are Tigireans

It can be safely argued therefore, that there is no Ethiopian national army but Tigrean.

b) The economy: The Ethiopian economy is controlled by two large conglomerates:
The Endowment Fund for the Rehabilitation of Tigray (EFFORT)
The Ethio-Saudi AI-Amudi-family - Midroc Ethiopia
Of interest to my ongoing argument is EFFORT. We will return to Midroc at another opportune time.
In 1978, the TPLF created the Relief Society of Tigray (REST), a financial umbrella organization of the TPLF, which acted as an NGO despite, headed by a TPLF Central Committee member. It collected donations from the international community and channeled it to the TPLF, playing a key role in the survival and ultimate victory of TPLF over the Derg.

After the rise of the TPLF to power in 1991, REST was formally registered with the governmental Relief & Rehabilitation Commission in Ethiopia as an NGO. As the TPLF’s financial backbone, it continued enjoying the state protection, and the restructured organization emerged as the richest “NGO” in the continent. In the summer of 1995, about four years after it took control of central power in Ethiopia, the TPLF established a stronger peer for REST - the Endowment Fund for the Rehabilitation of Tigray (EFFORT). Sources suggest that EFFORT started its business venture with a lofty investment volume of about 2.7 billion birr, - then just under US $1 billion (currently $1 US is about 9 birr).

Through EFFORT, the TPLF has considerably diversified its economic activities and expanded its outreach even to foreign countries. The European financial maneuver of the TPLF is based in UK where family members are trained and placed in key areas of Ethiopia’s financial institutions. In some cases, they are assigned to a now growing number of internationalized affiliates co-owned or owned by EFFORT, such as the Tower Trading Company (TTC) – a London-based TPLF owned company mandated with money laundering.

New companies continue to emerge, fully or partly owned by EFFORT through an intricate system of shares and investments. By controlling key growth areas, EFFORT has become the soul of the country's economy: agriculture (Hiwot Mechanized Agriculture), industry (Almeda Textiles Manufacturing Sc., Mesfin Industrial Engineering SC.), import-export (Guna Trading House), transport (Trans-Ethiopia SC.), insurance (Africa Insurance SC.), mining (Meskerem Investment SC.), communications (Mega-Net Corporation), banking (Wegagen Bank), just to mention some. Clearly, TPLF’s business enterprises cover numerous activities including textile, chemicals, pharmaceutical, and food industries. They also cover major service industries such as banking, insurance, transportation, printing, advertising, land developing, import/export, construction, mining, leather products, and farming.

EFFORT is divided into several sectors directed by members of the TPLF Central Committee, like Abadi Zemo for industrial activities, Arkebe Oqubay Mitiku for construction and transportation, and Tewodros Hagos for mining. The individuals may be moved around, but no non-Tigrean is appointed to EFFORT. In fact, no non-TPLF Tigrean is appointed to the ranks of EFFORT. Strategic positions of the Federal government that generate large amounts of cash are also led by Tigreans of EFFORT who hold multiple offices. For example, Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin is chairman of Ethiopian Air Lines, chairman of the Mugher Cement Factory, chairman of the Ambo Water Factory, chairman of EFFORT, and deputy-chairman of the TPLF at the same time. The more trusted individuals are usually offered the more strategic positions.

Although EFFORT is strictly controlled by the TPLF, it is not the only entity owned or controlled by high-ranking TPLF officials or favored Tigrean citizens. For example, although EFFORT controls WEGAGEN Bank, the TPLF encouraged the creation of DEDEBIT Credit and Savings Institution, headquartered in Meqele and administered by the local government of Tigray. The bank has numerous financial links with other TPLF controlled businesses of the country. DEDEBIT, as an extension of Rural Credit Program, acquired a near total monopoly over credit to rural areas, mostly farmers. The financial monopoly over rural Ethiopia has serious political ramifications. In the early 2000s, the main source of the bank was interest from fertilizer. Farmers were identified, registered, and forced to make a down payment of 25% on the price for the amount of fertilizer. The Bank estimated the amount of fertilizer the farmer supposedly needed. A credit agreement was written with each farmer, and after six months, the bank collected the debt from the farmers with 15% interest.

Business in Tigray is completely closed to non-Tigreans, and all walks of Tigrean businesses are exclusively owned by EFFORT or the local Tigrean government. For example, the trading company GUNA has a near monopoly in sesame and incense wholesale in Tigray whereas TRANS Ethiopia carries all goods designated as relief.

The TPLF also benefits EFFORT by ordering free transfer of funds from government accounts, often under a bogus claim of services that TPLF institutions offered to the public. It allows free flow of goods in the name of EFFORT, without customs and taxes, but EFFORT is allowed to compete with for-profit businesses of the country through its tentacle bureaus. Thus, Moseb Cement factory was built with public expenditure at a cost of 1.5 billion birr, and a Textile factory in Adwa at 1.2 billion. However, the incomes from these public investments are fully controlled by the TPLF through EFFORT.

EFFORT also makes extensive use of the credit opportunities offered by the state-owned Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) and other financial institutions controlled by the government. The generous provision of credits by CBE to EFFORT is clearly politically influenced and based upon directives issued by the TPLF controlled government of Ethiopia. When EFFORT defaults in the payment of loans CBE provides relieving credit, obviously upon directives from the Ethiopian government. In some cases, millions of birr loans obtained by EFFORT are unlawfully delayed or even cancelled. In a widely publicized case a few years ago, the Vice-Governor of CBE overruled an earlier decision by the credit department of CBE not to grant 40 million birr credit to SUR Construction, a subsidiary of EFFORT. There is no way escaping the conclusion that the loan was made possible by political intervention from the TPLF regime.

As an almost sole beneficiary of state contracts, EFFORT’s income continues to grow exponentially. For example, during the Ethio-Eritrean war, EFFORT became the financial wing of the war. MESFIN Engineering supplied water, fuel, and vehicles. TRANS-Ethiopia supplied trucks, and SELAM Bus was in charge of transporting militia. The income from the war propelled these companies to powerful monopolies of the country in their respective business domains.

EFFORT has now become a self-contained economic state operating on the call of the official government, formally serving the personal appetite of state officials, a phenomena witnessed nowhere in the world. Its assets are protected federally, and its under-the-table contracts are enforced by TPLF’s iron fisted militias. It has a favored access to government as well as to foreign aid contracts with profitable niches, dominating joint ventures with domestic and foreign investors. One of the strategic alliances is with Amoudi’s Midroc, which supplies the TPLF with billions of birr through investments. Midroc buys natural resources of the South including gold and other precious stones from the TPLF with cash, and service contracts at these sites go back to EFFORT.

At a policy level, the Financial Sector Steering Committee (FSSC) serves as an umbrella institute for justification of fund transfers, creating the legal framework for supporting even poorly performing EFFORT auxiliaries, or channeling funds to the Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) cash institutes. EPRDF is a bogus amalgam of Fronts populated with non-Tigrean renegades, created and dominated by the TPLF. FSSC defines policies and strategies for banks, appoints board of directors and executives for the banks, and routinely monitors their operations. Thus, the FSSC oversees all government banks, and has full power over their activities. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi chairs this committee. It is a public knowledge that he personally mandated EPRDF companies: Guna, Ambassael, Dinsho, and Wando to take over the sugar company when the plant was privatized. Interestingly Ato Sebhat who owns Guna, Ato Bereket who owns Ambassel, Ato Girma who owns Dinsho, and Ato Kassu who owns Wando are members of FSSC, and some of these same individuals seat on the Board of CBE that financed these companies. As a result, all privately owned enterprises competing for the privatization of the plant, Star, Abeba co. etc. were shut out of the competition.

The EFFORT companies are reported to owe billions of birr to Ethiopian banks. In fact, most of the EFFORT companies would not survive without government protection. In one case, CBE, the Construction and Business Bank, and the Ethiopian Development Bank collectively loaned 1.7 billion birr to EFFORT. According to insiders, the loan has not been paid to date. The 1.7 billion birr was distributed to Adigrat Pharmaceutical Factory, Adwa Textile Factory, Dashen Brewery, and Mesebo Cement Factory. These and other EFFORT or EPRDF affiliates including TESCO, Tikure Abay, Dansho Transport are constantly in deep financial crisis.

Although the main focus of this paper is private business ventures of the TPLF, it must be noted that Tigray, the TPLF’s home region has inequitably benefited from federal funds. For example, a recently published paper presents comparative welfare analysis of four Ethiopian regions: Oromia, Amhara, Southern States, and Tigray. A 2001/2002 data of these regions shows that 42% of children in Tigray are fully vaccinated, where as the percentage is - 10% for Oromia, 15% for Amhara, and 11% for Southern States. Population to physician ratio is 28,600 for Tigray. This jumps to 60,800 for Oromia, 60,700 for Amhara, and 44,000 for Southern States. Secondary education enrollment for Tigray is about 25% (a six-fold increase in just a decade), but Oromia has 11.6%, Amhara 9%, and Southern States 11%. According to World Bank report “Ethiopia Public Expenditure review” the Federal government never transferred more than 6% of the country’s cash revenue to the states, which leaves more than 94% of the federal budget at the discretion of the TPLF, appropriation of which is apparent from the above numbers.

In conclusion, the TPLF has clearly violated international business rules and practices, and as a ruling political party, it not only owns large amounts of properties and engages in commercial and trading activities whereby it places competing private sectors in a hopeless situation, but it also uses this economic dominance to incarcerate, harass, dominate, and control political opposition forces to stay in power. This injustice justifies continued armed struggle of the people against the TPLF domination, and rejection of foreign expeditions to exploit natural resources of the country on behalf of the TPLF.

KD

Ethiopia, Somalia accused of war crimes

2007-08-17T04:27:00.000-07:00

Ethiopia, Somalia accused of war crimes
By Jeffrey Gettleman, AP Writer
Aug 15, 2007

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
RUMBEK, Sudan — Human Rights Watch on Monday accused the transitional government in Somalia and the Ethiopian troops that helped bring it to power of committing war crimes in Somalia, saying Ethiopian troops had shelled hospitals, Somali officials had blocked aid convoys and both forces had shown wanton indifference toward civilians.

In a scathing 113-page report on the bloodshed in Somalia, Human Rights Watch also blamed Somali insurgents for summary executions and mutilating bodies.

The report found what Somali refugees, United Nations arms monitors and Western diplomats in East Africa have been saying for months: that Somalia is a human rights nightmare characterized by wild urban combat, heavy casualties and no foreseeable end.

“The warring parties have all shown criminal disregard for the well-being of the civilian population of Mogadishu,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch.

Ethiopian and Somali officials denied their troops had committed any abuses.

“Those are very unfounded reports,” said Bereket Simon, special adviser to the Ethiopian prime minister, Meles Zenawi. “We haven’t killed any civilians.”

Abdi Haji Goobdoon, a spokesman for the Somali transitional government, called the report “very, very complicated.”

“During the fighting this spring,” he said, “we were acting in self-defense. Our government had just arrived in the capital and we were coming under repeated attack. We had to stop it.”

But the violence seems to go on and on. On Monday, at least 9 people were killed in Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital, by gunfire and a powerful roadside bomb, according to news service reports. Over the weekend, two prominent Somali journalists were assassinated in Mogadishu.

Many diplomats in Africa are now calling Somalia the new Iraq and many seem exhausted by the steady slide downward of security, even in a place notorious for chaos. Somalia has not had a permanent central government since 1991. Late last year, thousands of Ethiopian troops rearranged the power dynamic by ousting an Islamic movement that had seized considerable territory. The Ethiopians then helped empower a Western-backed transitional government that previously had limited influence inside Somalia. The Ethiopian government and the American military, which provided the Ethiopians with prized intelligence, had accused the Islamists of harboring Al Qaeda terrorists.

Since then, the Ethiopian troops have been facing an insurgency that appears to be a mix of clan militias, disgruntled businessmen, hired gunmen and remnants of the Islamist forces.

Last month, United Nations arms monitors accused the Ethiopian military of dropping white phosphorous bombs on insurgents and killing 35 civilians in the process. Residents said the bombs literally melted people. The Ethiopian government denied even having white phosphorous bombs in its arsenal.

In April, European diplomats said they were investigating whether Ethiopian and Somali government forces committed war crimes during heavy artillery shelling in Mogadishu that reduced blocks of buildings to smoldering rubble and killed hundreds of civilians.

The Human Rights Watch report provided accounts of witnesses in Mogadishu who said they saw Ethiopian troops killing captured insurgent suspects and firing on hospitals from tanks. Other Mogadishu residents said they had been imprisoned by the transitional government in underground bunkers, where prisoners were routinely beaten.

Oromia And Ethiopia (A new book by prof. Asafa Jalata)

2007-08-10T08:19:00.000-07:00

Oromia And Ethiopia (A new book by prof. Asafa Jalata)

OROMIA AND ETHIOPIA
State Formation and Ethnonational Conflict, 1868-2004

by Prof. Asafa Jalata

This original work traces the cultural and political history of the Oromo, their colonization and incorporation into the modern state of Ethiopia and the racialized/ethnicized capitalist world system, and their long struggle for self-determination and democracy. It further illustrates how facing state terrorism, genocide, and gross human rights violations in the twenty-first century from the Tigrayan-led Ethiopian government has increased the commitment of the Oromo to determine their destiny as a nation.

Focusing on the development of the class and nation-class contradictions manifested in the continuing crisis of the Ethiopian state, Jalata examines why the reorganization of that state in the 1970s and again in the 1990s failed to change the nature of Ethiopian colonialism. He challenges the assumptions of many modernization and mainstream Marxist theories that colonized peoples like the Oromo would disappear through a process of assimilation. To the contrary, the Oromo case serves as an apt demonstration that colonialism and imperialism have not been successful in destroying the cultural identity of colonized people, nor their desire for self-determination and democracy.

"Jalata provides a valuable study of the rise of Oromo ethnonationalism, and its deepening struggle with the Ethiopian state."

�Crawford Young, University of Wisconsin-Madison

"The theme of the book reflects a worldwide proclivity for a redifinition of ethnicity. Useful for students of comparative ethnicity and nationalities."

�W.M. Akalou, Texas Southern University

"Dr. Jalata has written a brilliant history of Oromia and its relations with Abyssinia (Ethiopia) from the point of view of the Oromo, whose voice has been omitted from Ethiopian historiography. In terms of clear articulation of the rich and wide use of Oromo sources, [and] careful interpretation of data the book is an excellent antidote to Ethiopian historiography. . . this book explodes many myths about Ethiopia while placing Oromia on the intellectual map of the international community."

�Mohammed Hassen, Georgia State University, Atlanta

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ASAFA JALATA is Professor of Sociology, Global Studies, and Africana Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. He has authored two books and edited two collections of essays, including, "State Crises, Globalisation, and National Movements in North-East Africa" (2004), "Fighting Against the Injustice of the State and Globalization: Comparing the African American and Oromo Movements" (2001), and "Oromo Nationalism and the Ethiopian Discourse: The Search for Freedom and Democracy" (1998). He also has to his credit over two-dozen book chapters and refereed articles. He is currently researching for a new book titled "Faces of Terrorism in the Age of Globalization: From Christopher Columbus to Osama bin Laden."

CATEGORY
Politics, History/AFRICA

Displaced Oromians race to free their homeland

2007-08-10T08:16:00.000-07:00

Displaced Oromians race to free their homeland

by Charles Hallman

Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

Originally posted 8/8/2007

Photo from www.runfororomia.com

Although it is one of Africa’s largest nations, Oromia is either forgotten by or unknown to the majority of the world today. A July 29 first-ever race around Lake Calhoun was intended in part to rectify that oversight.

Only four nations in Africa have larger populations than Oromia (estimated at 40 million), which is located in the Horn of Africa and makes up a large part of Ethiopia. It is about the size of Texas.

However, throughout most of their early history, the Oromo people have been utterly mistreated. During the last quarter of the 19th century, Oromia was colonized by Abyssinia, a Black African nation that received help from the European colonial powers of the day. Between 1870 and 1900, the Oromo population was cut in half from 10 million to five million. Many were killed by the colonial army, while others died of famine and epidemics and others were sold as slaves.

The Abyssinian leaders called the Oromians “G#$$&,” which means “inherently inferior,” a term the Oromo people still disdain today. When the late Ethiopian ruler Haile Selessie was in charge, he continued the genocidal practices against the Oromians and did everything possible to destroy the Oromo culture (they believe in self-sufficiency), their language (Oromo, or Afan Oromo, closely related to Somali), and religious customs (Oromians believe in Waaqa (God) and either follows Islam or Christianity).

Despite being the majority in Ethiopia, the Oromo people have no representation in the minority-ruling Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Party government, which has been in power since the early 1990s. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has continued the century-plus oppressive policies that have driven out many of the Oromo people, forcing them to neighboring African countries such as Somalia, or even farther west to America. The largest number of Oromians living in the U.S. are found in Minnesota.

The Oliqaa Foundation sponsored a first-time “Run for Oromia” 5K and 10K race at Lake Calhoun July 29. It was originally billed to honor past Oromian runners such as Abebe Bikila, the first African to win an Olympic gold medal, and Derartu Tula, the first Black female athlete to win the 10K gold medal.

Run for Oromia’s main purpose was to call attention “in a peaceful way” to the human rights violations currently being committed by the Ethiopian government against the Oromo people, said its organizer Mike Abebe. He explained that a primary reason so many of his native Oromians chose Minnesota as their home away from home is because of the history of working with missionaries of Norwegian decent in Ethiopia, many of whom came from Minnesota. As a result, when asked where they like to live once they reach the United States, Oromians often choose Minnesota, he noted.

There were approximately 500 participants in the two races, said Abebe. Spectators greeted the runners at the finish line, cheering them on while waving Oromo Liberation Front flags.

Mathew Chesano of Kenya, which borders Oromia to the south, won the 5K race, and Wegayehu Tefera, an Oromian who now lives in New York, finished second. Another Oromian, Yimenasha Taye, was the top female 5K finisher. All were pleased with their results, but solidarity with the Oromo people was more important to them.

“I ran for my neighbors,” said Chesano.

Now living in New York, Tefera said through an interpreter, “I’m so glad to be a part of this.” Berhanu Wakene of Seattle, a 5K runner, said that the race is “about the freedom of our land.”

Abebe left his homeland 20 years ago. Now living in Atlanta, he has visited family members back home in Oromia in the past but now feels that he might not be able to go back because of the attention Run for Oromia might bring. “I don’t feel good [about not returning to his homeland], but I told everybody that this is not about me and my family, but it’s about millions of people,” he said matter-of-factly.

“The biggest concern is about human rights,” said Abebe’s assistant Alecia Crumby of Atlanta, Georgia. She participated in events leading up to the race during Oromo Week, which was declared in Minnesota for the last two weeks of July.

The American-born Crumby noted, “It bothers me a lot because I have a lot of friends who are Oromians, and I work with Oromians, too. A lot of people get killed [in Oromia] for speaking their minds. [They] don’t have freedom of speech that we have here.”

After spending 15 days in jail, Kassa Dadhi, a 10K runner, said he left Oromia as soon as he could after his release. He has been in the United States for 10 years, and lives in St. Paul. “Some of my friends and family are dead,” he painfully recalled.

Abraham Dalu, a 5K runner who also lives in the Twin Cities, said he, too, fled his homeland and relocated in the U.S. 20 years ago because of the oppressive conditions in Oromia. “It was a die or live situation,” he pointed out. “Of course, it is a natural thing to opt for life.”

He visited family members in Oromia earlier this year. “[The conditions] are so bad for our people,” Dalu said, also decrying the Ethiopian government for sending soldiers into Somalia and committing atrocities against Oromo refugees there. Many were deported back to Ethiopia and jailed. “They [the soldiers] killed a lot of Oromo people who fled [Ethiopia] because of persecution.”

Mihref Sarka once was a reporter in Oromia. “I was working for Barisa, the only newspaper in Ethiopia. It is a government newspaper.” He left Oromia in 1995 because of limited press freedoms, and now lives in Hannover, Germany.

“It wasn’t easy leaving,” Sarka noted. “Losing my homeland is losing friends, peer groups…losing everything.”

In the United States for the first time to visit his three brothers and other relatives, Sarka said he will return to Germany later this month. For now, he can’t go back to Oromia. “I know the risk waiting for me back there,” he said.

These transplanted Oromians want to see change in their homeland, but according to Sarka, it won’t happen anytime soon. “The change is very slow,” he said, “and our people are dying rapidly. I can say I have been an eyewitness to the brutality of this regime.”

Added Dalu, “Hopefully, the world community will recognize what is going on in terms of human rights abuse and the lack of true democracy in the country. Hopefully, the Western countries will open up their eyes and learn what really is going on.”

When his native land becomes more democratic, Dadhi said, “I want to go back home.”

Said Crumby, “I challenge everyone to take a look at what is going on over there. It is not right.”
“Going back home [one day] is our target,” concluded Sarka.

Letter from U.S. Senator Feingold On Reported Ogaden Human Rights Abuses

2007-08-02T05:52:00.000-07:00

Letter from U.S. Senator Feingold On Reported Ogaden Human Rights Abuses

United States Senate (Washington, DC)
DOCUMENT
1 August 2007
Washington, D.C.

The following is a letter sent by United States Senator Russ Feingold, chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on African Affairs, and a bipartisan group of his senate colleagues to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice regarding reports of human rights abuses committed by the Ethiopian military in the country's Ogaden region. The senators are urging Secretary Rice to intensify pressure on the Ethiopian government to respect fundamental human rights.

Dr. Condoleezza Rice

Secretary of State

Department of State

2201 C St. NW

Washington, DC 20520

July 31, 2007

Dear Madam Secretary:

We are deeply concerned by reports of systematic human rights abuses being committed by the Ethiopian military in Ethiopia's Ogaden region. We believe it is the moral and legal duty of the United States to promptly and vigorously investigate these allegations and send clear, consistent messages that there will be serious consequences if these violations of national and international law are proven to be true.

As you know, last month the Ethiopian government announced a crackdown on Ogaden National Liberation Front rebels operating in Ethiopia's eastern Somali region after the rebels attacked a Chinese-run oil exploration field in April. While the threat posed by the rebels is real and increased security measures in the area are warranted, the military's operations appear to go far beyond what can be justified by national security concerns.

A New York Times article published on June 18, 2007, described "a widespread and longstanding reign of terror, with Ethiopian soldiers gang-raping women, burning down huts and killing civilians at will." Although aggressively denied by Ethiopian authorities, reports of murder, torture, rape and village burnings have been corroborated by independent observers and aid groups struggling to respond to the growing humanitarian crisis in the region.

On July 4, 2007, Human Rights Watch released a statement accusing the Ethiopian military of forcibly displacing thousands of civilians from rural areas to large towns to deny support for the rebels. The Ethiopian government has also imposed a commercial blockade on parts of the region, preventing both normal commercial exchange and the delivery of food aid and other essential humanitarian assistance. The blockade has already provoked serious food shortages and large sectors of the population may face a severe emergency if commercial and humanitarian access is not immediately restored and preserved as the coming rainy season brings the threat of renewed flooding.

For years, the State Department's own Human Rights Country Reports have cited unlawful killings and arbitrary detentions by Ethiopian security forces and police, most of which have never been investigated or resolved. In the meantime, the United States Government has been providing increased non-humanitarian assistance to Ethiopia, with a request to nearly double that support next year.

We understand that the United States has a valuable strategic relationship with the government of Ethiopia. However, we believe it is of fundamental importance to ensure that in our relationships with all governments on the African continent and around the world, the United States demonstrate a steadfast commitment to human rights, good governance, and justice.

We urge you to intensify pressure on the Ethiopian government to respect fundamental human rights norms even as it pursues critical security objectives. We expect that you will keep us appraised of new information regarding the Ethiopian military's operations and conduct in the Ogaden and how the United States is responding.

Thank you for your attention and timely action on this important issue.

Sincerely,

Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI)

Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN)

Senator Susan Collins (R-ME)

Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME)

Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT)

Senator Joe Biden (D-VT)

Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD)

Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA)

Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL)

Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO)

CC: Assistant Secretary Jendayi Frazer

CC: Ambassador Don Yamamoto

United States Senate (Washington, DC)
DOCUMENT
1 August 2007
Washington, D.C.

The following is a letter sent by United States Senator Russ Feingold, chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on African Affairs, and a bipartisan group of his senate colleagues to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice regarding reports of human rights abuses committed by the Ethiopian military in the country's Ogaden region. The senators are urging Secretary Rice to intensify pressure on the Ethiopian government to respect fundamental human rights.

Dr. Condoleezza Rice

Secretary of State

Department of State

2201 C St. NW

Washington, DC 20520

July 31, 2007

Dear Madam Secretary:

We are deeply concerned by reports of systematic human rights abuses being committed by the Ethiopian military in Ethiopia's Ogaden region. We believe it is the moral and legal duty of the United States to promptly and vigorously investigate these allegations and send clear, consistent messages that there will be serious consequences if these violations of national and international law are proven to be true.

As you know, last month the Ethiopian government announced a crackdown on Ogaden National Liberation Front rebels operating in Ethiopia's eastern Somali region after the rebels attacked a Chinese-run oil exploration field in April. While the threat posed by the rebels is real and increased security measures in the area are warranted, the military's operations appear to go far beyond what can be justified by national security concerns.

A New York Times article published on June 18, 2007, described "a widespread and longstanding reign of terror, with Ethiopian soldiers gang-raping women, burning down huts and killing civilians at will." Although aggressively denied by Ethiopian authorities, reports of murder, torture, rape and village burnings have been corroborated by independent observers and aid groups struggling to respond to the growing humanitarian crisis in the region.

On July 4, 2007, Human Rights Watch released a statement accusing the Ethiopian military of forcibly displacing thousands of civilians from rural areas to large towns to deny support for the rebels. The Ethiopian government has also imposed a commercial blockade on parts of the region, preventing both normal commercial exchange and the delivery of food aid and other essential humanitarian assistance. The blockade has already provoked serious food shortages and large sectors of the population may face a severe emergency if commercial and humanitarian access is not immediately restored and preserved as the coming rainy season brings the threat of renewed flooding.

For years, the State Department's own Human Rights Country Reports have cited unlawful killings and arbitrary detentions by Ethiopian security forces and police, most of which have never been investigated or resolved. In the meantime, the United States Government has been providing increased non-humanitarian assistance to Ethiopia, with a request to nearly double that support next year.

We understand that the United States has a valuable strategic relationship with the government of Ethiopia. However, we believe it is of fundamental importance to ensure that in our relationships with all governments on the African continent and around the world, the United States demonstrate a steadfast commitment to human rights, good governance, and justice.

We urge you to intensify pressure on the Ethiopian government to respect fundamental human rights norms even as it pursues critical security objectives. We expect that you will keep us appraised of new information regarding the Ethiopian military's operations and conduct in the Ogaden and how the United States is responding.

Thank you for your attention and timely action on this important issue.

Sincerely,

Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI)

Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN)

Senator Susan Collins (R-ME)

Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME)

Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT)

Senator Joe Biden (D-VT)

Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD)

Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA)

Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL)

Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO)

CC: Assistant Secretary Jendayi Frazer

CC: Ambassador Don Yamamoto

Somalia: A Grenade blast kills an Ethiopian soldier in north Mogadishu

2007-08-02T05:48:00.001-07:00

Somalia: A Grenade blast kills an Ethiopian soldier in north Mogadishu
Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 02, August.07 ( Sh.M.Network)- An Ethiopian soldier was killed while a Somali civilian was wounded after unknown gunmen hurled a grenade at 4 Ethiopian soldiers passing by the main road of Ex-Control Balad in north of Mogadishu, the Somali capital, on Thursday.

Witnesses said the Ethiopians opened fire at every direction after the explosion. "Unknown gunmen hurled a grenade at 4 Ethiopian troops crossing the intersection. The blast instantly killed one of them, while the others opened fire indiscriminately," said one witness, who refused to be named.

A large number of Ethiopian troops soon arrived at the site of the blast sealing off the whole vicinity and searching houses nearby.

Meanwhile, at least ten people have been killed and more than 25 have been wounded in Mogadishu last night after a barrage of mortar bombs exchanged by Ethiopian troops based in the capital and suspected Islamist-led insurgents targeted a residential area of Odweyne in Hodan district, south of the capital.

Women and children were among the dead

Questions shower Ethiopian ex-leader

2007-08-01T06:00:00.000-07:00

Questions shower Ethiopian ex-leader

Ethiopian students probed Dr. Negasso Gidada's dealings with the Oromos, a local ethnic group.

By Jake Grovum

Remedan Yuya fled Ethiopia to escape the hardship and strife brought upon the Oromo people by the Ethiopian government.

Dr. Negasso Gidada, an Oromo himself, served as president of that government from 1995 to 2001. He is currently a member of the Ethiopan parliament.

Dr. Negasso Gidada, president of Ethiopia from 1995 to 2001, speaks Thursday at the second annual International Oromo Human Rights Conference in Coffman Union’s Great Hall.

Dr. Negasso Gidada, president of Ethiopia from 1995 to 2001, speaks Thursday at the second annual International Oromo Human Rights Conference in Coffman Union’s Great Hall.

"When I saw him, what I feel, (he is) somebody who tried to kill me, who tried to hunt me back home, I escaped from that," said Yuya, an activist and Oromo Studies Association member. "My sisters, my brothers, my mom, my father, because of him, disappeared. Then, how can I tolerate (him) over here?"

Last week, hundreds of Oromos attended two conferences at Coffman Union to discuss human rights issues facing the Oromo community in Ethiopia.

Gidada spoke at both conferences; Yuya attended one.

"When Sept. 11 happened, I was a student in college. I was made sick by that day because of all the people dying in America," Yuya said. "That's the same I feel when I see (Gidada)."

The situation in Ethiopia

The Oromo people have faced persecution in Ethiopia since a transitional government gave way to the

Tigray Peoples' Liberation Front in the mid-'90s, under Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and the TPLF have remained in power ever since.

"We had party members in the countryside who were beating people, for example taking out the whole village, maybe about 5,000 people, and have them sit down in the sun for five days," Gidada said. "(They were) accusing them of hiding the (Oromo Liberation Front) people and they were violating the human rights of the whole village."

The Oromo Liberation Front works for the human rights of the Oromo people. In Ethiopia, membership in the group is viewed as illegal by the governing regime.

Gidada said while he was president there were approximately 25,000 Oromos held as political prisoners for five or six years.

"I know that in 2000, when the new president was elected … he gave amnesty to about 1,000 people," he said. "The rest, we don't know where they are."

The U.S. Department of State issued a human rights report on the Ethiopian government in 1999. The report said the government's human rights record "generally was poor," and despite improvements, "serious problems remain."

In the Ethiopian government, the presidency is mainly a symbolic position which serves as head of state, but Gidada said he participated in all decisions made by the ruling party.

Gidada said he is prepared to accept personal and collective accountability for human rights violations.

"How many have died … are crippled … in prison and how many have run away to other countries because of the brutality of the government, I do not know exactly," he said. "What I can only say at the moment is I am very sorry."

Last week's conferences, The International Oromo Human Rights Conference and the Oromo Studies Association annual conference were both co-sponsored by the University's Oromo Student Union.

There are an estimated 12,000 to 15,000 Oromos living in the Twin Cities and more than 90 percent have refugee status, according to the Oromo Community of Minnesota.

Oromo students react

Oromo Student Union secretary, Hussein Waliye, lived in Ethiopia while Gidada was in office. Waliye said his father was imprisoned "pretty much for being Oromo."

"Every time and anytime they want, they'd just put him in jail," he said. "Every night, even though we were little kids, we would be sitting in the house wondering what's going to happen to our dad."

Eventually the government gave his father a final notice to leave the country. Officials threatened him, saying if they suspected he was involved with the OLF, he would be killed.

Gidada also played a role in the formation of the current government during four years of transitional government. Because of this, Waliye said Gidada has significant responsibility.

"Him coming here and saying sorry and then criticizing the current government doesn't make any sense to me, because he's the one that put this government in place," he said. "I have more blame on him than any Ethiopian president that came after him because without him (they) wouldn't be able to stand on their feet today."

Oromo Student Union President Gada Beshir said he once shared that distrust of Gidada and other members of the regime. But a trip to South Africa changed his mind. There, he studied the way that country reconciled following years of apartheid.

"Going to South Africa, personally, that changed me around 180 degrees," Beshir said. "I would like to see a true reconciliation commission based on the South African model that brings the society together."

Despite his optimism for the future of Ethiopia, Beshir admits Gidada's apology is not enough for him to forgive.

"As a student leader, I decided to tolerate him and accept him," he said. "When it comes to the excuse and apology that he made in front of the public, I just know that's not enough."

Community reaction

Oromos make up nearly 40 percent of the Ethiopian population, according to the CIA's World Factbook.

Because he is Oromo, Gidada's role was part of the reason why the regime was able to gain power, Nuro Dedefo, chairperson of the OLF in the United States, said.

"Because he held that status (he) gave legitimacy for the TPLF regime," Dedefo said. "He's a doctor, he should know better man, he should know better."

While Gidada's position was largely ceremonial, Dedefo said the former president could have done much more while in power.

"He should speak up for the human rights violations committed against the Oromo people," he said. "Once he left the office, whatever he says doesn't fly in my eyes because of the action that government committed. He was part of the regime; he is responsible."

Barbara Frey, director of the University's human rights program, was seated alongside Gidada on the panel held Thursday at the International Oromo Human Rights Conference.

"I found it quite extraordinary that the president chose to come here knowing that he would probably face criticism from his own ethnic community," she said. "It was a very powerful, the most powerful moment in the event, when he personally apologized for his role."

President of the Oromo Studies Association Dr. Gobera Huluka, said Gidada brought a necessary point of view to the conference.

"I am the most idealistic person who believes in the free flow of ideas," he said. "That is the only way we can understand our enemy; we can understand ourselves and we can understand our friends."

Minnesota Daily

Minneapolis Holds "Run for Oromia"

2007-07-29T13:41:00.000-07:00

Minneapolis Holds "Run for Oromia"

On July 29, 2007, the city of Minneapolis, MN is hosting the first ever "Run for Oromia."

The race is designed to raise awarness about the plight of Oromos living in Ethiopia and about the Mecha and Tullema Development Association's prisoners, says the sponsor and coordinator of the race Obbo Mike Abebe.

This international 5k and 10k race, which already has been recognized by the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF), will reward the total amount of $50,000 to the top 5 racers for both female and male athletes .

Top Ethiopian athletes and various world-class athletes are expected to participate in this competition.

VOA Afan Oromo Reporter Nigusu T. Negawo interviewed Obbo Mike Abebe for the Afaan Oromo program.

Ethiopian regime turns its critics into untouchables

2007-07-29T13:29:00.000-07:00

Ethiopian regime turns its critics into untouchables
Jul 27th, 2007

By ZOE ALSOP AND NICK WADHAMS
The Globe and Mail

ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA — Dressed in a black Adidas track suit and seated amid a comfortable clutter of term papers and political science tomes in his modest office at Addis Ababa University, Prof. Merera Gudina hardly looks like a menace. But, ever since he was elected to parliament two years ago, people have been avoiding him.

There was, for example, the time that local mechanics were too terrified to repair his car when it broke down on the way back from his mother's funeral east of Addis.

"The mechanic said somebody was giving him a signal and they ran away and we had to transport the car to Addis," Prof. Gudina said. "What they do is that they don't touch me as a person, but people in contact with me, after I leave an area, they harass them or detain them or whatever they want," he said of government security agents.

Optimistic visitors from the United States, which will give $500-million (U.S.) in aid to Ethiopia in 2008, like to point out that the Ethiopian opposition pulled off a feat that would be unthinkable in America or Europe when they unseated more than 150 ruling lawmakers two years ago.

But civil-society groups and supporters of the opposition throughout Ethiopia describe the country's parliament as little more than a Potemkin village. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's ruling EPRDF party puts on a show of democracy for international donors, while enacting a brutal crackdown on supporters of the opposition outside of the capital.

Leaders such as Prof. Gudina say they've been denied offices, staff and access to their constituents and the media.

"At this point, Ethiopia has some of the trappings of democracy, but none of the substance," said Bronwyn Bruton, a Program Officer for East and Southern Africa with the National Endowment for Democracy, which gets some funding from the U.S. government.

In the 2005 elections, the opposition made historic gains against the EPRDF, which is dominated by Mr. Zenawi's own Tigray ethnic group.

Hundreds of demonstrators were killed and tens of thousands more jailed, including journalists, the elected mayor of Addis Ababa and the head of the country's only independent human-rights organization.

The government only last week released 38 of the opposition activists who had been tried and found guilty of inciting violence, treason and trying to topple the government, but not before they signed statements admitting their guilt.

While a number of opposition members have boycotted parliament in protest against the election, scores of others followed the advice of Western countries including the United States and took office.

"I can't run away from this place and expect some miracle," said Beyene Petros, who has represented the opposition ever since Mr. Zenawi ousted dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam in 1991.

Mr. Petros has seen so many colleagues jailed or killed that he seems somewhat bemused at his own survival.

"Not me. I'm sort of an alibi for a lot of bad things they do to others. They will say, 'Look, Beyene Petros has been this, he's a fierce opponent, he can say anything.' Instead of coming to me, attacking me, they have gone and killed my immediate associates, they have abducted some. That's not enjoyable position to be in."

The government's true face, people say, is shown in places like Dembi Dollo, a two-day journey from the capital along more than 480 kilometres of dusty, dilapidated roads. Few foreigners visit, and little news emerges from the area.

Dembi Dollo is the political heart of Oromia, Ethiopia's most populous region. It's the birthplace of the Oromo Liberation Front, a group once allied with Mr. Zenawi, but today the largest of half a dozen rebel fronts in the country.

It is here that men who once campaigned for an opposition party called the Oromo Federalist Democratic Movement are still paying the price.

"You can say my home is the prison. I spend a lot of my life in the prison," said one elder who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution. "Since 1991, every year I was in prison it's only this time now, this year, I didn't visit the prison."

Though support for the rebels runs high here, the town's elders campaigned for the OFDM, which eschews violence. Unfortunately for them, the local officials of the ruling party do not distinguish between political parties like the OFDM and the OLF, which was branded a terrorist organization by Mr. Zenawi's administration late last year.

The elders had been jailed and followed. Telephone and power lines to Dembi Dollo were cut off. The OFDM's office was vandalized and closed. After an elementary school teacher campaigned for the OFDM, riot police went after his 16-year-old daughter. They broke both her wrists, bludgeoned her in the abdomen and held her for a month.

"When she went to the court, the witnesses are the police who beat her - so how can this be?" said one teacher, who also insisted on anonymity.

Ethiopia's ruling party attributes any heavy-handedness against the opposition to growing pains. "In most cases there are no problems," said Bereket Simon, a senior adviser to Mr. Zenawi. "We feel there might be problems here and there because this is not a mature democracy like that of the West. It is an emerging democracy and we're bound to make mistakes."

Prof. Gudina has kept his full-time job at the university. After seeing 56 members of his party killed amid post-election violence, he says there's very little he can do in parliament, where, unlike representatives for the ruling party, he has no offices, no budget and no influence. "In a year and a half, I've attended five, six sessions, that's all," Prof. Gudina said. "There's nothing there to do. When Meles makes a report, you go so at least people see you are there."

Bipartisan duo of Ex-congressional Heavyweights Blocking action against Ethiopia

2007-07-27T05:37:00.001-07:00

Bipartisan Duo of Ex-Congressional Heavyweights Blocking Action Against Ethiopia
by Ken Silverstein

July 25, 2007 (HM) - There have been a series of accounts out of Ethiopia recently that describe a nasty situation there, including a Human Rights Watch report earlier this month that said the Ethiopian military had “forcibly displaced thousands of civilians in the country’s eastern Somali . . . while escalating its campaign against a separatist insurgency movement.” Government troops were “destroying villages and property, confiscating livestock, and forcing civilians to relocate,” according to Peter Takirambudde, Africa director of Human Rights Watch. “Whatever the military strategy behind them, these abuses violate the laws of war.” Eyewitness accounts offered to Human Rights Watch said Ethiopian troops had been “burning homes and property, including the recent harvest and other food stocks intended for the civilian population, confiscating livestock and, in a few cases, firing upon and killing fleeing civilians.”

Despite that record, the Bush Administration views Ethiopia as an important counterterrorism ally, especially given Ethiopia’s recent involvement in Somalia, and annually provides the regime of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi with hundreds of millions of dollars in aid. But some in Congress have grown weary of abuses committed by Zenawi’s government. Earlier this month a House subcommittee passed a bill that would limit American aid to Ethiopia and ban government officials linked to human rights abuses from coming to the United States. In the Senate, Patrick Leahy of Vermont is seeking passage of a measure that would review some of the military assistance that is being provided.

But two congressmen-turned-lobbyists–former House Majority Leaders Richard Armey, the Republican from Texas, and Missouri Democrat Richard Gephardt–are working hard to block full congressional action against the Zenawi regime. The duo work with the firm of DLA Piper, which federal disclosure records show is being paid at least $50,000 per month by the Ethiopian government for “strategic advice and counsel.”

In 2006, the House International Relations Committee approved the Ethiopia Freedom, Democracy, and Human Rights Advancement Act, which criticized the government for its human rights record, called for it to free jailed opposition leaders and restricted security assistance. But the full House never voted on the bill. Two sources that follow the issue–one a former Hill staffer and the other a lobbyist on African affairs–tell me that Armey twisted the arm of then-House Speaker Denny Hastert to ensure that it didn’t come up for a vote. “Armey has a lot of influence over there,” the former Hill staffer said. “A lot of people in the GOP leadership owe their positions to him.”

Armey has no pull with the new Democratic leadership so now Gephardt has apparently been called on to block full passage of this year’s version of the bill. Gephardt, incidentally, also lobbies for the government of Turkey (another Piper client to the tune of $100,000 per month), as was recently detailed in a terrific New Republic piece in which author Michael Crowley wrote about Gephardt’s efforts to stop Congress from declaring as genocide the Turkish massacre of Armenians during the early twentieth century:

A few years ago, [Gephardt] was a working-class populist who cast himself as a tribune of the underdog–including the Armenians. Back in 1998, Gephardt attended a memorial event hosted by the Armenian National Committee of America at which, according to a spokeswoman for the group, “he spoke about the importance of recognizing the genocide.” Two years later, Gephardt was one of three House Democrats who co-signed a letter to then House Speaker Dennis Hastert urging Hastert to schedule an immediate vote on a genocide resolution. “We implore you,” the letter read, arguing that Armenian-Americans “have waited long enough for Congress to recognize the horrible genocide.” Today, few people are doing more than Gephardt to ensure that the genocide bill goes nowhere. It’s one thing to flip-flop on, say, tax cuts or asbestos reform. But, when it comes to genocide, you would hope for high principle to carry the day.

Piper’s lobbyists have been working the “war on terrorism” angle hard, arguing that even a hand-slap of Ethiopia for human rights abuses will jeopardize its support in Somalia and the Horn of Africa. (And we all know what a smashingly successful collaboration that’s been.)

I called Armey and Gephardt but never heard back from them. Piper did, however, send me a statement which said:

The U.S. first established diplomatic relations with Ethiopia more than a century ago and Ethiopia remains a close ally today, particularly in the global war against terrorism. It is crucial for the United States to have friends and allies in the strategically important Horn of Africa region who are committed to democracy, stability and moderation. The firm is assisting Ethiopia in strengthening bilateral relations with the U.S., including increasing humanitarian, economic and development assistance, expanding trade and investment opportunities, and enhancing relationships with financial, academic and public policy institutions.

I had heard that former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell of Maine, Chairman of the Global Board of Piper and Co-Chair of its Government Controversies Practice Group, was also working on the account. The firm’s statement said that Mitchell “has never lobbied or done legal work on behalf of Ethiopia in connection with DLA Piper’s representation.” However, Piper declined to say whether Mitchell had played a role in winning the Ethiopia deal or whether he was offering strategic advice or playing some other role in the contract.

Tightening the Noose Around Zenaw

2007-07-27T01:14:00.000-07:00

Tightening the Noose Around Zenawi

Selam Beyene, Ph.D.

New York, NY 10017

In a series of articles [1,2] published in the New York Times, Jeffrey Gettleman shocked the world with a glimpse of the atrocities committed by Zenawi's regime against the people of Ethiopia.

In so doing, Gettleman not only demonstrated journalistic professionalism of the highest order, but also provided uncommon comfort to the 70 million Ethiopians suffering under Zenawi's iron
rule.

Through a powerful exposition of the brutality of Zenawi and his deceits of the donor community, Gettleman declared: "The Ethiopian military and its proxy militias have ... been siphoning off
millions of dollars in food aid and using a U.N. polio eradication program to funnel money to their fighters..."[2].

What support can one give to such an admirable journalist, who is owed so much by the people of Ethiopia, so that his efforts will not be in vain?

The answer may not be difficult. All genuine Ethiopians should express their gratitude for his Herculean efforts, and provide him with much needed information that exposes the brutality of Zenawi's regime not just in the Ogaden region, but throughout the country.

Gettleman's efforts would bear fruit, and the struggle to free the oppressed people of Ethiopia would be successful, only if the true picture of Zenawi's regime is presented in the proper perspective, without falling in the dangerous ethnic traps that the dictator has wickedly installed for us.

When Zenawi directed one of his attack dogs, Seyoum Mesfin, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, to respond to the first of Gettleman's reports [3], the motive was to divert the focus of the discussion from the absence of human rights and democracy to one concerning the rise of one ethnic group against the rest of "Ethiopia".While fully sharing the pains of our Ogaden compatriots, as we do collectively share the pains suffered by all other ethnic groups across the land, we should guard against the tendency to fall victims to Zenawi's ethnic politics by treating the movements to overthrow Zenawi's dictatorship as isolated movements of disparate ethnic groups against the motherland.

A movement against Zenawi's oppression cannot have a lasting democratic outcome, if it is anchored in an ethnic agenda. The memory is still fresh that less than two decades ago the ethnicbased movements that overthrew the dictatorship of Mengistu Haile Mariam only brought us
equally vicious dictators in the likes of Zenawi and Afewerki.

So, as we applaud Gettleman for his courage, integrity and objectivity in exposing the brutal nature of Zenawi's dictatorship, let's provide our support to him so that he will be better equipped with comprehensive knowledge to more effectively use the power of the New York Times toward the search for a more permanent and lasting solution to the suffering of all Ethiopians: from the Somalis and Afars in the lowlands to the Oromos, Amharas, Gurages and Tigreans of the highlands; and from the Anuaks of the West to the numerous oppressed people of the South.

Interestingly, Gettleman's reports could not have come at a worse time for the brutal dictator, who is cornered like a wounded and dangerous beast with no place to escape:

• At home, he is vilified and humiliated, having been rejected on May 15, 2005 by the people of Ethiopia in a vote of no confidence against his dictatorial and ethnic-based minority regime.

• Abroad, he is considered persona non grata, even by his once-ardent supporters, having been found responsible, by a commission set up by his own government, for the massacre of over 193 peaceful demonstrators and the arrests and torture of thousands of opposition party members[4].

• As recently as July 19, 2007, a U.S. congressional panel approved legislation aimed at supporting democracy and human rights in Ethiopia, and sent the bill to the House Foreign Affairs Committee[5]

• His army is bogged down in a protracted war in Somalia ― a country he attacked although it had posed no tangible danger to the security of Ethiopia.

• Despite the billions of dollars poured into his coffers by donor nations, the economy is in shambles, thanks to blatant nepotism, corruption and mismanagement. According to a recent report[6], the number of Ethiopians living on less than a dollar a day, has nearly tripled since Zenawi took power in 1991 ― a shameful record, especially given the baseline is the discredited regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam.

• Across the land, the flames of inter-ethnic discord he once fanned for the purpose of weakening the Ethiopian nationhood have gone out of his control and are spreading like a wildfire, rapidly engulfing him.
What is the response of the desperate dictator, as the noose is tightening around him from all directions?

True to his roots, Zenawi copied Stalin's formula for the Great Purge, coerced the political prisoners, and forced them to accept accountability for the crimes he committed against humanity.

In his petty mind, the move was intended to serve several purposes:

1. The document bearing the signatures of the political prisoners would serve as a defense
against the inevitable charge for crimes against humanity.

2. The release of the opposition leaders, whose only crime is to have been elected by the people of Ethiopia, would serve to placate donor countries, who have withheld much needed money to finance Zenawi's repressive machinery and to fatten his overseas bank accounts[7].

3. The move is also intended to thwart the ongoing congressional activities in the US to hold the
regime accountable for human rights violations.

4. Most importantly, the alleged confessions and subsequent release of the political prisoners would help to divert attention from the dreaded issue of the illegitimacy of Zenawi’s government.

However, a careful evaluation of the recent unfolding events suggests that Zenawi's wishful thinking has no traction. No credible legal expert would believe that the documents signed under duress by the political prisoners would hold water in a court of law. Despite expensive lobbying[8], the plan to thwart the ongoing congressional activities has also backfired, and Congressman Payne has already declared that he’d still demand that “the killers of the 193 innocent civilians" be held accountable[9].

Thus, given Zenawi's desperate situation, and the abundance of support for the democratic movement, what is the optimal course of action for the opposition?

All genuine Ethiopians in the Diaspora and back home should now seize the moment and keep the pressure on Zenawi. They should set aside their personal, ethnic and political differences, and pool their resources to address the critical questions of the day:

• the return of political power to the legitimate leaders chosen by the people on May 15, 2005, and

• the prosecution of the criminals responsible for the post-election massacre of peaceful demonstrators, for the unjust imprisonment and torture of opposition members, and for the genocide of Anuaks and other ethnic groups.

UN and Ethiopia reached agreement to allow food aid to Ogaden

2007-07-26T18:21:00.000-07:00

By Jeffrey Gettleman

Published: July 25, 2007

LAMU, Kenya: United Nations officials and the Ethiopian government appear to have reached an agreement allowing emergency food aid into an embattled area that the Ethiopian military has been blockading for several weeks, both sides said Wednesday. But Ethiopian government officials expelled the Red Cross from the same area after accusing its workers of being spies.

Nur Abdi Mohammed, a government spokesman, said food deliveries would soon begin to most parts of the Ogaden, an eastern region that the Ethiopian military has recently sealed off in what appears to be an effort to squeeze a growing rebel movement.

"The food distribution has started from the center to different areas," Mohammed said. "I think it will reach most places soon. But where there is no security, there will not be deliveries."

Peter Smerdon, a spokesman for the United Nations World Food Program, said that UN officials had been meeting with the Ethiopian government for several weeks about access for food aid and that assessment teams had now reached most parts of the conflict region.

"The food is still not there in all the zones, but there is a process under way," Smerdon said. "We are working with Ethiopian officials and others on exactly how the food will be dispatched so it arrives with the people who monitor the distribution."

Smerdon said that with food prices rapidly rising, local markets empty and the flood season due to begin next month, there could be a "humanitarian crisis" in some areas unless the military lifted the restrictions on food aid and commercial traffic soon.

The Ogaden is one of the poorest parts of one of the poorest countries in the world, and it is also the site of an intense insurgency and counterinsurgency. According to human rights groups and firsthand accounts, Ethiopian troops have gang-raped women, burned down villages and tortured civilians.

Several former administrators from the area and a recently defected member of Parliament have accused the Ethiopian military and its proxy militias of skimming food aid and using a UN polio-eradication program to funnel money to their fighters. The Ethiopian government has denied these charges and said it was the Ogaden National Liberation Front, one of the most active of Ethiopia's many separatist groups, that was stealing food aid and abusing the population. The Ethiopian government has also accused the Ogaden rebels of getting arms and training from Eritrea, Ethiopia's neighbor and a bitter enemy.

Western diplomats and lawmakers in the U.S. Congress have expressed increasing concern about Ethiopia's human rights record. Several measures are moving through the House and the Senate that would place strict conditions on assistance to Ethiopia, which receives nearly half a billion dollars in American aid each year.

Western diplomats in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia's capital, said their biggest issue right now was the military blockade, which they said was putting hundreds of thousands of impoverished nomads at risk of starvation. Several humanitarian officials have said that they need to temper their criticisms or not speak publicly, or that their organizations might be permanently blocked from the area.

On Tuesday, the Somali regional government, which oversees the Ogaden, expelled the Red Cross, accusing its workers of providing weapons, money and sensitive information to the rebels.

"They were spies," Mohammed said. "They were following regional officials and relaying information to the rebels. We warned them to stop and they didn't."

Red Cross officials declined to comment, saying they were still negotiating with the government in the hopes of working out a way to stay. The regional government has given the Red Cross, which runs water and livestock projects in the Ogaden, seven days to leave the area. Red Cross projects in other parts of the country will not be affected.

Problematic Ally The moral hazards of dealing with Ethiopia's Meles Zenawi

2007-07-22T14:55:00.001-07:00

Editorial
Washington Post

Saturday, July 21, 2007; A12

MORE THAN once during the Cold War, the United States aligned itself with dictatorial or corrupt, but anticommunist, foreign governments, compromising democratic principles for perceived advantage against the Soviet Union. These choices were not necessarily wrong, but each one put the U.S. on a slippery slope, at the bottom of which lay a completely amoral foreign policy.

The Bush administration's global war on terrorism faces similar moral hazards. Even as President Bush correctly declares that ultimate victory against al-Qaeda hinges on the spread of freedom, he sometimes makes common cause with authoritarian regimes that promise to help eliminate terrorists in the here and now. Examples: Egypt, Pakistan and, more recently, Ethiopia, whose authoritarian prime minister, Meles Zenawi, was once a darling of the Clinton administration and has also forged close ties to the Bush administration. With Washington's blessing, Mr. Meles sent troops to Somalia in December to expel the radical Islamic Courts movement linked to al-Qaeda.

Yesterday 38 opposition politicians and activists walked out of jail in Addis Ababa, where they had been held for almost two years. That is good news, but they never should have been there in the first place. After Mr. Meles's party tried to deny its opponents the share of Parliament they won in an election in May 2005, protests erupted across the country, only to be crushed by Mr. Meles's security forces at a cost of 193 civilian lives. (Six police officers also died.) Thousands of people were detained, including the opposition leaders -- 35 of whom were sentenced to life in prison on preposterous charges of treason and inciting violence. Their release came after they signed a letter taking "full responsibility for the mistakes committed both individually and collectively" and begging for a pardon, which a regime-controlled board granted. Immediately after his release, opposition leader Hailu Shawel said he had signed the Orwellian statement under duress. But the fact that he and other leaders of civil society were released without restrictions on their political activity is a hopeful sign.

More political prisoners remain. Mr. Meles's troops also stand accused of human rights abuses in Somalia and in the country's internal war against rebels in the Ogaden region. The Bush administration has remained mostly quiet about all of this, though the State Department played a back-channel role helping to arrange the prisoners' release. The most visible U.S. pressure came in the form of a bill, sponsored by Rep. Donald M. Payne (D-N.J.), which would link U.S. aid to Ethiopia's performance on human rights. It passed the House's Africa subcommittee, chaired by Mr. Payne, this week. Ethiopia is a strategic ally. But it will probably take more work by its hard-pressed civil society, and more pressure from the United States, before it can be called a democratic one.

2007 The Washington Post Company

violence kills three soldiers, four civilians in Somali capital

2007-07-22T14:49:00.001-07:00

.
Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 22, July.07 ( Sh.M.Network)- Four civilians and three government soldiers have been killed in huge explosion followed shootouts which this afternoon happened Black-Sea junction in Hodan district, south of the capital Mogadishu.

The explosion that caused by a hand grenade bomb aimed at the government soldiers passing there, witnesses told Shabelle Radio.

The explosion killed three policemen as gunshots fired by the police forces killed four civilians who were walking alongside the road.

Two the civilian dead bodies; one was a mad man and the other was a banana seller woman were still laying on the ground because of the area sealed off by the security forces.

The incident took place around 4:30 pm local time as people was hurrying to their houses before dusk.

This brings 12 people the number killed in Mogadishu violence today alone.
For the last 20 days, about 100 people have been killed in the violence raged in the volatile city of Mogadishu where insurgency acts continue to threaten the government members.

Congressman called for relaese of all political prisoners

2007-07-22T14:46:00.000-07:00

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Honorable Donald Payne, member of the US Congress
WASHINGTON - The chairman of a U.S. House subcommittee on Africa has welcomed the release of 38 Ethiopian opposition members and called for the release of all political prisoners in the country.

U.S. Representative Donald Payne issued a statement Friday saying he hopes the release of opposition leaders and activists this week will trigger a new, peaceful democratic process in Ethiopia.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi announced the release of the prisoners Friday in the capital, Addis Ababa. A three-judge High Court panel had sentenced the group to death Monday.

The charges against them, inciting violence and attempting to overthrow the government, were related to protests against the 2005 elections.

Representative Payne has authored a bill in Congress that calls on the Ethiopian government to release political prisoners and support democratic reforms in the country or face losing U.S. security aid.

Opposition groups say the 2005 election was rigged to keep Mr. Zenawi in power. Ethiopian security forces killed at least 193 people while stopping the protests.

Former Ethiopian President Negasso Gidada says the cases should have never gone to court. He says he views the releases as just another power play by the government.

Several other defendants received prison sentences between 18 months and 18 years. The government has said it would consider clemency appeals for them

Despite pardons, others still face trial in Ethiopia

Jailed human rights defenders Daniel Bekele (left) and Netsanet Demissie
The pardoning of 38 people by the Ethiopian government does not mean that all the cases stemming from the 2005 election protests have been resolved, according to a VOA report by Joe de Capua.

For example, the NGO ActionAid says Daniel Bekele, its policy manager in Ethiopia, and Netsanet Demissie, general manager of the Organization for Social Justice in Ethiopia, are still on trial. They refused to sign a document admitting wrongdoing.

Richard Miller is the director of ActionAid UK. From London, he spoke to VOA English to Africa Service reporter Joe De Capua about their cases.

“(They) were charged over 18 months ago as part of this trial with crimes of outrage against the Constitution and constitutional order. They always said they believed their activities were entirely legal and they entered a plea of not guilty from the outset of the court proceedings. They always engaged with the court proceedings, unlike these other people who’ve been pardoned today (Friday). And they’re ready and waiting to present their defense. So they want to demonstrate in court the activities they engaged in were entirely legal and didn’t undermine the Ethiopian constitution, but in fact protected and promoted it,” he says.

The two men refused to sign a document signed by those who were pardoned, admitting the use of “unconstitutional means to change the constitutionally established government functions.”

Miller says, “They didn’t sign because obviously they don’t believe they did that. They believe that any of the activities they were involved in, that’s primarily the work in monitoring the 2005 parliamentary election and their involvement in a civil society initiative to resolve the post-electoral impasse.” He says that those actions were “positive contributions in Ethiopia and were performed in a peaceful and constitutional manner.”

Their trial continues next week.

Somalia: Conference venue attacked again

2007-07-19T06:11:00.000-07:00

Somalia: Conference venue attacked again
Thu. July 19, 2007 03:07 pm.- By Mohamed Abdi Farah. - Send this news article

(SomaliNet) Suspected local militants launched a mortar attack on the peace conference venue in north of the Somalia capital Mogadishu on Thursday just after the meeting restarted with more than 1,300 clan delegates.

According to the local residents, around six mortar shells landed near the venue of the reconciliation conference, former police compound in Abdulaziz district, north of the capital around 2:25pm local time.

“The mortar attack happened as the session of today’s meeting ended,” Addawe Mohamed, a local resident told Somalinet by telephone.

This is the second time that the heavily guarded conference site under mortar attack. There is no immediate casualty from the latest mortar attack.

Meanwhile, Somalia's Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi addressed the conference gesturing that his government is determined to make the meeting successful and many issues will be discussed during the conference.

Texts on the conference agendas were distributed to the delegates who will resume talks on Saturday.

Somalia: Roadside bomb explosion wounds six government soldiers

2007-07-19T06:09:00.000-07:00

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 19, July.07 ( Sh.M.Network)- At least six Somali soldiers have reportedly been wounded after their pick-up truck mounted with anti-aircraft gun hit a roadside bomb in Afgoi district, west of the capital, Mogadishu, on Thursday.

Witnesses said two battlewagons carrying number of government soldiers were on their way to their base in the district when the roadside blasted. “I could see 6 soldiers bleeding and lying on the ground when the blast occurred,” said Yusuf Ali, a witness.

He said one of the cars was badly damaged. The troops opened fire and a number of other soldiers have been deployed to blast site. “The area was sealed off by other troops who arrived after the blast and the people in the area ran away because they were afraid that they would be arrested,” he said.

In another incident four people, including one police officer, have been wounded after unknown gunmen hurled two grenades at government soldiers based in Bar Ubah residential area in south the capital, Mogadishu, on Thursday.

Witnesses told Shabelle that the explosions targeted the government forces positioned at the main road of the neighborhood, wounding the policeman. The troops opened fired toward every direction. Three civilians were hurt in the crossfire

HR 2003

2007-07-19T06:02:00.000-07:00

HR 2003
US Legislation on Ethiopia Democracy Moves Forward
By Dan Robinson
July 19, 2007

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Congressman Donald Payne
WASHINGTON DC - A U.S. congressional panel has approved legislation aimed at supporting democracy and human rights in Ethiopia, sending the bill to the House Foreign Affairs Committee. VOA's Dan Robinson has this report from Capitol Hill.
Lawmakers concerned about Ethiopia have faced the choice of taking steps to pressure the government in Addis Ababa, or waiting for Ethiopia's leaders to act on their own to improve the human rights and political atmosphere there.

Last year, legislation to pressure the Ethiopian government failed to reach the full House, as the Bush administration pressured Congress to hold off.

On Wednesday, Congressman Donald Payne referred to news reports that a clemency decision may be imminent for 38 opposition figures, including journalists, sentenced to life in prison and lesser terms.

While he hopes clemency is granted, Payne believes passage of this year's bill is important. "We want to see Ethiopia move back as it has been in the past, a good ally of the U.S, but we can no longer sit by and allow these issues to go without us mentioning them."

The United States, along with European governments and human rights groups, has condemned the sentencing of opposition leaders, and urged political reconciliation in Ethiopia.

State Department human rights official Barry Lowenkron testified this week before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "To this day, the crackdown casts a shadow over the Ethiopian government."

While underscoring Ethiopia's cooperation in what President Bush calls the global war on terror, the Ethiopia Democracy and Accountability Act calls for the release of political prisoners.

It calls on the State Department to fund human rights, democracy, civil society and rule of law groups and those helping victims of torture.

Although Payne describes the measure as not punitive in nature, it would prohibit non-humanitarian aid to Ethiopia if the government obstructs U.S. human rights and democracy training efforts.

It would also restrict security assistance until the Ethiopian government releases prisoners, holds those in the security forces accountable for human rights abuses related to the crackdown following 2005 demonstrations, respects freedom of speech, and allows human rights groups to operate without harassment.

Other provisions include prohibiting members of security forces from receiving U.S. training, a visa ban for officials accused of gross human rights violations, and support for identifying and extraditing former Mengistu regime members living in the U.S.

Republican Congressman Christopher Smith hopes the legislation will get a vote in the House this year, and asserts that the Bush administration has not pushed Ethiopia's government hard enough on human rights issues. "The war on terrorism is very important, we all know that. But no regime that terrorizes its own citizens can be a reliable ally in the war on terror. Terrorism isn't just a military issue, it is also a human rights issue," he said.

But others have reservations with the wording of the bill.

Republican Michael McCaul says while the Ethiopian government is far from perfect it has shown a willingness to move in the right direction. "I am concerned that the passage of this bill as it is currently written will do more harm than good to the Ethiopian democratic movement, and will hurt our strategic partnership with Ethiopia in combating terrorism. I am also concerned it will have a negative effect on the current negotiations between the government and the opposition," he said.

"It really does appear that we are taking sides. There is no recognition of the fact that there have been significant advances since the ruling party came to power in 1991," said Republican Congressman John Boozman shares the concerns.

Democrat Sheila Jackson Lee believes the legislation will be helpful. "I am concerned about the military assistance, but I am listening to how it is to be instructive, because right now although we are about to release a number of prisoners, we still have a series of individuals who are still incarcerated. The question becomes what will happen to them?," she said.

To become law, the Ethiopia bill would have to be approved by the House and Senate, but would still face potential opposition from the White House.

A spokesman for the House Africa subcommittee told VOA it is hoped the measure will be considered by the Foreign Affairs Committee before the end of July.

As currently written, the measure gives the president authority to ignore the ban on security assistance if doing so is in the interests of U.S. national security, including joint counter-terrorism efforts, and Ethiopian contributions to U.N. peacekeeping.

Somalia: Conference venue attacked again

2007-07-19T02:12:00.000-07:00

Somalia: Conference venue attacked again

Somalia: Roadside bomb explosion wounds six government soldiers

2007-07-19T02:07:00.000-07:00

Witnesses said two battlewagons carrying number of government soldiers were on their way to their base in the district when the roadside blasted. “I could see 6 soldiers bleeding and lying on the ground when the blast occurred,” said Yusuf Ali, a witness.

He said one of the cars was badly damaged. The troops opened fire and a number of other soldiers have been deployed to blast site. “The area was sealed off by other troops who arrived after the blast and the people in the area ran away because they were afraid that they would be arrested,” he said.

In another incident four people, including one police officer, have been wounded after unknown gunmen hurled two grenades at government soldiers based in Bar Ubah residential area in south the capital, Mogadishu, on Thursday.

Witnesses told Shabelle that the explosions targeted the government forces positioned at the main road of the neighborhood, wounding the policeman. The troops opened fired toward every direction. Three civilians were hurt in the crossfire, witnesses said

HR 2003

2007-07-19T02:04:00.000-07:00

Somalia Pm : EU and U.S. seem to fail the country's reconciliation conference

2007-07-18T07:08:00.000-07:00

Somalia Pm : EU and U.S. seem to fail the country's reconciliation conference
Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 18, July.07 ( Sh.M.Network)- Somalia's premier, Ali Mohammed Gedi, warned Wednesday that his country's national reconciliation conference could fail because of lack financial support from donor countries like the United States and the European Union.

The Arabic Asharqalawsat online newspaper reported Wednesday that Mr. Gedi indicated that the United States and the European Union were ignoring the reality of lack of funding, Somalia's reconciliation conference might fail.

He said the donor countries that pledged funding the congress fell short to fulfill their promises, specifying that many of the clan elders who were supposed to travel from the country's provinces could not reach the venue of the congress because they had no money to travel by, Asharqalawsat reported.

He said only 900 clan representatives have made their trips to Mogadishu and attended the first day of the conference while 1, 300 were supposed to be present at Somalia's N.R.C.

Gedi finally stressed that the EU and U.S. seem to fail the country's reconciliation conference after more than 16 years of lawlessness and anarchy, the online paper reported.

6 killed in separate battles in Somali capital

2007-07-16T18:29:00.000-07:00

6 killed in separate battles in Somali capital
16 Jul 16, 2007 - 2:02:58 PM

MOGADISHU, Somalia: At least six soldiers and civilians were killed and five others wounded on Monday in two separate battles in the Somali capital's main market, officials said.

A soldier and two civilians were killed in fighting among government soldiers who had disagreed on how to handle civilians during a search for arms in Bakara market, said Capt. Mohamud Aden Issaq. One soldier threw a grenade at a rival group of government soldiers, Issaq said.

"We told them (the rival group of government soldiers) to treat civilians well and they were behaving badly and we could not tolerate that, which is why we have clashed," Issaq told The Associated Press.

Later, suspected insurgents threw grenades at soldiers, who responded by firing towards the suspected insurgents but killed three civilians, said Col. Sheikh Ahmed Mohamed, a government soldier.

"When their bodies (the civilians) were taken by their relatives they had bullet wounds, so I think they were killed when government soldiers fired at suspected insurgents," Mohamed told The Associated Press.

Dr. Mohamed Osman Burane, the director of Medina Hospital, said that some of the five civilians wounded in the two separate battles told hospital staff that six people were killed.

Mogadishu Mayor Mohamed Dheere denied that government soldiers were responsible for killing any civilians.

"Soldiers have a right to defend themselves when they come under attack," Dheere told The Associated Press.

Government soldiers have been searching for arms in Bakara Market over the past 12 days. Officials have said the market is a stronghold of insurgents because some of the businessmen based there are from the same clan as the insurgents, the Ayr.

Mogadishu has seen little peace since government troops backed by Ethiopian forces drove an Islamic movement out of the city in December. Roadside bombs, attacks on government installations, assassination attempts and gunbattles have become common, and civilians are caught in the crossfire.

The Council of Islamic Courts ruled Mogadishu and much of southern Somalia for six months last year before being pushed out. But insurgents linked to the group have vowed to launch an Iraq-style guerrilla war unless the country becomes an Islamic state.

Somalia has been mired in chaos since 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned against one another, defending clan fiefdoms. The government was formed in 2004 with the help of the UN, but has struggled to assert its authority.

Ethiopia life jail terms attacked

2007-07-16T18:11:00.000-07:00

Ethiopia life jail terms attacked

The opposition blames the violence on the security forces
The head of the European Union 2005 election observers in Ethiopia has said she is "appalled" at the life sentences given to 30 opposition leaders.
Ana Gomes told the BBC the sentences were "farcical" and "inhumane" and urged the EU to seek their release.

Another eight people were given shorter jail terms, while five were tried in absentia for their role in violent protests at alleged poll-rigging.

Ethiopia's information minister hinted that the 38 could soon be freed.

Bereket Simon told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme that the government was looking into their apology and request for a pardon

"The prisoners have admitted... trying to overthrow the government by the use of force and have asked for clemency."

PROTEST SENTENCES
In court:
Life: 30
15-18 years: 6
1-3 years: 2 journalists
In absentia:
Life: 5

Democracy on trial
He said that now that the legal process had ended, a new political process would start.

Many Ethiopians expect the 38 to be freed soon by the government.

Their relatives say the detainees have signed a document which could pave the way for their release.

The prosecution had demanded the death penalty for them all.

Reconciliation

Ms Gomes told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme that she thought life in prison was just as bad as the death penalty.

"[Their] only crime was to express their opinions freely in elections, which were supposed to be democratic," she said.

The opposition leaders say the charges were political
High court judge Adil Ahmed also barred the 30 Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) leaders from voting or standing for election.

"The accused have committed serious crimes, which caused the death of civilians and security forces and attempted to overthrow the government," he said.

"The accused have also failed to present to the court mitigating evidences for the charges brought against them."

But he said they did not deserve the death penalty.

Before the sentences, the US had warned that any judgement should promote reconciliation between the government and the opposition.

The BBC's Elizabeth Blunt in Addis Ababa says the trial has been closely watched in the city, a CUD stronghold.

She says that the entire front row of seats in the court was taken up by diplomats and a simultaneous English translation was provided.

Apology?

Five of the 38, including CUD leader Hailu Shawel, were convicted of inciting, organising and leading armed rebellion.

Among the 38 are the entire CUD leadership, several of the capital's elected MPs and city councillors, including Berhanu Negga, mayor-elect of Addis Ababa.

Hundreds of thousands took part in demonstrations complaining of fraud and rigging in the elections won by Prime Minister Meles' party.

Some 193 people were killed in protests at alleged vote-rigging.

Most of the dead were protesters, killed by security forces.

Tarnished

An independent inquiry carried out by an Ethiopian judge concluded that the police had used excessive force.

He went on to accuse them of carrying out a massacre. The judge later fled Ethiopia, saying he had been put under pressure to change his findings and had received death threats.

The government points out that it introduced multiparty elections to Ethiopia after years of military rule.

In the elections, the opposition made huge gains but says it was cheated out of victory.

Three months ago, a judge threw out controversial charges of attempted genocide and treason against 111 people, including those sentenced on Monday, over the election protests.

The violence and the charges of election fraud have tarnished Mr Meles' image as a favourite of Western donors and one of a new wave of reforming African leaders.

Some donors have reduced aid over the case.

The opposition blames the violence on the security forces
The head of the European Union 2005 election observers in Ethiopia has said she is "appalled" at the life sentences given to 30 opposition leaders.
Ana Gomes told the BBC the sentences were "farcical" and "inhumane" and urged the EU to seek their release.

Another eight people were given shorter jail terms, while five were tried in absentia for their role in violent protests at alleged poll-rigging.

Ethiopia's information minister hinted that the 38 could soon be freed.

Bereket Simon told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme that the government was looking into their apology and request for a pardon

"The prisoners have admitted... trying to overthrow the government by the use of force and have asked for clemency."

PROTEST SENTENCES
In court:
Life: 30
15-18 years: 6
1-3 years: 2 journalists
In absentia:
Life: 5

Democracy on trial
He said that now that the legal process had ended, a new political process would start.

Many Ethiopians expect the 38 to be freed soon by the government.

Their relatives say the detainees have signed a document which could pave the way for their release.

The prosecution had demanded the death penalty for them all.

Reconciliation

Ms Gomes told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme that she thought life in prison was just as bad as the death penalty.

"[Their] only crime was to express their opinions freely in elections, which were supposed to be democratic," she said.

The opposition leaders say the charges were political
High court judge Adil Ahmed also barred the 30 Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) leaders from voting or standing for election.

"The accused have committed serious crimes, which caused the death of civilians and security forces and attempted to overthrow the government," he said.

"The accused have also failed to present to the court mitigating evidences for the charges brought against them."

But he said they did not deserve the death penalty.

Before the sentences, the US had warned that any judgement should promote reconciliation between the government and the opposition.

The BBC's Elizabeth Blunt in Addis Ababa says the trial has been closely watched in the city, a CUD stronghold.

She says that the entire front row of seats in the court was taken up by diplomats and a simultaneous English translation was provided.

Apology?

Five of the 38, including CUD leader Hailu Shawel, were convicted of inciting, organising and leading armed rebellion.

Among the 38 are the entire CUD leadership, several of the capital's elected MPs and city councillors, including Berhanu Negga, mayor-elect of Addis Ababa.

Hundreds of thousands took part in demonstrations complaining of fraud and rigging in the elections won by Prime Minister Meles' party.

Some 193 people were killed in protests at alleged vote-rigging.

Most of the dead were protesters, killed by security forces.

Tarnished

An independent inquiry carried out by an Ethiopian judge concluded that the police had used excessive force.

He went on to accuse them of carrying out a massacre. The judge later fled Ethiopia, saying he had been put under pressure to change his findings and had received death threats.

The government points out that it introduced multiparty elections to Ethiopia after years of military rule.

In the elections, the opposition made huge gains but says it was cheated out of victory.

Three months ago, a judge threw out controversial charges of attempted genocide and treason against 111 people, including those sentenced on Monday, over the election protests.

The violence and the charges of election fraud have tarnished Mr Meles' image as a favourite of Western donors and one of a new wave of reforming African leaders.

Some donors have reduced aid over the case.

Chronicle of an African Renaissance Foretold

2007-07-16T09:05:00.001-07:00

Chronicle of an African Renaissance Foretold
July 16 2007

Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis
July 15, 2007
As the massacres perpetrated by Meles Zenwai’s tribal soldiers plunge Ogaden in its millennia long History’s worst crisis, Ogadenis allover the world coordinate their reactions and intensify their activities in view of a Free Ogaden, devoid of Amhara and Tigray Abyssinian soldiers.

Back in Ogaden, the ONLF has taken control of a sizeable part of Ogaden’s undemocratically annexed territory; the fake ‘Ethiopian’ tyrant lost momentum, as recent events demonstrated clearly that ONLF has the possibility to efficiently defend the tyrannized Ogadenis against the governmental oppression, and at the same time to drastically damage any foreign intruder who, disregarding Human Rights’ violations and inhumanly imposed terror, closes lucrative deals with the unrepresentative and murderous tyrant Zenawi.

It is crystal clear that when the Ogadenis face extrajudicial killings, arrests and peremptory imprisonment, looting of personal belongings, and all sorts of humiliating treatment that cannot be tolerated even if applied to animals, no one can calmly exploit Ogaden’s natural resources, even if Zenawi’s greedy partner and myopic ally happens to be a significant power, China or the US.

On the other hand, the galaxies of the Ogadeni Communities abroad, either in Europe, in America or Africa, intensify their demonstrations, taking their Just and Noble Cause to the streets of Washington DC, European capitals, and other cities. Last week, a handful of manifestations took place, and Ogaden was more widely known to average Westerners who have not thus far had the chance to travel to that magnificent and marveling country, which was never a concern for package deals.

The urgency in the case of Ogaden, which can be called Africa’s first Darfur, hinges on the propinquity of Somalia, and the well documented need of the Somali Islamists to find possible allies among the oppressed and tyrannized African peoples.

The alliance of Liberation movements with the Somali extremists, and through them with al Qaeda, may be just a matter of time, very little time. It would offer Osama Bin Laden a multi-dimensional and exponential expansion; by selling arms to oppressed populations’ liberation fronts, the master of the Islamic Terror will attempt to viciously alter and definitely eradicate the traditionalist, tolerant and multi-faceted African Islam that is absolutely incompatible with the Saudi, Pakistani and Iraqi medressas of Terror.

This is what simple people allover the globe should realize; the best way to avert an Islamist explosion in Africa that would bring numerous regimes to knees, is to pressurize governments and administrations, politicians and statesmen, diplomats and military to take action now. Only free, independent, and democratically ruled peoples have no need of Islamic Terrorists, as they engage themselves in the path of progress and development.

An Independent Ogaden would be twice the size of Portugal, and more populated than Norway; it could be the focal point of Eastern African development, due to its rich soil.

It is within reach; AU and UN could expand their Somalia mission throughout Ogaden, which was illegally annexed by fake ‘Ethiopia’, by effectively replacing Amhara and Tigray soldiers and gendarmeries that are the means of Abyssinian oppression in Ogaden.

Then, following a UN monitored referendum, the Ogadenis could peacefully vote for their Independence, and like this the Western World could effectively promote the Cause of Human Rights and Democracy in Africa, isolating and virtually canceling Al Qaeda’s chances in the Horn of Africa region.

I find it very important to add here a pertinent text that bears witness to Ogadenis’ political maturity and tolerance, realism and vision, as well as commitment to the liberation of their long tyrannize country.

It is a text issued during last week’s Ogadenis’ manifestations in Washington DC; the Declaration of the Ogaden American Community.

It heralds the long awaited Renaissance of Ogaden.

Declaration of the Ogaden American Community

We the Ogaden American Community,

Having witnessed what can only be described as war crimes currently being committed against innocent civilians in Ogaden by the Ethiopian Government,

Aware of the widespread detention of teachers, students, merchants, traditional elders and community activists in Ogaden by the Ethiopian regime without trial or just cause,

Concerned by the numerous cases of rape, torture, looting and public beatings the civilian population of Ogaden has had to endure at the hands of the Ethiopian regime,

Outraged by the economic blockade affecting the lives of countless citizens of Ogaden resulting in the skyrocketing of food prices and other consumer goods

Clear on the fact that this is a systematic campaign targeting the people of Ogaden because of their ethnicity and thus constituting war crimes and genocide by any definition,

Call on our government, the government of the United States of America and in particular the Secretary of State Ms. Condoleezza Rice to

1. End all non humanitarian assistance and in particular, military assistance to the Ethiopian regime.

2. Apply targeted sanctions against the leaders and army officers of the Ethiopian regime directly involved in the planning and execution of the campaign of genocide against the people of Ogaden.

3.Draft and Support a resolution in the United Nations Security Council calling for an immediate end to the genocide in Ogaden and instructing the dispatch of a

Security Council fact finding mission to Ogaden.

4. Facilitate a dialogue between the Ethiopian regime and the legitimate representatives of the people of Ogaden, the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF).

Somalia: Six killed in Mogadishu grenade attacks

2007-07-16T09:02:00.000-07:00

Mon. July 16, 2007 03:52 pm.- By Mohamed Abdi Farah.

(SomaliNet) Six people and one government soldier have been killed and dozen others wounded in bomb blasts in the besieged Bakara market in Mogadishu today – as the reconciliation conference has been postponed to Thursday following mortar shelling near the conference venue.

The targets of the today’s bomb attacks were government soldiers but caused more casualties on the civilians, according to the local residents.

The transitional federal government soldiers indiscriminately sprayed bullets to the civilians in what looks like a response to the bomb attacks.

All the roads either entering or leaving the biggest market are sealed off by the TFG soldiers after the explosions.

“We have a problem with the constants blasts in the market as it is the only life line to the residents of the city,” said a local shopkeeper adding that “I have not opened my shop for the fourth day,”

Medina hospital, which is the only referral hospital, is stretched to the limit with wounded civilians in the latest round of violence.

25 civilians have been killed in bomb attacks and shootouts in and around Bakara market since the TFG soldiers began ringing it off two weeks ago.

Local militants in Somalia have vowed to continue the strings of the attacks on the TFG soldiers and government installations in the capital.

CUD leaders sentenced to life in prison

2007-07-16T08:59:00.000-07:00

CUD leaders sentenced to life in prison
The Associated Press
July 16, 2007

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia - A court sentenced 35 opposition politicians and activists to life in prison and denied them the right to vote or run for public office for inciting violence in an attempt to overthrow the government, a judge said Monday.
The prosecution had called for death sentences against the defendants, who included Ethiopia's top opposition leaders and five people charged, tried and convicted in absentia.
Another eight defendants facing similar charges were sentenced to between 18 months and 18 years in prison, said Judge Adil Ahmed, reading the sentences on behalf of the three-judge panel.

The judges declined to follow the recommendation of the prosecution to hand down the death penalty, Adil said.

"The court has deemed life imprisonment as a comprehensive and sufficient verdict for the actions taken," he said.

All people sentenced to life imprisonment have also been permanently denied the right to vote or run for office. Those given lesser sentences were banned from office for five years.

The judges also ordered the closure of three publishing companies and fined each of them between $1,700 and $13,600.

Those facing life imprisonment include the leader of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy, Hailu Shawel; Berhanu Nega, who was elected mayor of Addis Ababa; former Harvard scholar Mesfin Woldemariam; and former U.N. special envoy and former Norfolk (Va.) State University professor, Yacob Hailemariam.

International human rights groups have widely condemned the trial as an attempt to silence government critics, and opposition leaders have claimed it was politically motivated.

The Federal High Court trial began in December 2005 following postelection violence that erupted during protests over balloting six months earlier.

The opposition won an unprecedented number of parliamentary seats in the 2005 vote, but Prime Minister Meles Zenawi held onto power. The opposition claimed the voting was rigged, and European Union observers said they were marred by irregularities.

Initially, the opposition leaders, journalists and others were charged with treason, inciting violence and attempted genocide. Judges dropped the treason and attempted genocide charges in April and later that month freed 25 prisoners, among them eight journalists.

Since April, a total of 43 people faced four other charges, but only nine chose to put up a defense.

Late last year, Ethiopia acknowledged that its security forces killed 193 civilians protesting alleged election fraud, but insisted they did not use excessive force. A senior judge appointed to investigate the violence had accused the security forces of excessive force.

Somalia: A roadside bomb blast targets an Ethiopian water truck in Mogadishu

2007-07-13T04:00:00.000-07:00

Mogadishu 13, July.07 ( Sh.M.Network)- An Ethiopian water truck hit a roadside bomb in Ex-Control Balad, on the northern outskirt of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, on Friday. Witnesses told Shabelle that the truck has emerged from an Ethiopian military base nearby while on its way to water well at Ex-Control intersection.

Isse Ahmed, a witness, said he could see the truck blown up. "There were up to five Ethiopians armed with automatic machineguns on the top of the vehicle. I ran for my life when the blast occurred," he said.

It is not yet clear if any of the Ethiopians were hurt in the blast.

Number of other heavily armed Ethiopian troops soon arrived in the area, sealing off the site and stopping buses and people on the road.

The incident comes as two mortar bombs were targeted at military bases of Ethiopian and Somali troops last night.

Two grenades have also been hurled at Somali soldiers based in former Somalia dairy factory in north of the capital. A resident who only gave his name as Mohammed said two grenades blasted at the base of the Somali soldiers. "The soldiers randomly opened fire after the two explosions," he said.

Violence escalates in the volatile city where the interim government says would the venue of the national reconciliation conference which is due to begin in less than 48 hours.

Heavy shelling in Somali capital

2007-07-12T01:39:00.000-07:00

Last Updated: Thursday, 12 July 2007, 09:16 GMT 10:16 UK

Bombs go off almost every day in Mogadishu

Shells have been fired overnight at the presidential palace and the venue for forthcoming peace talks in the Somali capital, Mogadishu.

Shooting was also heard in the city's main Bakara market. Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attacks.

At least two people were killed when a mortar bomb landed on their house.

The upsurge in violence comes ahead of a reconciliation conference planned for Sunday, to be attended by more than 1,000 Somalis in the capital.

Attacks on Ethiopian troops and the Somali government have been a regular event since December, when Ethiopian forces ousted the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC), which had been controlling much of southern Somalia.

Somalia has not had an affective national government for 16 years, with rival militias battling for control of different areas.

Conference doubts

"Several mortar rounds were fired from the centre of town but all were off target. Some of them hit the nearby buildings but the palace suffered no damage," government security officer Mohammed Ganey told AFP news agency.

Mogadishu's Bakara market is the city's lifeline

The BBC's Mohammed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu says there is an uneasy calm in the capital but the shelling is a clear indication that the city is not safe to host the major conference.

On Wednesday, President Abdullahi Yusuf met diplomats from the European Union, Norway, Italy, Belgium, Kenya and the military adviser of the African Union at his residence in Mogadishu.

The delegation was in the capital for four hours to inspect security arrangements ahead of Sunday's reconciliation conference.

They also held talks with elders from the dominant Hawiye clan but it is not clear whether they will attend the conference.

The Hawiye clan has been opposed to the presence in Somalia of Ethiopian troops.

The clan elders insist that the conference should not be organised around clan allegiances, since the problems in Somalia are political and not clan-based.

Western countries have urged the Somali government to try to include moderate Islamists in the conference but it seems unlikely that anyone from the UIC will attend.

Somalia: Seven bomb blasts kill 3 and wound 13 in Mogadishu

2007-07-12T01:27:00.000-07:00

Somalia: Seven bomb blasts kill 3 and wound 13 in Mogadishu

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 12, July.07 ( Sh.M.Network)- Mogadishu's latest wave of bombings killed at least three people and wounded 13 after insurgents hurled seven grenades at Somali government soldiers based in different neighborhoods of the capital, including Bakara market.

One person was killed and five others have been wounded in the latest grenade attack in Bakara. Witnesses said three of the wounded were the employees of Hormood Telephone Company based in Bakara market and the other two were passersby.

"Unidentified gunman hurled a grenade at the government police moving along the company's outside door. The blast wounded three of our staff and two persons walking by, killing a businessman in the area," explained one of the employees, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was afraid of reprisal.

An hour earlier, three grenade blasts rocked the market, killing two construction workers that were on the top of a roof and wounding four others. Witnesses said unknown gunman hurled a grenade at two police forces positioned inside the market.

Our reporter, Hirabe, at the scene said the first blast occurred at a bus station in Bakara. "Minutes after the first bomb blasted, another grenade was thrown at the Somali soldiers who were coming towards the first site of the blast. We could not know the casualties because we had to run for our lives," he said.

Businesspeople in the market have shut down their shops and warehouses after series of bomb explosions and gunshots fired by the Somali soldiers based in and around the market rocked the neighborhood.

The government believes the market is a safe heaven for the remnants of the Islamic rebels, despite its promises that the military operations would be finalized in a three-day period.

Meanwhile Somalia president, Abdulahi Yusuf, who held a news conference at top-hill palace on Thursday, said the country's reconciliation conference would take place in the volatile city.

"Even if a nuclear bomb explodes in Mogadishu, the conference will happen as scheduled," he said.

Also two grenade explosions occurred in Bar Ubah, and one in Wardhigley neighborhoods. Mohmoud Yare, a witness, in Wardhigley told Shabelle that he saw four people being rushed to a hospital after the blast. "I saw four people who got wounded in the blast. They were severely bleeding," he said.

He said he could not tell whether it was a roadside bomb or a grenade. The area is frequented by Ethiopian troops.
Suspected Insurgents also fired at least five mortar rounds at the presidential compound last night. Officials said on Thursday that three mortars hit the walls of the compound and two landed at a residential area near the president's house, killing one civilian.

Face to face gun battles also took place in Hawlwadag and Wardhigley neighborhoods, south of the capital, minutes after the mortar attacks. Unknown gunmen and government soldiers based in those areas clashed, exchanging gunfire and rocket propelled grenades.

Ethiopian troops based in Mogadishu's biggest football stadium also went under attack overnight.

Only less than three days are left for the reconciliation conference to take place. The European Union, whose delegation arrived in Mogadishu Wednesday, urged the government to hold the twice postponed congress on July 15 and allow oppositions to attend, promising that they would send representatives.

Since 1991 when warlords toppled former dictator, Siad Barre, the Horn of African nation has had no effective central government.

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Heavy exchanges of gunfire underway in Mogadishu as Ethiopians search houses

2007-07-05T05:28:00.000-07:00

Heavy exchanges of gunfire underway in Mogadishu as Ethiopians search houses

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 05, July.07 ( Sh.M.Network)- Joint house-to-house search operations by Somali and Ethiopian forces are underway in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, on Thursday. The troops halted the entire movements of buses and cars, searching Mogadishu's biggest bazaar, Bakara.

Heavy exchanges of gunfire soon erupted in the area as the Ethiopian and Somali soldiers penetrated the market. Rocket propelled grenades were used in the gun battle which is still going on.

The Ethiopians were supported by tanks and heavy weaponries during the operations.

It is not yet clear if there casualties.

Mogadishu's biggest business firms have been searched. Mosques were among the area searched today.

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Somalia: Ethiopians soldiers killed in roadside bomb blast in Mogadishu

2007-06-28T14:45:00.000-07:00

Somalia: Ethiopians soldiers killed in roadside bomb blast in Mogadishu

Aweys O. Yusuf

Mogadishu 28, June.07 ( Sh.M.Network) Two Ethiopian soldiers were reported killed so far on Wednesday after an Ethiopian and Somali military convoy hit a roadside bomb near Ramadan Hotel in north of the Somali capital, Mogadishu.

Witnesses said they saw two Ethiopian soldiers who were killed by the blast. The Ethiopians and the Somali soldiers opened fire following the blast which rocked north Mogadishu around 7: 50 A.M. local time, witnesses said.

“They were two military pick-up trucks and a mixture of Somali and Ethiopian troops were onboard. When the bomb blew up four soldiers fell off the second car. Two were wounded and two others were dead,” said a grass seller, who asked to remain anonymous because he was afraid of reprisal.

The witness said the two who died in the blast were Ethiopians, indicating that he was only 10 meters away from the incident area.
Shabelle reporter, Hirabe, who went to the area where the explosion took place, said a large number of Ethiopian troops sealed off the area. He said two shop owners near the scene were also wounded.

Surge of bomb explosions against the government and the Ethiopian forces in Somalia multiplied since the T.F.G. imposed curfew on the volatile city.

Mayor of Mogadishu, Mohammed Dheere, laid blame on what he called foreigners in Somalia supported by the remnants of the Islamic Courts for carrying out the bomb blast in the capital.

Also five civilians were killed and 8 were wounded after unknown gunmen threw two grenades at Somalia military convoy which was passing near Mogadishu’s Bakara market yesterday.

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Greg winter's report from Ogadenia

2007-06-27T14:09:00.000-07:00

Greg Winter and Jeffrey Gettleman discuss Ethiopia. ..Jeffrey, you’ve been in the Ogaden..., the forbidding territory..

Former Somalia Defense Minister Wounded In A Roadside Bomb Blast.

2007-06-27T13:53:00.000-07:00

Former Somalia Defense Minister Wounded In A Roadside Bomb Blast.

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Somalia’s former Defense Minister, Col. Barre Aden Hirale, was wounded in roadside bomb blast on Wednesday. The blast occurred as a convoy carrying the former minister, along with number of Somali entourages, hit a roadside bomb which was remotely detonated, according to Mohammed Abdi Karin an official with Hirale.

The convoy was passing by the outskirt of Bardhere in Gedo province, southern Somalia when the bomb exploded.

His driver was killed in the blast, Shabelle correspondent, Ahmed Salihi , said. Initial reports indicated that the driver lost his two legs
Salihi said the colonel was admitted to a hospital in Bardhere. “But it is expected that he will be flown to Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, for treatment,” he said.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the bomb attack.
Hirale, who was interviewed by Shabelle, Tuesday, said he was determined to be neutral in the clan conflict of Kismayu, where the two major clans clashed on Friday, killing more than 20 and wounding over 40.

He hails from Merahan sub-clan that fighting Somalia president’s Majecteen sub-clan.

The leaders of both clans have been challenging over the management of Kismayu since the T.F.G. backed by its Ethiopian allied troops routed out the Union of Islamic Courts in early this year.

The minister was sacked nearly three months ago after the Somali government blamed him for instigating the tribal incongruity in Kismayu

OPDOf shibbisuu?

2007-06-24T10:45:00.000-07:00

Akka dhagahamutti wallisaa Taaddalaa Gammachuu miseensa OPDO akka tahee fi wareegama sabani keenya gabroonfataa fi ergamtoota isaanii irratti godhaa jiru keessatti tarree saba isaa osoo hin taane diina cinaa akka dhaabbatee dha. Yeroo goototni barattoota Oromoo Fincila Diddaa Gabrummaa finiisnaa turanitti fincila kanatti bishaan naquuf yeroo tokko ergamaa TPLF Abbaa Duulaa Minaasee waliin barattoota University Finfinneetti akka bobba'e himama. Kun xinnoo bubbulus ar'as taanaan namni kun qabsoo sabni keenya gabrummaa of irraa fonqolchuuf godhaa jirutti kan hin amanne, yeroma hunda gabri gooftaa isaaf ergamuu fi buluun uumaa isaa akka tahe kan amanu natti fakkaata.

Odeessaa fi gumgummiin kun dhugaa taanan, ar'a qophii "aadaa" inni gaggeessu irratti qooda fudhaachuun maqaa sabboontotaa kan xurreessuu fi walliftoota sabboontota biyya keessatti rakkoo diinagdee fi kan gabroonfataan irraan gahuun osoo hin jilbeenfatin qabsoo keenyaaf bobaa'aa fi humna tahan akkasumas ummata keenya diinaaf osoo hin jilbeeffatin dhaloota dhufu bilisummaa dhaalchisuuf wareegama baasaa jiruuf kabajaa dhabuu mul'isa.

Gama birootiin Waldaan dargaggoota Oromoo eenyummaa wallisaa Taaddalaa Gammachuu qoratee adda osoo hin baafatin Oromoon akka dibbee isaa dha'u haala aanjeesssuun kanneen jaarmaya kana dursan hawwii malee dandeettii fi ogummaan hogganna kennuu akka ir'atu agarsiisa.

Kanneen" bu'aa fi nagummaa yeroof jedhanii diinaaf bitaman ykn hojjatan bilisummaa fi nagummaan isaaniin hin malu" jedha beekaan tokko.

Joobiraa dha

Somalia: Five bomb explosions rock Mogadishu amid second night-time curfew

2007-06-24T06:02:00.000-07:00

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 24, June.07 ( Sh.M.Network) Explosions rocked the Somali capital, Mogadishu, overnight amid curfew was being observed for the second night. At least 5 blasts occurred in three different districts in the capital.

No casualties have been reported on Saturday morning and the situation is calm.

The explosions coincided with the exact time (7: 00 pm local time) when the night-time curfew was to take effect.

Unknown gunmen threw a grenade at a police station in Karan district, north of the capital, last night.

The district commissioner, Abdulahi Hassan Roble, told Shabelle last night that insurgents targeted the police station with a hand grenade.

“There were no casualties in the explosion and the police arrested two suspects. We do believe that the insurgents were responsible for this blast and other explosions we just heard,” he said.

The blasts also took place in Hawlwdag and NBC neighborhoods in Mogadishu.

Despite the bombings, several police forces were patrolling the main roads and areas in the capital, seizing a number of people who violated the curfew, according some Mogadishu residents.

More than 16 bomb explosions came about in the hot-blooded city since the Somali transitional federal government formally announced that curfew was imposed on Mogadishu on June 22

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Fighting erupts in Kismayo

2007-06-22T18:57:00.000-07:00

Fri. June 22, 2007 08:47 pm.- By Mohamed Abdi Farah. - Send this news article

(SomaliNet) Fresh gun battle between rival soldiers within the Transitional Federal Government has erupted in Somalia’s southern port city of Kismayu on Friday killing seven people and wounding 30 others - as heavily armed Ethiopian forces are heading to Kismayu to go between the warring clans.

The fighting that lasted for four hours in Bulo-Gadud and Gobweyn villages village, near Kismayu went between Sade and Majerten clans of Darod, one of powerful tribes in Somalia.

Both clan soldiers in the government are fighting for the control of Kismayu, 500km south of the capital Mogadishu.

Unconfirmed reports say the soldiers that hailed from Sade clan who now control Kismayu overrun those from Majerten clan, led by Col. Abdirisak Afgadud who was close to the president of Somalia Abdulahi Yusuf Ahmed.

A spokesman for Sade clan who declined to be named claimed that his militia seized six war vehicles from the other side and took hostage their commander Aden Bojar.

There is no independent confirmation on that.

Just in reports say that the fighting still continues as both sides regain reinforcements.

Ethiopian Planes Carpet-Bomb Ogaden Cities

2007-06-22T14:09:00.000-07:00

Ethiopian Planes Carpet-Bomb Ogaden Cities

June 21, 2007 Reports reaching our service desk from the provinces of Godey and Nogob confirm carpet bombings carried out by the Ethiopian air force in many
parts of these two provinces.

As confirmed by eyewitnesses, the places carpet-bombed entirely include Abaaqaroow in Godey province, and the towns of Cayuun and Dara-salaam in Nogob province. Confirmed casualties so far number forty civilians who all died as a result of the carpet bombings carried out by the Ethiopian air force.

Our reporters have been dispatched to the areas where the carpet-bombing took place and we plan to detail casualties in our later report filings.

In related news, the Ethiopian military killed in broad daylight and inside the town center teacher Xasan. It is not known the reasons of this broad daylight, extra judicial killing carried out by members of the Ethiopian military deployed in Dhuxun.

--Ogaden Online News

Somalia: A bomb explosion kills five including 4 Somali policemen

2007-06-22T14:05:00.000-07:00

Somalia: A bomb explosion kills five including 4 Somali policemen

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 22, June.07 ( Sh.M.Network) A huge bomb blast was targeted at a Somali police pick-up truck carrying at least 10 government police forces near the main seaport of Mogadishu, the Somali capital, on Friday.

Witnesses told Shabelle that they saw 4 policemen who were bleeding being dragged from the truck which was badly damaged by the strong blast and also ten year old boy dead in the blast.

The explosion occurred amid a large number of Ethiopian troops massed Mogadishu’s biggest market, Bakara, conducting house-to-house search operations.

A curfew is due to be imposed on the whole capital today from 7:00 pm to 5:00 am local time.

Somalia’s national security committee revealed Thursday that a curfew would be imposed on Mogadishu, the Somali capital. The committee which is made up diverse government officials that are under the direct command of Somalia President Abdulahi Yusuf said the curfew was imposed to pacify the volatile capital.

Mohammed Warsame Darwish, the leader of the committee, told journalists in a news conference he held in Mogadishu yesterday that government soldiers were geared up to battle with the insurgents who carry out their hit-and-run attack on the government and Ethiopian bases in Mogadishu overnight.

Unconfirmed reports say the vehicle hit a roadside bomb placed on the roadside near Mogadishu seaport.

No group has claimed responsibility

Clan fighting

Meanwhile fighting erupts in the port town of Kismayu, 500 KM south of the capital, on Friday. Residents told Shabelle that the gun battle is raging between two clans (Puntland and Marehan) in the transitional government.

A witness, who asked to remain unnamed, told Shabelle by the phone that the fighting started in Bulo Gaduud settlement on the outer edge of Kismayu where government troops led by Col. Abdirisaq Afgadud, a relative of Somalia president Abdulahi Yusuf, are based.

“The fighting restated between Abdirisaq’s government troops and Sade (Maerehan) clan militias in the settlement,” the witness said.

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Qophii Galagala Aadaa Oromoo J

2007-06-15T10:35:00.000-07:00

Wallisaa Beekkamaa fi sabboonaan ilmaa oromoo J. Muktaar Usmaan ilmaan Oromoo Washington DC fi naannoo isii jiran sirboota aadaa fi warraaqsaa dhagahamanii hin qufamneen isin gammachiisuuf qophii galgala aadaa Oromoo qopheessee jira. Qophii kana irratti hirmaachuu dhaan maatii, hiriyaa, fi lammii keenya waliin sirboota aadaa Oromootiin akka bashannannu kabajaan isin affeerra

Guyyaa: 06/30/2007

. Bakki: 1610 Colombian Street NW

Unification Church, Washington DC.

Saa'aa: Galagala 8:00 irraa Eegalee

Galatoomaa!

Dhaamsa Jaal Muktaariif

Joobiraa

Ethiopian and Somali government forces come under attack in Mogadishu

2007-06-15T03:44:00.000-07:00

Ethiopian and Somali government forces come under attack in Mogadishu

Mohamed Amiin Sheikh Addow

Mogadishu 15, June.07 ( Sh.M.Network) Somali government forces and their Ethiopian allies have been targeted with two roadside bombs in Somalia’s chaotic capital city today.

One of the two explosions which were minutes only apart has targeted an Ethiopian military convoy which was passing near Sanca square in north Mogadishu while the second targeted a Somali police convoy which was driving by Afarta Jirdino square.

Residents in the neighborhood have confirmed Shabelle Media Network that two police officers got wounded in the later attack while it is also reported that Ethiopian forces have also suffered casualty.

Forces from the transitional federal government of Somalia have cordoned off the area of the attacks and are carrying out search operations.

There are reports that many people in the area have been arrested.

These attacks coincide with as Ethiopian forces and their Somali allies carry out army search operations in the capital and massive cache of weapons have been seized during those operations.
.

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Somali MP accuses Ethiopian forces of robbery

2007-06-15T03:42:00.000-07:00

Somali MP accuses Ethiopian forces of robbery

Mohamed Amiin Sheikh Addow

Mogadishu 15, June.07 ( Sh.M.Network) Osman Ali Hassan Atto, a member of Somalia’s transitional parliament has accused Ethiopian forces who searched his home in Mogadishu of robbing him around four thousand US Dollars.

In an exclusive interview with Shabelle Radio, Mr. Atto has confessed that the Ethiopian forces found weapons in his house but he angrily accused the troops of taking other valuable items from his house including a large sum of Money.

“It is true that Ethiopian troops found weapons in my house during their search but they also took money in cash such as 369,000 US dollars, four thousands Emirates Dirham, a large number of jewelry for my wife, valuable watches of mine and Thuraya satellite phones and they tore all my bags” said Atto in his interview with Shabelle Radio.

The Somali MP pointed out that all those incidents are violations against his status of being a member of Somali parliament and also against his Somali citizenship and the charter of the Somali transitional government.

Osman Ali Atto called the presence of Ethiopian troops in Somalia as against the wishes of the Somali people.

The fury accusations of this MP came after the transitional federal government of Somalia displayed to the journalists a huge cache of weapons seized during a joint army search operation by its forces and their Ethiopian allies.

London student’s jungle war escape led to ‘rendition’ trap

2007-06-10T01:46:00.000-07:00

From The Sunday Times

June 10, 2007

London student’s jungle war escape led to ‘rendition’ trap

Stephen Grey

A BRITISH student who was caught up in fighting in Somalia has described how he fled for his life only to be arrested as a suspected Al-Qaeda member and then rescued by a British consul from a secret operation to transfer terrorist suspects to Ethiopia for interrogation.

Reza Afsharzadagen, 25, from north London, was among hundreds of refugees forced to flee battles last December between Islamic radicals who had seized power in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, and Ethiopian soldiers trying to install a rival United Nations-backed government.

After dodging bombs from American warplanes deployed in support of the Ethiopians and trekking through jungle for 13 days, Afsharzadagen reached safety in Kenya. But there he was detained as a suspected terrorist and questioned for nearly a month without being charged.

He and three other British Muslims who were arrested - Shahajan Janjua, Hamza Chent-ouf, and Mohammed Ezzoueck, all from London - were eventually returned home and cleared of any suspicion of terrorist activity after the intervention of the Foreign Office.

But more than 85 other captives who had fled Somalia were flown back to the war zone and later interrogated for weeks at a prison in Ethiopia. Among those transferred were women, and children as young as seven months old, who were alleged to be from the families of militants.

The mass transfers in East Africa were the first case to come to light of an “extraordinary rendition” - the covert transfer of terrorist suspects to other countries for interrogation - involving children.

Afsharzadagen’s account, in an interview for Channel 4’s Dispatches programme tomorrow, emerged as arguments about the rendition programme intensified. The Council of Europe reported last Friday that the CIA had run secret prisons in Poland and Romania. The CIA said such claims were biased and distorted, and insisted it had operated lawfully.

Yesterday the Association of Chief Police Officers was accused by the human rights group Liberty of “spin” after it concluded in a separate inquiry that there was no evidence that British airports had been “used to transport people by the CIA for torture in other countries”.

Afsharzadagen says he travelled to Mogadishu last September after the radical Islamic Courts Union drove out war-lords who had ruled for 15 years. The US and other governments warned that the regime was establishing an extreme form of Islamic rule, sheltering Al-Qaeda members and creating jihadist training camps.

Some preachers in British mosques were urging young Muslims to travel to Somalia to help the Islamists. Afsharzadagen, who completed a computing degree at London Metropolitan University, claimed he had gone partly in search of “adventure” and partly to do voluntary work, teaching young Somalis computer skills.

When he arrived, he said, he found people revelling in their freedom to walk around the city for the first time in years without fear. “It wasn’t like the Taliban in Afghanistan,” he said. “There were women working and walking on the streets.”

Within three months, troops from Ethiopia entered Somalia with the aim of replacing the Islamic Courts Union with a government of national unity. As the bombs began to fall near Mogadishu, Afsharzadagen and many other foreigners fled.

Travelling south with convoys of refugees, he met the other Britons for the first time and they took a boat towards the Kenyan border. “It was like a big canoe - when we arrived we had to swim ashore - that’s when I lost all my money,” he said.

For several days they hid in the jungle as they watched US helicopters and warplanes seeking out Al-Qaeda fugitives and listened to the bombing. “We felt we were being hunted down.”

One morning Afsharzadagen woke to the sound of gunfire and explosions nearby. He was separated from his friends as they fled towards the Kenyan border. “I just got up and ran. I left my passport. I left my food rations. Everything.”

By the time the gunfire had died away he was lost in the jungle with 30 people, mostly strangers. As they trudged through the bush in search of help, they drank from puddles. By the 13th day many were close to collapse. Then someone heard a cock crow, indicating a settlement nearby.

The villagers gave them honey but Kenyan soldiers who turned up lashed out with kicks. “Some were telling us, ‘You’re Al-Qaeda, we’ve finally caught you’.” From the nearby town of Kiunga, where officers from Kenya’s counter-terrorism unit were waiting, they were flown to Nairobi, where they were held in crowded communal cells.

Afsharzadagen said he was asked if he had handled weapons or trained in a terrorist camp. “I said I hadn’t. But they would tell me, ‘You’re lying’.”

Requests to see a British diplomat were refused, but eventually Afsharzadagen and the others were taken to a hotel to meet some officers from MI5. The first one called himself Richard.

“He told me he was here to help me. But it wasn’t true. I knew they were there to trap us,” he said.

After returning to their cells, the Britons’ hopes of going home rose briefly when they were moved to the airport. Then they noticed cars and lorries carrying other prisoners.

Handcuffed and blindfolded, they were flown instead to an unknown city in Somalia and handed over to Ethiopian soldiers who locked them in a dark cell teeming with cockroaches.

But after two days, an official told them they were leaving. At the top of a flight of stairs, Afsharzadagen was introduced to a British consul who had flown to Somalia to bring them out. An RAF plane took them from Kenya to Britain. No evidence was found of any terrorist connection to them.

For the other prisoners, including an American, a Frenchman and three Swedes, the ordeal was far from over. They were moved to Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, for interrogation. Among the 85 transferred, according to flight manifests, were at least 11 women accompanied by 11 children.

One of them was a 25-year-old Tanzanian, Fatma Chande. After her release she alleged the police in Kenya had threatened to strangle her. “They tried to make me admit my husband was a member of Al-Qaeda,” she claimed.

“When we arrived at the airport, we were handcuffed and our headscarves were pulled down over our eyes. The men were hooded. The children were crying all the time saying, ‘We want to go home’.”

The prisoners transferred to Ethiopia were questioned by Americans. “They’ve concealed their role, but you can assume the Americans were behind all these renditions,” said a senior western diplomat in Nairobi. “By sending prisoners to Ethiopia, they had a convenient place to interrogate people.”

Ogaden National Liberation Front denies VOA report

2007-06-09T16:52:00.000-07:00

Ogaden National Liberation Front denies VOA report
Press Release
June 9, 2007

The Voice of America (VOA) recent report citing unnamed sources alleging that Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) has entered into a coalition with political entities in Somalia is far from reality and well within the realm of fantasy.

For nearly two decades, the TPLF regime has been engaged in an deliberate effort to misrepresent our struggle to the international community in a bid to divert attention from the legitimate grievances of the people of Ogaden. This misrepresentation has included efforts to portray the ONLF as a religious organization instead of a nationalist organization and TPLF statements aimed at leaving the impression that the scope of our military operations extend beyond Ogaden.

The ONLF wishes to make clear to the international community that we are not, have not been and will not be a party to the ongoing conflict in Somalia as a matter of policy and principle. In that regard, the ONLF is not, has not been and will not be a part of any coalition with political groups in Somalia. The only coalition that the ONLF is a proud member of is the Alliance for Freedom & Democracy (AFD). The foundation of the ONLF policy toward Somalia is that Somalia should be left to the Somalis and that the Ethiopian army should immediately and without condition, pull its troops out of Somalia.

The TPLF regime will have to face the reality that they must deal with the legitimate representatives of the people of Ogaden and abandon their failed military strategy in Ogaden and ongoing brutal crackdown against our civilian population. The TPLF must accept direct talks with the ONLF in a neutral country and in the presence of a third party arbiter with no pre-conditions placed on either side if there is ever to be a just, comprehensive and lasting solution to the conflict between the people of Ogaden and successive Ethiopian governments.

The TPLF must also accept the call for an all inclusive conference made by the member organizations of the Alliance for Freedom & Democracy (AFD)

------------
URL of the VOA report: http://www.voanews.com/english/2007-06-08-voa39.cfm
The Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF

On Meles interview

2007-06-09T16:27:00.000-07:00

Haromaya) In the recent interview with Jonathan Dimlbey of the Teachers TV, the prime minister of Ethiopia, Meles Zenawi, has reaffirmed that he would not seek office during the next election. Meles had made similar statements in the past but had never been materialized. What makes this round of statement more likely to be true is the fact that Meles has faced increasing pressure from his own ruling party, the Tigrean People Libration Front (TPLF), to step down. Inside information has conformed to this writer that several members of the Politburo of TPLF have advised Meles that he must step down for the sake of reviving the party’s image as a democratic organization.

This recent announcement by the Mr. Zenawi has led many people to speculate about who his successor is going to be. The speculation and rumor has created intense debate among supporters of the Zenawi’s government. The Tigrean community in particular is divided along two lines in this debate. Hardliner Tigrean nationalists have insisted that the next prime minster must be a member of TPLF while moderates have continued to advocate for appointing a non-Tigrean in order to give credibility to the administration and to silence the opposition group that are protesting against Tigrean domination of Ethiopian politics.

The former argues that in the face of mounting pressure against the Tigrean leadership, and the continuing defection of non-Tigreans from the government, it is becoming impossible to trust a non-Tigrean holding a key government position. They fear that, even though they appoint a trusted individual from one of the three members of the TPLF-controlled coalition, Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), the individual might align with opposition groups of his own ethnicity. They support their argument by referring to recent defections of once highly trusted military commanders and high ranking officials, mostly from Oromo ethnic group.

The later argues that appointing a Tigrean would further increase the tension and suspicion against the Tigrean ruling elites and validates to the international community the allegation that Ethiopia is fully run by Tigreans. They believe that it is necessary to appoint a non-Tigrean while putting a system that enables for a greater TPLF control. According to this group, this model would work because the prime minister would be surrounded by Tigreans who would serve as advisors and security personnel. They also believe that even though Zenawi officially steps down, he would still remain closely involved in all decision making process as an advisor.

However, those who advocate for appointment of a non-Tigrean seem to be dominating the debate. Even though the Tigreans in Diaspora and the elites in Mekele and Addis are as apprehensive about appointing a non-Tigrean to the prime ministerial position, they seem to be convinced that it is absolutely impossible to retain power under Tigrean domination unless a non-Tigrean is appointed to give a semblance of change and real democracy.

The next controversial question was from which ethnic group the non-Tigrian future prime minister should be appointed from. By virtue of their sheer number as well as their domination of opposition politics, a PM from the Oromo or Amhara ethnic groups were considered and intensely debated upon among the Tigrean elites. Those who advocate for an appointment of an Amhara justify their position by pointing to two crucial differences between Amharas and Oromos within the EPRDF. They believe that the Amhara National Democratic Movement (ANDM) leadership has shown better loyalty to the TPLF- leadership than the Oromo People Democratic Organization (OPDO). This claim is supported by the apparent high rate of defection from OPDO compared to that of ANDM. The figures show that the Oromo defectors outnumber the Amhara defectors in the ratio of 20:1. Prominent and once highly trusted Oromos who served TPLF have defected and most have joined Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) - one of the most formidable rivals to TPLF. A number of Oromos who once were instrumental in establishing TPLF rule in Oromia state have either defected or rendered persona non grata or have been assassinated by TPLF security forces for opposing further consolidation of state power into the hands of Tigreans. These include former Oromian president Hassen Ali, former Ethiopian president Negasso Gidada, House of Federation Speaker Almaza Meko, former security chief Yonathan Dibissa, and most recently a highly decorated military leader, Brigadier General Kemal Gelchu, who defected along hundreds of Oromo soldiers in his unit and joined the OLF. Brigadier General Kamal Gelchu is now appointed as the general commander of Oromo Liberation Army which has recently allied with the Ogaden National Liberation Army in the fight against the government of Ethiopia in Eastern Front. Therefore they argue that appointing an Oromo to a prime ministerial position could bring disastrous consequences to the Tigrean domination of Ethiopia. Hence appointing an Amhara is much safer than appointing an Oromo since ANDM has not been plagued by defections as much as the OPDO did. During the past 16 years of TPLF domination of Ethiopia, only Tamirat Layine from the top leadership in ANDM fell out with TPLF leadership. Even this fall out is not due to political reasons but conflicts over their respective share of personal property that was embezzled from Ethiopian peoples.

Those who advocate for appointing an Oromo present the following argument. They believe that the most challenging opposition to the Tigrean domination comes from Oromo nationalists, especially from members and sympathizers of OLF. They also understand that such strong opposition from Oromo emanated due to the obvious marginalization of the Oromos from the country’s social, economic, and political process. They argue that, being the largest ethnic group in Ethiopia, appointing an Oromo as a prime minster would convince the international community that indeed there is democracy and proportional power sharing in Ethiopia. They also emphasize that the ever increasing uprising in Oromia region can subside if an Oromo prime minister is appointed thereby depriving OLF and Oromo nationalists their claim that Oromos do not have fair share within the Ethiopian system. Accordingly, the international community would be deceived into believing that, in a country where a third of the parliament is controlled by “Oromos” and where the prime minister is an “Oromo”, it would not convince anyone if anybody claims that Oromos have been oppressed. In this system, any human rights violation will be perceived as if it has been committed by Oromos against Oromos; therefore TPLF won’t be blamed. Therefore, this group advocates that the best way to maintain Tigrean hegemony and legitimize their rule is by appointing an Oromo as the next prime minister. To minimize the risk of betrayal and probable alliance of the person with OLF, the group suggests that all remaining key positions such as security, military and advisory positions be filled with nationalist Tigreans who will keep the power of the prime minister in check at all times.

Even though consensus has more or less been reached about appointing a non-Tigrean, the Tigreans are yet to agree whether to appoint an Oromo or Amhara although those who advocate for appointment of Oromo seem to have dominated the debate.

Therefore the TPLF politburo has created an exploratory committee led by Sibehat Nega, a founding member of TPLF, along with Professor Medhine Tadesse, one of the prominent Tigrean scholars, and Prof. Kinfe Abraham the president of the International Institute for Peace and Development (Ethiopia)-a Tigrean think-thank group, to investigate and recommend potential non-Tigrean successors to Meles Zenawi. The investigation is aimed at collecting detailed information about ideologies and affiliations of individuals in their social and political networks.

The Nominees

Top leaderships of the ANDM and OPDO have been the focuses of this exploratory committee. The contenders from the Executive Committee of ANDM were Tefera Walwa, Min. of Capacity Building, and Addisu Legesse, deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development. These two individuals have been involved in TPLF for almost two decades. Both were once members of the Ethiopian People Revolutionary Party (EPRP) but defected to TPLF in early 1980s to establish the Ethiopian People Democratic Movement that was later converted to ANDM to fit into the EPRDF’s ethnic quota appropriation. Mr. Walwa is the most loyal non-Tigrean, but had some personal conflict with hardliner Tigrean nationalists. Addisu Legesse, who was born in Hararghe and fluent in Afan Oromo, is a more pragmatic Amhara with proven loyalty to Meles Zenawi. He was the person who saved Meles Zenawi from the hardliner Siye Abraha’s conspiracy during the 2001 TPLF internal crisis. Mr Legesse betrayed Siye’s group by informing Meles about the proposed coup. Therefore even though some Tigrean nationalists still see him as a traitor, he has the full backing of Meles. Both Walwa and Legesse are chained to the top TPLF leadership through marriage and financial dealing.

From the OPDO side, Abadula Gemeda, Kuma Demeksa and Girma Birru were the leading contenders. Abadula, former minister of defense and the current president of Oromia regional state, is unquestionably the most loyal Oromo person to the TPLF leadership. However his lack of education and increasing unpopularity as well as the claim by some Oromos about him not being an Oromo has forced the explanatory committee to see him less favorably. Kuma Demeksa- former president of Oromia and the current Minister of Defense- had bad as well as good things going for him. The bad is that he took side with Siye’s faction during the TPLF internal split and was sacked from his position by executive order from Meles. The good thing is that by laying low and never complaining about Meles’ action, he was able to get sympathy from Mr Zenawi who later appointed him as a Minster of defense last year. Meles even made an honest remark when he nominated him to the parliament saying that “Teshrom Yalakorefe” meaning “the one who did not get disappointed even when fired”. Girma Birru, the Minster of trade and Industry is considered by far the most eligible candidate with significant resume in loyalty and ability. He is a well educated economist and had never showed sympathy toward the oppressed Oromos and unlike some other OPDO leadership he never mentioned or questioned the Tigrean domination of Ethiopian politics and economic outlets.

Therefore Addisu Legesse, and Girma Birru, has been the most favored from ANDM and OPDO, respectively.

A credible inside informant from the Tigrean side has confirmed that the committee has strongly recommended Girma Birru to be the next prime minister. The recommendation also seems to have been accepted by Meles Zenawi. Girma Biru, even though he was a latecomer to OPDO, has served Meles Zenawi with utmost loyalty. Girma is an economist and a bureaucrat who served under the previous Ethiopian regime, the Derg, at a ministerial position. According to the TPLF politburo, some of the qualifications that made Girma Birru the most favored candidate are that he has no affiliations with any Oromo opposition political party and has no nationalistic sentiment like many OPDO members. His long resume has also convinced the committee that his involvement with Derg and later on with TPLF is driven by personal and material gains rather than any political ambition. Unless there is a drastic change in Girma’s behavior and affiliation that might force the politburo to reconsider their earlier exploratory results, we will be seeing more of him on TV, radio and trips to foreign countries as a sign of his preparation to assume his new position.

So What?

This recent move by the TPLF politburo and Mr. Zenawi to appoint an Oromo as the next prime minister will undoubtedly generate a lots discussion among those who follow the politics of Ethiopia and the region. I would argue that the move is crucial for TPLF and is a tactical maneuvering by the Tigrean elites. It is an acknowledgement to the fact that the most significant opposition against the Tigrean hegemony is coming from Oromo population. Unlike the short-lived Amhara opposition groups following the contested 2005 election, the Oromos have sustained an ever increasing diplomatic, political and military pressure against TPLF. While legally functioning Oromo political parties such as Oromo National Congress (ONC) and Oromo Federalist Democratic Movement (OFDM) have publicly challenged and peacefully exposed the regimes’ gruesome actions in Oromia, OLF has stepped up its military and diplomatic pressure. The current victory of OLF in infiltrating the Ethiopian army ranks and files has permanently disabled TPLF ability and reliance on Oromos as machinery of war. Similarly OLF’s, pragmatic move in forming the Alliance for Freedom and Democracy (AFD) along with other opposition groups has, for first time, enabled the party to be increasingly trusted and embraced by non-Oromo peoples in Ethiopia. Consequently it deprived TPLF the ability to divide and rule non-Tigrean peoples of Ethiopia. Hence, in the mind of the Tigrean elites, appointing an Oromo as the next prime minister would help them to get back on track.

From the Oromo nationalists’ perspective, appointing Girma Birru or any other Oromo as the next prime minister would not affect the Oromo people positively or negatively. They argue that the Oromo people struggle isn’t about having an Oromo president or prime minister. The struggle, they say, is about dismantling the system of oppression and exploitation- it is about creating a condition that would allow the Oromo to determine their fate without external pressure. According to a prominent Oromo scholar from Addis Ababa University, this is not the first time Oromos have been appointed to leadership of Ethiopia. Teferi Bent was a president of Ethiopia between 1974-77, but nothing changed for Oromos during his rule. The empire continued to be dominated by Amharas. Teferi himself was murdered when he started to show disapproval of the killing of Oromo scholars and leaders such as Tadesse Birru and Haile Fida. Similarly Dr. Negasso Gidada who served as ceremonial president of Ethiopia under TPLF confessed that he did practically nothing for the Oromo people except prolonging the reign of TPLF. Then this scholar argues that appointing Girma Birru as prime Minster would not serve the Oromos as long as the system of governance remains under Tigrean control.

To the question whether the latest move could weaken the Oromo opposition groups, by legitimizing TPLF’s claim of democracy, a leader of one of the Oromo political parties here in Addis argued that as long as the government continue to harass, imprison and kill Oromo students, scholars and farmers, there will be impossible to slow down Oromo struggle let alone stop it.

Finally several critical questions remain unanswered. Would the Tigrean elites make final decision to take the risk of appointing an Oromo to such a key position? Could this risk taking adventure help legitimize Tigrean hegemony as they dream? Could Girma Birru remain loyal to TPLF or make historic decision, and join his fellow ex-OPDO members such as Almaz Meko, Yassin Hussein, Hassen Ali, and Gen Kemal Gelchu, and surrender state power to join Oromo nationalists? These are all question that time and only time can answer.

*The writer is a staff member of Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and can be reached at [email]faisaldc@yahoo.co.uk[/email]

Press watchdog slams Somalia media shutdown

2007-06-07T06:12:00.000-07:00

Thursday the 7th of June, 2007

Press watchdog slams Somalia media shutdown

MOGADISHU, June 7 (Reuters) - A press freedom watchdog on Thursday condemned the Somali government's closure of three independent broadcasters accused of supporting terrorism, saying the authorities' allegations were unproven.

HornAfrik, Shabelle and Koranic radio station IQK were shut down on Wednesday for the second time in six months on charges of supporting terrorism, violating the freedom of the press and opposing the Horn of Africa nation's interim government.

"The authorities hbave silenced important, independent voices on the basis of unsubstantiated accusations," Joel Simon, head of the Committee to Protect Journalists, said in a statement.

"We call on the Somali transitional government to allow these broadcasters back on the air immediately."

The broadcasters were temporarily closed when similar accusations were made in January, just weeks after the Somali government and its Ethiopian military allies seized the capital Mogadishu from a rival Islamist movement.

The latest shutdown came amid a virulent rebellion blamed on remnants of the Islamist group who have vowed to wage an "Iraq-style" insurgency against the government and Ethiopians.

Dozens of guerrilla attacks have rocked the seaside capital, spreading fear and confusion.

HornAfrik has accused the government -- chaotic Somalia's 14th attempt at central rule since 1991 -- of intentionally firing artillery shells at its offices during battles with the insurgents. The government denies it.

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Ethiopia Faces Ethnic Fallout from Somalia Intervention

2007-06-07T02:02:00.000-07:00

Ethiopia Faces Ethnic Fallout from Somalia Intervention

Jun 6, '07 11:17 AM
for everyone

By Andrew McGregor

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi

During the month of May, Ethiopia faced a series of attacks from its own ethnic-based rebel groups. The attacks come as a consequence of its invasion of Somalia last December, as the groups are attempting to take advantage of the Ethiopian army's entanglement. The U.S.-backed government of Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi now faces a new phase of armed resistance in the Muslim Ogaden region, which occupies nearly a third of modern Ethiopia and is home to four million ethnic Somalis. The recent discovery of substantial oil and mineral resources in the Ogaden region has complicated an already long-standing dispute over the territory's status. In the Ogaden, China and Malaysia are intent on reproducing their success in dominating Sudan's oil industry.

The Coptic Christian Amhara and Tigrean ethnic groups form 40% of Ethiopia's population and have traditionally formed the power base for the Ethiopian government. Zenawi's Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) is the leading element in the coalition government, known as the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). In May 2005, the EPRDF reassessed the results of a general election in which the regime was apparently defeated. The recount resulted in an EPRDF majority, and opposition to the result was ruthlessly repressed. Opposition forces regularly point out that most senior government positions are in Tigrean hands, even though Tigreans represent only six percent of Ethiopia's population of 75 million.

Political violence has afflicted the Ogaden region since its conquest by Ethiopia in the late 19th century. Ethiopia is determined to avoid a repetition of the Ogaden War of 1977-78, which began when Somali dictator Siad Barre committed four mechanized brigades in support of ethnic-Somali separatists in the Ogaden. An airlift of military equipment and aircraft from the Soviet Union and the deployment of 10,000 Cuban regulars allowed the Ethiopians to repel the invasion after more than a year of intense fighting. Today, the armed resistance is led by the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF).

The Ethiopian government's presence in the Ogaden has been almost entirely military in nature since its conquest, with little effort extended to develop the region. Ogaden human rights groups complain of the brutal military rule that has disrupted traditional social systems and devastated the local economy (Ogaden Human Rights Committee, Press Release, April 29). The government has also been accused of mismanaging local wildlife resources, exploiting limited water resources and allowing the charcoal industry to raze the region's forests. The people of the Ogaden have also been denied a voice in the development of promising mineral and petroleum deposits. Contracts are negotiated in Addis Ababa, and the exploration companies arrive with large detachments of government troops. Last November, Swedish oil company Lundin Petroleum was warned by the ONLF that its exploration activities in the Ogaden were "both unrealistic and unwelcome." The ONLF advised foreign exploration companies that Ethiopia does not control the Ogaden and that their security guarantees are worthless (Afrol News, November 14, 2006). Malaysia and India, likewise, have oil exploration firms active in the Ogaden region.

On April 24, the ONLF's "Dufaan" commando unit attacked a well-guarded Chinese-managed oil exploration site near Obala in the northern Ogaden region, resulting in the deaths of 65 Ethiopian soldiers. Nine Chinese workers were killed while a further seven were abducted "for their own safety," but released a week later (ONLF Communiqué, April 24). After the attack, Ethiopia's parliament blamed the ONLF's backers in Asmara, accusing the Eritrean regime of engaging in "international terrorism activities" (Ethiopian News Agency, May 10). According to rebel sources, the ONLF followed up its oil-field attack by taking the town of Kefalo on May 15 (http://www.oromoliberationfront.org).

The ONLF accuses Prime Minister Zenawi of currying favor from Western states by presenting himself as an ally in the "war on terrorism" and by suggesting that the ONLF has ties to al-Qaeda. The ONLF denies using terrorism, emphasizing that the movement restricts itself to attacking only legitimate targets of the regime.

The ONLF has entered into an alliance with the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) to confront "Abyssinian colonialists." Unlike the Somalis of the Ogaden, the indigenous Oromos have mixed with their Amharic neighbors since the 17th century. Today, Oromos can be found in all parts of Ethiopia and many modern Ethiopians are at least part Oromo. Not all Oromos support the creation of an independent "Oromia"—the Oromo People's Democratic Organization remains part of the EPRDF ruling coalition. With nearly equal numbers of Coptic Christian and Muslims (and a small Protestant minority), the Oromo movement is nationalistic rather than religious in character. The OLF encourages all of Ethiopia's disparate opposition groups to join a new umbrella group, called the Alliance for Freedom and Democracy.

Rebel reports claim that a joint OLF/ONLF operation in the Ogaden's Warder province killed 82 government soldiers and wounded a further 75 during six days in May (Voice of Oromo Liberation, May 17). The Ethiopian government denied these reports, describing them as simple attempts to gain media attention (Daily Monitor [Addis Ababa], May 23).

Ethiopia is following an ambitious long-term project to become a major East African energy supplier through oil exports, to construct five major hydroelectric dams and to provide a connection between the North African and South African power grids. In the meantime, the Zenawi government depends on U.S. support for its survival. The armed resistance has perceived a window of opportunity, as a large number of Ethiopian troops and military resources remain engaged in Somalia and are unable to withdrawal without the arrival of a larger African Union peacekeeping force than the 1,500 Ugandans already deployed.

Despite the TPLF regime's characterization of opposition movements as "terrorist" in nature, neither the ONLF nor the OLF appear on the U.S. or EU lists of designated terrorist organizations. These movements have been joined in their opposition to the regime by other ethnic-based opposition groups, including the Afar National Democratic Front, the Tigray People's Democratic Movement (TPDM) and the Ethiopian People's Patriotic Front (Amhara). The TPDM claims to have inflicted 127 Ethiopian government casualties in a May 7 battle in the Tigrean homeland in northwest Ethiopia (Voice of the Broad Masses of Eritrea, May 12). Many of these groups receive support from the TPLF's enemies in Eritrea.

Zenawi is currently faced with a dilemma: with no sign of AU reinforcements for Somalia, his U.S. sponsors are demanding that the Ethiopian army remain in Mogadishu despite the desperate need for these troops at home.

James Town Foundation (Global Terrorism Analysis)

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Somalia: Ethiopians kill one civilian after roadside explosion

2007-06-03T09:12:00.000-07:00

Somalia: Ethiopians kill one civilian after roadside explosion
Sun. June 03, 2007 03:19 pm.- By Mohamed Abdi Farah.

(SomaliNet) A remote controlled roadside bomb was targeted on a convoy carrying Ethiopian soldiers in north of Mogadishu, Somalia capital on Sunday and there is no immediate casualty on the Ethiopians.

An explosion was heard around ex-control crossroads in Huriwaa neighborhood, north of Mogadishu early this morning at about 6:40 am local time as Ethiopian military convoy was passing there.

Soon after the explosion which sent a huge cloud of smoke into the sky, the Ethiopians opened fire on all directions, killing a passerby and wounding a number of others near the area. They have started door to door search for suspects.

“We woke up with deafening sound of blast, I tried to find out what happened but I could not reach the area as it was sealed off by heavily armed Ethiopian soldiers,” Ismael Abdi, local resident told Somalinet.

I don’t know he said if any of the Ethiopian soldiers were hurt in the blast.

Some reports say that the explosion missed the target. No one was arrested for the latest explosion and no group has yet claimed the responsibility for the attack.

Meanwhile, in separate incidents, three persons including a policeman were killed in Mogadishu for the last 24 hours by unknown armed men.

The police man was shot dead in Bakara market in south of the capital while two civilians were slain in Yaqshid and Hodan neighborhoods in Mogadishu overnight.

The Ethiopian forces helped the interim government troops defeat the Islamic Courts Union late December last year.

Ever since the seizure of the control in whole the country five months ago, the transitional government and its allies of Ethiopians and Ugandans became targets of low level attacks by insurgents.

A suicide car bomb kills seven outside the home of Somalia primer

2007-06-03T04:59:00.000-07:00

A suicide car bomb kills seven outside the home of Somalia primer

Aweys Osman Yusuf
Breaking News
Mogadishu 03, June.07 ( Sh.M.Network) At least seven people have been killed and dozens wounded after a suicide car bomb was detonated outside the entrance of Somalia prime minister’s home in north of the capital on late Sunday afternoon.

Witnesses said suicide bomber who was driving a pick up truck packed in explosives was making his way in the premier’s house when he was intercepted by the guards.

“The truck suddenly blew up killing several guards and wounding a large number of people,” said a Somali officer in of the prime minister’s office who spoke to Shabelle on the condition of anonymity.

He said he saw the pieces of dead bodies that numbered six. “We are still busy collecting the pieces of the dead bodies. But I tell you this was a suicide bomber,” he said.

The prime minister was in the house when the blast occurred. He said, “The premier is fine and safe.”

Contingents of Somalia and Ethiopian military troops have been deployed in the area immediately.

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Somalia: AU seeks Nato air support in Somalia

2007-06-01T09:31:00.000-07:00

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 31, May.07 ( Sh.M.Network) Nato allies are studying a request from the African Union to provide air transport for its troops in Somalia, an alliance official said on Wednesday.

"We are seeking military advice on how to respond to the request. There is an intention among allies to help," said the official of an AU request he said Nato received in recent days.

The official said he understood the support would be similar to that provided to AU peacekeepers in Sudan's Darfur region, where Nato planes have since 2005 helped troop reinforcements and rotations.

The Nato official said he understood the AU wanted help "relatively quickly". The request had been passed to the Nato Military Committee made up of national defence chiefs, who will draw up proposals for how Nato could help.

Somalia has been in anarchy since warlords kicked out dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
Ethiopian troops are helping the government fight an insurgency but say they will leave when the AU force is at least half its planned strength of 8 000.

At present the AU force is made up of just 1 600 Ugandans. Other African nations have been wary of sending more soldiers, especially after four Ugandan peacekeepers were killed two weeks ago by a roadside bomb targeting their convoy.

Nato's air-transport mission in Darfur was launched in July 2005 and was its first operation on a continent previously off limits to the Western military alliance.

It says it has provided air transport to 24 000 AU peacekeepers and civilian police officers since then, as well as providing training and other logistical support. It is exploring long-term cooperation options with the AU.

(Reuters)

Somalia: One dead as double bomb blasts occur in the capital overnight

2007-05-29T15:07:00.000-07:00

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 29, May.07 ( Sh.M.Network) At least two bomb explosions occurred in north of the Somali capital overnight. Witnesses told Shabelle that they heard double bomb blasts that took place minutes of each other.

Both blasts were targeted at Somali government police forces in Heliwa neighborhood, north of Mogadishu.

Ahmed Jama, a resident, said several people including armed guards whose weapons have been licensed by the government have been apprehended.

Meanwhile unknown gunman armed with a pistol shot dead the chairman of Baled Weyne, the main town Hiran province, central Somalia. The victim was shot twice in the chest at a junction near Mogadishu’s largest bazaar, Bakara, where government police were stationed.

The police cordoned off the area after the incident which happened around 5:25 pm local time.

Since the Ethiopian backed government seized control of the insurgent strongholds in north Mogadishu, several bombings were launched on the foreign troops including the vanguard Ugandan forces from the AU.

The government asks the African Union member states to send the rest of the peacekeeping forces to the war-torn country, but security and funding concerns have discouraged other African countries from sending troops to Somalia.

President Yusuf promised to hold the national reconciliation conference by June despite the ongoing turmoil.

The chairman of the conference, Ali Mhadi Mohammed, indicated recently that the number of attendees has been reduced from 3,000 to 1,300 because of lack of funding.

Shabelle Media Network Somalia

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

2007-05-27T18:02:00.000-07:00

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

Saturday, May 26, 2007
Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

What have we Ethiopian achieved that we are rushing to celebrate the ‘Ethiopian new millennium’-2000? Whose millennium is it any way? These are questions that inquisitive minds are likely to ask when observing the rushes and the extraordinary government preparation to celebrate the new millennium in September 2007 Gregorian calendar or known to ‘Ethiopian’ as September 2000, ‘the new millennium’. That comes almost eight years later than the millennium that was celebrated on most of the world’s continents. It is the odd one out I guess. This is perhaps the only millennium of its kind in Africa to be celebrated at this time.

Let us come to the meat of the argument to attempt to answer the questions. The facts scream that Ethiopia’s 76,511,887 population according to CIA (2007) are leaving in abject poverty, major epidemic diseases such HIV/AID are spreading at alarming rates with diverse consequences, the country is involved in major wars and conflicts both internally and externally. Economy-wise there is no story worth telling; those notorious adjectives and pictures which describe the economy are still there - ‘poverty-stricken’ for instance. There is nothing false about the description because it is fact that more than 80 % of its population are unemployed. But sometimes statistics is generous; it takes from the ruling party companies and some people who can afford and says that the per capita GDP is $ 100 ‘giving’ the money to the 80 % unemployed people who do not even have that $ 100. The cause for all major cause for all these appears to be the unending wars and conflicts within and neighbouring countries because of lack of freedom and democracy to mobilise it people. Government’s war spending has even devastated the non- exiting economy for most of its people, BBC. Over 10 big rebel movements are active including the Oromo liberation front and the Ogaden Liberation Front are struggling for freedom because the government has proved that peaceful dialogues is not possible as long as it there.

To me as person who has observed and experienced the pains of this country, most people have more reason to mourn, to cry, and to curse the millennium, 2000, than celebrate it. The government has started the campaign for the celebration at the beginning of this year. A so called ‘millennium celebration secretariat’ (the whole millennium plan is found in the ruling party’s press) has offices in every region and cities in the country to coordinate the effort. EPRDF’s surrogates parties are rushing to spend ‘donors’ money and to achieve publicity internationally. That is because the government wants the world to forget the massacres on all the three de facto elections that took place from 1992-2005 where tanks and helicopters were deployed on protesting civilians to silence them from speaking against injustices of immeasurable magnitude.

Will thousands of families who lost someone to conflicts, wars, hunger even put smile, to the maximum, let alone celebrate the so called ‘Ethiopian millennium-2000’? That is impossible when everyone is aware that the government is trying to project a positive image about itself regardless of the screaming facts about what they have made that country to be. There seem to be many more reasons to mourn than celebrate. My attempt is not to finish all of them but to show that the Ethiopian government is using the millennium propaganda to campaign for acceptance amongst world leaders. The millennium is planned with a ‘great run’ event on which they want to force 30, 000 people out to run to attract the attention said.

Deconstructed, the Ethiopian millennium will be, as the preparations show, celebration of a minority ruling class and affiliates who have amassed the wealth of the poor unjustly. On the millennium date, stories will be told that ‘Ethiopia has never been colonised’. This is completely controversial areas where all people of the country have not yet formed the country by their consent that is agreed to be ‘Ethiopia’. The cultural and linguistic expression of the ruling group has been imposed on rest of the country. Excuse me if you think this is outrageous and not true. Of course I’m a lot patriotic than you think I may not be. May be I love my country better than you do. I am only describing that there is not yet a national identity or a just national state formed since the nations 100 years history by the consent of its people. Ethiopian is an empire which was born and we opened our eyes to see it clamp down on us. Yet, we are ‘Ethiopians’. The year does not matter, it can be 3000 thousand as some historians would flippantly love to write. But where are we in those hundred or 3000 thousand years pretending that history is true. It is painful to and violent to physically fight, but I am only talking, just conversation so that you can question what there really is to celebrate. As rational beings thinking is what precedes doing. Let us think and do something…

Without achieving any freedom and democracy, and as we daily see the all-rounded meltdown of the Empire (oh sorry, I forgot it is now called the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia), it is hard to celebrate but mourn, but cry, but sob, but think that our own land is not ours. What millennium with a pack of 77 million dying people. Ok, I have forgotten the ruling tyranny is not amongst the dying. It leverages the millennium celebration to cover up the stinks in its backyards to stay in power for some more years. This government off people to itself, by itself, and against people is never tired of duping donors to convince them to vote for the cancellation of its debts. The debts were used on military spending not on the bread that people desperately need as the facts suggest. And it will use the new millennium whistles for the same attraction.

Qeerransoo Biyyaa

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

2007-05-27T17:58:00.000-07:00

Amnesty International Report 2007

2007-05-27T17:28:00.000-07:00

News

Amnesty International Report 2007
ETHIOPIA

FEDERAL DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF ETHIOPIA

Head of state: Girma Wolde-Giorgis
Head of government: Meles Zenawi
Death penalty: retentionist
International Criminal Court: not ratified
There were a number of political trials of opposition party leaders, journalists and human rights defenders. A parliamentary commission reported that the security forces did not use excessive force when they killed 193 demonstrators in 2005, but defecting commission leaders said there had been excessive use of force but that their findings had been changed by the government. Scores of people were detained and some reportedly tortured for opposition activities. Civilians were detained and some were tortured or killed in the armed conflicts in the Oromia and Somali regions, and also in Gambella region. Thousands of political detainees arrested in late 2005 were released but several thousand others still remained in detention without charge or trial. The "genocide" trial of the former Dergue government (1974-1991) ended in December after 12 years with convictions of 33 members in court and 25 others in their absence, including former President Mengistu Hailemariam. Several death sentences were passed by courts but there were no executions.

Background
Five million people were dependent on emergency food aid, especially in the drought-affected Somali region.

The government continued to face armed opposition from the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) and Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), both based in Eritrea. Ethiopia supported the armed Sudan-based Eritrean Democratic Alliance (EDA).

Ethiopia sent military assistance to Somalia's Transitional Federal Government (TFG), contravening a UN arms embargo, to support it against the forces of the "Islamic Courts", which captured the capital, Mogadishu, in June and extended control over most of central and southern Somalia. In October, Ethiopia increased military assistance to the TFG after the Council of Somali Islamic Courts (COSIC) declared jihad (holy war) against Ethiopia. After increasing clashes with COSIC forces, the large Ethiopian force defeated COSIC in several days of fighting in December, and took control of Mogadishu. It placed the TFG force in power and pursued fleeing COSIC fighters to southwestern Somalia.

The UN Security Council extended until January 2007 the UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) but criticized the stalemate in negotiations over the contested border. Ethiopia said it accepted the International Boundary Commission's judgment following the 1998-2000 armed conflict, but refused to implement it.

The National Human Rights Commission, legally established in 2004, held a first workshop for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in mid-2006. It had not started operating by the end of the year.

Political trials
Following the disputed May 2005 elections and mass arrests of opposition party activists, leaders of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD), journalists and civil society activists were brought to trial in May. They faced charges including treason, outrage against the Constitution and other capital charges. The 76 defendants included Hailu Shawel, the CUD president, Berhanu Negga, an economics professor, and Mesfin Woldemariam, a retired geography professor. In addition, 34 prominent Ethiopians in exile were charged in their absence. Five Voice of America radio journalists who were US citizens were among nine defendants discharged before the trial started.

All but three defendants refused to defend themselves on the ground that they did not expect a fair trial. The trial had not concluded by the end of 2006. AI considered they were prisoners of conscience and sent a trial observer in October.

Four other CUD-related trials on similar charges were not completed at the end of the year. In the trial of Kifle Tigeneh, an elected member of parliament, and 32 other people, some defendants complained in court that they had been tortured to make false confessions. Berhane Mogese, a lawyer, was on trial with 22 others.

A separate trial of Mesfin Woldemariam and Berhanu Negga continued. They were accused of instigating violence during demonstrations at Addis Ababa University in 2000.

Journalists
Fourteen independent press journalists arrested in November 2005 were tried with the CUD leaders. Kifle Mulat, president of the Ethiopian Free Press Journalists Association, was charged in his absence and sought asylum abroad. Two other journalists, Solomon Aregawi and Goshu Moges, were tried in separate capital cases.

All private newspapers which had criticized the government in connection with the elections remained shut down. Many journalists fled the country.

• Frezer Negash, a reporter for a US-based website, was arrested in February when three months pregnant, but released on bail two weeks later.

At least four journalists were charged under the Press Law in connection with alleged offences committed some years previously.

• In March, Abraham Gebrekidan of Politika magazine was jailed for a year for allegedly publishing false information.

A new Press Law, proposed by the government in 2003 to replace the 1992 Press Law, was still under debate. Combined with provisions in the new Criminal Code of May 2005, it could lead to further legal restrictions on the freedom of the media and imprisonment of journalists.

Human rights defenders
Among defendants in the CUD trial were four human rights defenders: Professor Mesfin Woldemariam, former president of the Ethiopian Human Rights Council; Daniel Bekelle, a lawyer and staff member of ActionAid; Netsanet Demissie, chair of the Organization for Social Justice in Ethiopia; and Kassahun Kebede, an Ethiopian Teachers Association (ETA) official.

Two ETA officials were arrested in October without explanation but released on bail after some days. Three other officials were arrested in December and allegedly tortured. The ETA, Ethiopia's longest-established trade union, continued to contest court actions by the Ministry of Justice to ban it and replace it by a pro-government organization bearing the same name.

Political arrests
Dozens of people were arrested in Addis Ababa in late 2006 for possession of a book secretly written in prison by Berhanu Negga or a calendar containing images of the CUD prisoners and calling for civil disobedience.

• Yealemzawde Bekelle, a lawyer working for the European Commission in Addis Ababa, was arrested in October, reportedly after being named by a tortured prisoner. She was released on bail after eight days' incommunicado detention.

Several thousand opposition supporters detained in different parts of the country after the November 2005 demonstration were released on bail after some weeks or months in detention without charge. However, some thousands were believed to be still detained without charge or trial during 2006.

Detentions and killings in the regions
In the Oromia region, there were large-scale arrests in different areas during anti-government demonstrations, particularly by school and college students. Some protesters called for the release of Diribi Demissie, a Mecha Tulema Association community leader on trial since 2004. He and his co-defendants were charged with supporting the OLF, but AI considered them prisoners of conscience. Hundreds of Oromo people detained in November 2005 were reportedly still held during 2006 without charge or trial, as well as others detained in previous years for alleged OLF connections.

Numerous people accused of ONLF connections were reportedly detained in the Somali region, and many political prisoners arrested in previous years were still held without charge or trial. Extrajudicial executions were also reported.

In Gambela region in the southwest, there were scores of arrests of members of the Anuak ethnic group. Hundreds of people arrested during mass killings in Gambela town in December 2003 were still detained without charge or trial.

Some 60 peaceful demonstrators belonging to the Sidama ethnic group in the southern region were arrested in Awassa and other southern towns in March. They were all released on bail by May.

Commission of inquiry
In March parliament established a Commission of Inquiry to investigate the killings during the 2005 demonstrations. The Commission, headed by a judge, took evidence from the public and NGOs and interviewed CUD leaders in prison. In July, the Commission's chairperson fled the country and his replacement did the same in September. They alleged that the Prime Minister had instructed them to change their finding - that the security forces had committed excessive force - which they were not willing to do.

In November the report presented to parliament stated that the Commission had found no evidence of excessive use of force by the security forces. The list of people killed numbered 193, including six police officers, far more than the 78 reported by police. The Commission found that 765 people, including 99 women and several children, had been wounded, almost four times the police figure.

Victims had been shot by army or police bullets, some in the back while escaping and others possibly targeted by snipers. At least 17 people imprisoned earlier in Kaliti prison, mostly on remand for ordinary criminal offences but also some political prisoners, were shot dead in their cells at the same time on suspicion of supporting the demonstrations and trying to escape.

Torture and ill-treatment
Torture was reported by methods including electric shocks and beatings on the feet while tied upside down. The victims were political prisoners, particularly those detained on suspicion of supporting armed political groups such as the OLF and ONLF.

• Alemayehu Fantu, an engineer and supermarket owner in Addis Ababa, was reportedly tortured in October to make him admit to publishing or distributing the CUD calendar, and to name others. He was taken to court with visible injuries, which the judges did not investigate, but released on bail on November.

Several of the CUD leaders held in Kaliti prison in Addis Ababa were at first denied medical treatment for illnesses contracted as a result of harsh and unhygienic prison conditions. Professor Mesfin Woldemariam, aged 76, was refused physiotherapy for back and leg complaints. There were fears for his health as a result of his hunger strikes in December 2005 and February 2006. He recovered quickly, however, after being treated in hospital for pneumonia in September. There were serious delays in provision of medical treatment for Hailu Shawel for eye surgery, and Berhanu Negga for a heart complaint.

• Serkalem Fasil, a journalist who was seven months pregnant, was taken to hospital to give birth, but denied intensive care treatment for her baby son. She was returned to prison soon after the birth, taking the baby with her.

Four prisoners of conscience were moved as punishment to the Central Prison (Karchele), which was in the process of demolition. CUD leaders Muluneh Eyuel and Amanuel Araya and journalists Eskinder Negga and Sissay Agena were kept for over two months in dark underground cells in solitary confinement.

Dergue trial
The trial of members of the 1974 military government known as the Dergue ended in December after 12 years. Of the 72 people originally charged, 33 had been in custody since 1991, 14 others had died in custody and 25 were tried in their absence, including former President Mengistu Hailemariam, who had asylum in Zimbabwe. All were found guilty of capital offences including genocide and mass killings, with sentencing due in 2007. The long series of other trials of officials of the former government for killings during the "Red Terror" campaign against "anti-revolutionaries" in 1977-79 was nearly completed. Many defendants were jailed for long periods (which most had already served, leading to their release) and several death sentences were imposed. Many convictions went to appeal.

Violence against women
According to Ethiopian women's organizations, violence against women through domestic violence, rape and harmful traditional practices, including female genital mutilation and early marriage, remained widespread. Female genital mutilation was prevalent among many ethnic groups of different faiths in remote rural areas and abductions of girls were associated with early marriages.

Death penalty
Ten death sentences for ordinary crimes were commuted by presidential clemency in September. Several other death sentences for alleged politically related violent crimes were still in force. There were no executions.

AI country reports/visits
Report
• Ethiopia: Prisoners of conscience on trial for treason - opposition party leaders, human rights defenders and journalists (AI Index: AFR 25/013/2006)

TPLF and Tigrean Identity politics

2007-05-27T16:41:00.001-07:00

TPLF and Tigrean Identity politics
Kallacha Dubbi

The TPLF dominated Ethiopian leadership holds the view that the Eritrean government plays the most destabilizing role in the Horn of Africa. The Ethiopian opposition forces and Eritrea on the other hand believe that it is the TPLF led Ethiopian government that is severely destabilizing the region. And yet the US foreign office is concerned by a "rising extremism of Islam", accusation which rests pointedly at Somalia and perhaps somehow at the Sudan.

I argue that the TPLF's politics has been a source of material, political, community, and intellectual development of the Tigrean ethnic class over the last 16 years, and thus created an identity which has been the primary source of instability in the region. The genesis and consequences of this identity politics vis-à-vis the rest of Ethiopia have been bashed repeatedly but not put in an argued perspective of a short format.

On Eritrea's role: Eritrea's role in the region has often been grossly exaggerated by promoting the human rights abuse in Eritrea into the forefront of the regional politics. Given that Eritrea's human rights records are inherent results of the perpetual state of war in which it is forcedly placed by Meles, and given that there is no ethnic cleansing in that country, Meles' has clearly tipped the scale of human rights abuse for the region if not for the world. No matter how intensely human rights are abused in Eritrea, these abuses simply do not constitute a regional agenda capable of destabilizing the Horn. This is by no means to argue that Eritrea does not have its share of human rights burden in satisfying the mood of an emerging middle class and rewarding aspirations of a population that may be growing impatient of life under perpetual cloud of war, anticipating the unknown. While legitimately critiquing Eritrea's human rights records, one must bare in mind Eritrea's unruly neighbor who has vested interest in making things go wrong in Eritrea. Simply stated, the Eritrean has to temporarily choose either a full blown human rights or compromise its hard-earned freedom. Here, I am sure I am opening a Pandora's Box - a tired debate of the Eritrean community in the hope that a complete stranger may offer un-invested view point. But I know for sure, that Eritrea's friendship with the majority of the Ethiopian population including the oppressed carries a strategic weight for peace and prosperity in the region, including the oppressor.

On Extreme Islam: In the past many writers have argued that the rise of extreme Islam in the Horn was a designed panic or a bogus goat for Ethiopia's venture into Somalia, and even more likely, a scheme to facilitate the US's recoup in the region. This seems consistent with the creation of a new U.S. Africa Command headquarters, AFRICOM, to coordinate all U.S. military and security interests throughout the continent. Although there were extreme Islamic attacks to US establishments in the Horn, it is simply not known if these attacks could have precipitated into a powerhouse capable of overtaking Somalia and launching precipitous attacks to US interests there or anywhere. The US simply chose not to take a risk, no matter what the cost of siding with an unpopular regime in Ethiopia would be. So, there is a funny logic to the US interest in the Horn - it doesn't want to place the Ethiopian opposition on a hopeless bench, but it also doesn't want to demote Meles in which case it would have to deal with Somalia in person. Thus, the current US policy in east Africa is a result of the mishmash of its disapproval of Meles' abuse of human rights and its desire to guard what it perceives as US strategic interest in the Horn. In this policy, one can clearly read into the level of neglect the US demonstrates towards the genesis and potential impact of the Tigrean hegemony, the potential destruction of the Ethiopian state as a consequence, and the critical role of the TPLF towards this precarious end. The cost of this destruction could be much higher than the feared rise of Islamists in Somalia, which many believe had orderly manifestations and localized tendencies.

On the Tigrean hegemony: There is a thesis among Ethiopian historians that Tigrean nationalism has been historically belligerent and more intolerant than the rest. The Ethiopian historian Bahiru Zewde writes about the last Tigrean emperor, Yohannes, as follows: "The Muslims of Wallo were told to renounce their faith and embrace Christianity or face confiscation of their land and property. Thus, two prominent converts were Muhammad Ali, baptized into the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as Mikael, and Abba Wataw, who became Hayle-Maryam. Others confirmed outwardly, praying to the Christian God in the daytime and to the Muslim Allah at night. . There was no room for Islam in his (Yohannes) ideological world. The thrust of his repression directed against Wallo forced some of them to flee to other areas. an Argobba Muslim leader by the name Sheik Talha fled to the Sudan with his followers."

Coming from Tigrean leaders, there is a parallel to be drawn between Yohannes' attempt to exterminate Islam from Ethiopia and Meles' decision to invade Somalia to suppress unarmed Islamists emerging in a country where international embargo has virtually dried any war machinery.

The TPLF started its guerilla resistance with a simple motto: initially to create independent Tigray, but later to free Tigray/Ethiopia from invidious governance of the Derg, by running a political ideology that openly claimed to be more Marxist than the Marxists who then ruled the country with a vicious duty to kill. The combination of its leftist claim through and by which the current Tigrean-based Ethiopian leadership usurped power, with its ethnic identity which it used to galvanize mass support and cleanse out the EPRP from the Asimba hills of Tigrean territory, give the TPLF its ethno-political distinctiveness.

The TPLF's distinctiveness sharply contrasted the ethno-political composition of the Derg; the somewhat inclusive but Amhara dominated Derg army was suddenly replaced by an exclusively Tigrean army, reigning over the entire country. This unexpected collapse of the sense of Amhara polity, though camouflaged as Ethiopian, created a retreated void in the military role of the rest of Ethiopia, especially the south whose modest share was in the rise. Within a growing Tigrean ruling class, this void was marked by diacritic presence of the xPDOs whose role simply legitimized Tigrean supremacy than dilute its pronounced exclusivity as intended. It was clear Meles and the TPLF have fussily calculated that Tigray elites will be assured and guaranteed of continued rule of Ethiopia so long as this new army remained exclusively Tigrean, or so long as its command is not challenged militarily. The exclusivity of the TPLF army now turned into "Ethiopian army" has been morphed the same way as the civic landscape was morphed - unchallenging and obedient members of the southern societies were recruited into the army and kept at low ranks and also at bay. A few handpicked non-Tigrean military personnel with little capacity were appointed as Generals but they were controlled by Tigrean captains operating from the same office as the General. The level of mistrust and the unconventionality of this military hierarchy are similar to that of racist South Africa where an ordinary white soldier gave orders to black army officers. For this reason, the non-Tigrean Ethiopian army has low moral, and it can be safely argued, that there is indeed no Ethiopian army but Tigrean. A recent opposition report states that 90% of the Ethiopian Generals are Tigreans, 80% for the Colonels. For a Tigrean population constituting only about 6% of Ethiopia's population, this ratio offers a grim reality of the Ethiopian political perspective.

This passed November the Ethiopian Ministry of Defense suspended three generals: Maj-Gen Alemshet Degefe, ex-Ethiopian air force commander, Brig-Gen Kumer Asfaw and Brig-Gen Asamenew Tsege. This suspension comes after the defection of several high ranking officers including Gen. Kemal Gelchu who joined the OLF. This has effectively rid the top army echelon of non-Tigreans unless the very few left whose loyalty is assured through their excessive brutality or shared racketeering.

The TPLF has therefore plainly demonstrated that it uses Tigrean identity politics as a tactic - to manipulate the Ethiopian political power blocks based on self-identification as an eminent supra-ethnic group that shall enjoy the innate of being and becoming above the crowd. With such manipulation, the TPLF has effectively marginalized the Tigrean people who are now perceived to be outside of the mainstream society. The Tigreo-ethiopian common basis has broken down, and there seem to be no real opportunities in the near sight for peacefully ending this marginalization.

In a recent brave political gesture, the OLF created a political platform, the AFD, partly to facilitate a means by which this Tigrean marginalization can be put to an end, and all political forces of the country be integrated into a mainstream constructive policy without sabotaging discrete ethnic cultures or identities. The idea was born from an authentic concern that Tigrean intolerance is primarily responsible for this marginalization, and that the OLF should take a leading role to change the mainstream politics of the country to create a safe bridge of communication or even a forbearing pluralism, without recourse to the Tigrean oppressive homogeneity now at play. Ironically, this constructive proposal was cause for a split among some Ethiopian long-distance nationalists, and the TPLF completely rejected the initiative opting for a beefed up military offensive against the OLF instead. The initiative put the political ideologies of Ethiopia that thrive with and for a passion to dominate, in the defensive. It also exposed the tenacity of some Ethiopian elites to their passion for ethnic domination.

In a general sense, Tigrean nationalism has manifested itself as a carrier of the official state ideology of Ethiopia expressed along economic, ethnic, or cultural lines. In fact, it now seems obvious, that the Tigrean domination of Ethiopia has intoxicated the Tigrean upper and middle class transforming its ethnicity to xenophobic.

The TPLF derives its political legitimacy from the active participation of Tigreans, matched by the will of the TPLF to represent the will of the Tigreans above and beyond that of the rest. Simply stated, the TPLF is openly discriminatory in its policy. In the long run, this discrimination is as destructive to the Tigrean identity as it is to the non-Tigreans, a recipe for a collective demise. The hitherto failure of the Tigrean scholars and political elites to see this self-destruction and side with the ultimate good of the Tigrean population, should be taken as an inconceivably ill-bred and short-sighted politics, unfortunately so common in Ethiopia.

The TPLF has implied and manifested that the country is a community of Tigreans who contribute to the maintenance and strength of the TPLF, and that other ethnic groups or even the individual exist to contribute to this Tigrean goal. In the words of Mussolini: "Tutto nello Stato, niente al di fuori dello Stato, nulla contro lo Stato", meaning "everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State" - and of course here the state is the TPLF.

It is also likely that the TPLF will revive irredentist claims to Eritrea to boost Ethiopian nationalism and draw aggressive attention from orthodox Ethiopia to defend against a perceived Eritrean threat or simply reclaim a sea outlet for the country. This will be driven by a will to buy more political life than a legitimate concern for Ethiopia. But in the eyes of conservative Ethiopians, the entire Eritrea, or at least Asab remains the irredenta, offering a pool of political backup. The TPLF has sufficiently proven that it indeed manifests aggressive irredentist traits by annexing parts of Gondar and Wallo to Tigrean territory, and attempting to cut a piece of Eritrean land which resulted in the death of 70,000 people.

In conclusion, given the extreme nature of the blatant ethnic inequity perpetuated by Meles in favor of Tigray, which has put Tigray and Tigreans in a presently reviled and potentially liable position, it defies logic that we do not see mass defiance of Tigrean elites to the TPLF domination. Furthermore, the cruel stance of past Tigrean leadership to Islam should have demanded caution from Meles in his venture to Somalia to squash Islam. It also defies conventional logic that the level of dislike for the TPLF which is now rampant in and among Ethiopians goes on virtually ignored and unnoticed by the TPLF. The widespread psychological rejection of TPLF as a bad thing that happened to the country, the level of popular resistance that seems to be curing into hate for Tigray, is not sensed by Tigrean elites - for the sake of Tigreans if not peace. It is mind-boggling to know that Meles spends millions of dollars to buy the support of the US government through highly placed lobbyists while doing everything to loose the respect and support of the entire Ethiopian population. This Tigrean identity politics, selfish in its value, vicious in its extent, and shortsited in its vision, is the primary destabilizing force in the Horn of Africa.

May 25, 2007

KD

Somalia: Four Somali government officials kidnapped

2007-05-27T16:35:00.000-07:00

Somalia: Four Somali government officials kidnapped
Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 27, May.07 ( Sh.M.Network) Four Somali government officials based in Hamar Jajab district, south of the capital, have been abducted by unknown gunmen overnight, according to relatives.

Ahmed Sheik Mohamoud, the district commissioner, revealed to the press on Sunday that the four officials in the division were forcibly taken with gun point by unknown armed men in a small car with no plate number.

“These men were among the local administrators assigned for the district by the federal government and until now we did not hear from their captors, neither do we know why they have been kidnapped,” he said.

He stressed the report has been submitted to the mayor, Mohammed Dheere, who promised restoring peace and security in the gun-infested city, Mogadishu.

This is the first time that unidentified gun men took government officials hostage No group has yet claimed responsibility for the seizure of these officials.

Meanwhile Ethiopia reopens its embassy in the Somali capital Mogadishu for the first time in 16 years. Ethiopian foreign minister, Seum Mesfin, erected the Ethiopian flag inside the newly opened embassy near the presidential palace (Villa Somalia) at the center of the capital.

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

2007-05-27T13:57:00.000-07:00

Saturday, May 26, 2007

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

What have we Ethiopian achieved that we are rushing to celebrate the ‘Ethiopian new millennium’-2000? Whose millennium is it any way? These are questions that inquisitive minds are likely to ask when observing the rushes and the extraordinary government preparation to celebrate the new millennium in September 2007 Gregorian calendar or known to ‘Ethiopian’ as September 2000, ‘the new millennium’. That comes almost eight years later than the millennium that was celebrated on most of the world’s continents. It is the odd one out I guess. This is perhaps the only millennium of its kind in Africa to be celebrated at this time.

Let us come to the meat of the argument to attempt to answer the questions. The facts scream that Ethiopia’s 76,511,887 population according to CIA (2007) are leaving in abject poverty, major epidemic diseases such HIV/AID are spreading at alarming rates with diverse consequences, the country is involved in major wars and conflicts both internally and externally. Economy-wise there is no story worth telling; those notorious adjectives and pictures which describe the economy are still there - ‘poverty-stricken’ for instance. There is nothing false about the description because it is fact that more than 80 % of its population are unemployed. But sometimes statistics is generous; it takes from the ruling party companies and some people who can afford and says that the per capita GDP is $ 100 ‘giving’ the money to the 80 % unemployed people who do not even have that $ 100. The cause for all major cause for all these appears to be the unending wars and conflicts within and neighbouring countries because of lack of freedom and democracy to mobilise it people. Government’s war spending has even devastated the non- exiting economy for most of its people, BBC. Over 10 big rebel movements are active including the Oromo liberation front and the Ogaden Liberation Front are struggling for freedom because the government has proved that peaceful dialogues is not possible as long as it there.

To me as person who has observed and experienced the pains of this country, most people have more reason to mourn, to cry, and to curse the millennium, 2000, than celebrate it. The government has started the campaign for the celebration at the beginning of this year. A so called ‘millennium celebration secretariat’ (the whole millennium plan is found in the ruling party’s press) has offices in every region and cities in the country to coordinate the effort. EPRDF’s surrogates parties are rushing to spend ‘donors’ money and to achieve publicity internationally. That is because the government wants the world to forget the massacres on all the three de facto elections that took place from 1992-2005 where tanks and helicopters were deployed on protesting civilians to silence them from speaking against injustices of immeasurable magnitude.

Will thousands of families who lost someone to conflicts, wars, hunger even put smile, to the maximum, let alone celebrate the so called ‘Ethiopian millennium-2000’? That is impossible when everyone is aware that the government is trying to project a positive image about itself regardless of the screaming facts about what they have made that country to be. There seem to be many more reasons to mourn than celebrate. My attempt is not to finish all of them but to show that the Ethiopian government is using the millennium propaganda to campaign for acceptance amongst world leaders. The millennium is planned with a ‘great run’ event on which they want to force 30, 000 people out to run to attract the attention said.

Deconstructed, the Ethiopian millennium will be, as the preparations show, celebration of a minority ruling class and affiliates who have amassed the wealth of the poor unjustly. On the millennium date, stories will be told that ‘Ethiopia has never been colonised’. This is completely controversial areas where all people of the country have not yet formed the country by their consent that is agreed to be ‘Ethiopia’. The cultural and linguistic expression of the ruling group has been imposed on rest of the country. Excuse me if you think this is outrageous and not true. Of course I’m a lot patriotic than you think I may not be. May be I love my country better than you do. I am only describing that there is not yet a national identity or a just national state formed since the nations 100 years history by the consent of its people. Ethiopian is an empire which was born and we opened our eyes to see it clamp down on us. Yet, we are ‘Ethiopians’. The year does not matter, it can be 3000 thousand as some historians would flippantly love to write. But where are we in those hundred or 3000 thousand years pretending that history is true. It is painful to and violent to physically fight, but I am only talking, just conversation so that you can question what there really is to celebrate. As rational beings thinking is what precedes doing. Let us think and do something…

Without achieving any freedom and democracy, and as we daily see the all-rounded meltdown of the Empire (oh sorry, I forgot it is now called the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia), it is hard to celebrate but mourn, but cry, but sob, but think that our own land is not ours. What millennium with a pack of 77 million dying people. Ok, I have forgotten the ruling tyranny is not amongst the dying. It leverages the millennium celebration to cover up the stinks in its backyards to stay in power for some more years. This government off people to itself, by itself, and against people is never tired of duping donors to convince them to vote for the cancellation of its debts. The debts were used on military spending not on the bread that people desperately need as the facts suggest. And it will use the new millennium whistles for the same attraction.

Qeerransoo Biyyaa

Africa's secret prisons

2007-05-24T07:18:00.000-07:00

May 21, 2007

BYLINE: Christopher Thompson

HIGHLIGHT:

Observations on rendition

BODY:

Regional African wars rarely excite much media interest and Ethiopia's invasion into neighbouring Somalia has been widely greeted with a collective sigh. Even reports of civilian bombardment and television pictures of refugees have failed to elicit much response; events across the Red Sea in Iraq have constantly overshadowed the violence elsewhere.

But, with the world's gaze averted towards the Middle East, the United States government has quietly opened up another front in its war on terror, in East Africa - catching many innocent people in the crossfire.

Central to the new strategy is the use of Ethiopian jails in the "rendition" and interrogation of terror suspects. Hundreds of these, including Britons, have been held incommunicado by the Ethiopian and Kenyan authorities on suspicion of terrorism, according to US-based Human Rights Watch.

In what has been described as "Africa's Guantanamo", the organisation accuses Washington of complicity in the maltreatment of these detainees and of using Ethiopia as a proxy ally in Somalia.

Ethiopia's official rationale for its December invasion was to restore order in a country that has been without a central government since the 1991 collapse of the dictatorship led by strongman Siad Barre. The Ethiopians claimed they were "invited" to invade by Somalia's Transitional Federal Government, which had been prevented from entering Mogadishu, the de facto capital, by fighters from the militant Union of Islamic Courts, which held sway there at the time.

And the US has had its own score to settle.

"The US gave [Ethiopia] the green light and logistical support . . . similar to Israel's intervention in Lebanon," says Cedric Barnes, a member of the international affairs think-tank Chatham House's Horn of Africa group. "It was after al-Qaeda suspects for the [1998] bombing of its embassies in Nairobi [Kenya] and Dar es Salaam [Tanzania]."

The stakes were raised when the US used air strikes against three al-Qaeda leaders attempting to flee into Kenya in January, killing scores of civilians. Later, the Pentagon admitted the bombs may have missed their target after none of the intended was found dead.

At the same time, US special forces, along with Kenyan and Ethiopian authorities, were arresting more suspects in operations along the Kenyan-Somali border in December 2006 and January 2007. An unknown number were subsequently "rendered" onwards to Ethiopia.

Last month, Ethiopia's foreign affairs ministry acknowledged that 41 people were held "after being captured by the joint forces of the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia and Ethiopia". It added that 29 were listed for release, including four Britons, and that there were no "secret" prisons.

But, according to manifests shown to the New Statesman by Human Rights Watch, at least 85 people were deported from Kenya to Somalia on three flights chartered by two little-known airlines, African Express Airways and Sudan's Blue Bird Aviation, on 20 and 27 January and 10 February.

The other 44 captives remain missing.

In April, a man called Ali Jog, a blue-eyed, blond-haired Danish Muslim convert, was released from Ethiopia after being captured in Somalia and flown to a jail in Addis Ababa. Jog appeared on none of the flight logs - sparking fears that < B>Ethiopia is holding more prisoners than it admits.

One human-rights activist disputes Ethiopia's figures, saying there are "up to 300 prisoners". Activists believe that many of these are more likely to be opponents of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's government than terrorists.

Unfortunately, there is no way of knowing the exact number of prisoners. They are kept in secret detention that bears all the hallmarks of a Guantanamo-type policy: cross-border transfers without judicial proceedings, military tribunals, abusive conditions and the prospect of indefinite imprisonment. "They are being held incommunicado - like Guantanamo - so we represent their families because we've had no contact," says Jonathan Hafetz, the New-York-based lawyer acting on behalf of Amir Meshal, a US citizen.

Meanwhile, there are reports that western intelligence agencies are taking advantage of these conditions - and, by ext ension, Ethiopia's poor human-rights record - to conduct clandestine interrogations.

Last month, the US government conceded that interviews with the detainees have produced "valuable information" but denied the detentions were part of a covert rendition programme.

In an eerie echo of US strategy during its post-invasion "round-ups" in Afghanistan, Halima Hashim, a Kenyan citizen who fled Somalia after the bombardment in December, told the UK human-rights organisation Reprieve that the US had been paying off locals in return for captured foreigners.

According to Hashim, after she took refuge in a Somali hospital, Ethiopian troops entered, and seized the records. "Then, they came back and took foreigners out of the hospital," she said. "At that time, the Americans and Ethiopians were buying foreign nationals from the Somali people."

Research by the US-based Seton Hall University School of Law concluded that 66 per cent of the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay seized in Pakistan were handed over to the Americans for a bounty. Five years on, not one of those prisoners stands charged with a crime.

Do those stranded in Ethiopia await the same fate?

EPRDF MP defects

2007-05-21T11:34:00.000-07:00

News

EPRDF MP defects

18 May 2007 (EMF) -- Fikru Jeldessa Nikuss, former member of Benishangul Gumuz Front (BGPDUF) and an MP (EPRDF) applied asylum in The Netherlands escaping the ever growing persecutions, it was revealed today.

"The political persecutions are very severing in the regional states, if one is against the will of the ruling party." Fikru said.

"One faces torture, imprisonment and death unless he complies with the interests of the ruling elites. More than 300 political dissents including former vice president of the region, Mr. Abdul Mohamed Ibrahim, are languishing in prison. Hundreds, including president of the regional Supreme Court, Ms. Zeneba Mohammed, are also forced to exile in Sudan." he added.

Having lost almost all seats in the May 2005 general election, the regime has panicked and vowed vengeance against the people. Fikru says there has been increasing discontent among MPs, officer corps and dissent in Ethiopia.

He also said the Meles Zenawi's regime became more irresponsible after the May 2005 election, complaining that the regime has appointed Mr. Al Bedri, a Sudanese citizen, as head of Education to the region. Mr. Bedri escaped to Sudan stealing Millions of birr allocated to the region.

Mr. Fikru, whose responsibilities include head of auditor general in the region, was twice locked up at tatek military camp for exposing the severe corruptions of the authorities.

Commenting on Ethiopia's ethnic federalism, Fikru says, Benishangul Gumuz region is not different from other local states. All key positions are controlled by the Tigrian People's Liberation Front (TPLF) in all the regions.

In practice, Mr. Zeray Asgedom, who is TPLF Central Committee Members and a close ally of Meles Zenawi, is administering the region. The president of the region, Mr. Yaregal Aysheshum is simply a puppet similar to many other regional states. His representation is only symbolic and aimed to deceive the people in the region.

"During my stay in house, I have become increasingly frustrated with the conduct of the TPLF-led government." Fikru said.

"More than 400 people were killed as a result of ethnic clash between Benishangul Gumuz and Shinasha, which was caused by the regime as its strategy to divide and rule." He added.

Nordland: Somalia's Rent-a-Tree Disaster

2007-05-21T11:25:00.000-07:00

Nordland: Somalia's Rent-a-Tree Disaster

WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Rod Nordland

May 18, 2007 (Newsweek) - How bad is it in Somalia? Bad enough that people fleeing the capital have been reduced to renting trees for shelter. It's the sort of thing that happens when drug-addled warlords roam the countryside, imposing taxes of 50 percent on aid recipients. And the sort of thing to be expected of a government whose prime minister, Ali Mohamad Gedi, has publicly accused the United Nations agency feeding the country of spreading cholera along with food deliveries. And that's the internationally recognized government, which enjoys U.S. support, although it is widely unpopular in southern Somalia and the capital, Mogadishu. That's not surprising, since the prime minister is from a clan that's hostile to the clan that dominates the capital, and the president, Abdulahi Yusuf, is from Puntland, in northern Somalia, a breakaway region that is best known as the homeland of Somalia's pirates, who once again are on the prowl, bedeviling aid shipments even further. "Is there actually any hope for the future in Somalia?" said the World Food Program's Somalia country director, Peter
Goossens. "I don't know."

Sixteen years after the established government fell in Somalia, the East African nation just lurches from one disaster to another, some man-made, some natural, each one deepening the humanitarian crisis. Last year marked more than six years of a record-breaking drought, followed by renewed fighting as the Islamic Courts Union sought to oust feuding clan warlords, which they did, establishing a semblance of order in the unruly capital and most of the country for the first time in a decade and a half. Then the drought ended-only to be replaced by devastating floods, cutting off much of the population from aid deliveries. And by the end of 2006, warfare resumed, with Ethiopia, encouraged by the United States, invading Somalia to oust the Islamic Courts, which were a little too pro-Al Qaeda for U.S. tastes, and prop up the Transitional Federal Government (TFG), an amalgamation of former warlords with little popular support in Somalia, but recognized internationally. Faced with Ethiopian tanks and warplanes, the ICU quickly collapsed and for the first time, the TFG took up office in the capital.

This year promises to be no better, and probably still worse. The Courts fought back, particularly in Mogadishu, and the Ethiopians cracked down, killing 2,000 people in the capital (population about 1 million), and sending 365,000 residents fleeing into the countryside; 190,000 of them fled in April alone. It was the biggest exodus from the city in 16 years of conflict, and many thousands more were displaced within, unable to flee or get to their homes. For the first time, residents in Mogadishu had to turn to aid agencies for food aid-something previously only needed in the countryside. There it's even worse, with renewed flooding in this year's rainy season; presently World Food Program food supplies are only reaching 40 to 50 percent of people, and a fifth of those who fled the capital are completely without aid, according to WFP Somalia Country Director Peter Goossens.

The TFG and its Ethiopian allies announced the insurgency was quelled two weeks ago, encouraging African Union (AU) countries to send troops to replace the Ethiopians, who are widely unpopular in Somalia even among those who didn't care for Islamist rule. So far only Uganda has sent a vanguard of 1,500 troops, far less than the 30,000 Ethiopians that the AU intends to replace, but other African countries have balked, saying there's no peace for peacekeepers to keep. While it's true that Mogadishu was quieter than it had been in months, the Islamists were still fighting back, this time using Iraq-style methods of roadside bombs, even suicide car bombings-tactics never before seen in Somalia. When John Holmes, the U.N.'s top emergency relief official, came to visit on May 12, three bombs were set along his route-the first went off and missed him by a few hundred yards, killing three Somalis. And when TFG president Yusuf met Uganda's president Yoweri Museveni on May 16 to thank him for his support, another roadside bomb went off in Mogadishu, killing four Ugandan soldiers and
wounding five more.

"Next it will be a plague of locusts," one aid official said, knocking on wood.

Ethiopia has publicly declared that it wants to leave Somalia, but unless a large African Union contingent replaces them, the TFG will simply collapse; they were never any match for the Islamists. "We have a mandate after 16 years of no government to try and return to sanity," said Paddy Ankunda, spokesman for the AU force. "We can't chicken out. There is a lot of goodwill among the populace, and we have the support of the Somali people."

The solution, everyone agrees, is a national reconciliation conference, in which the government and Somalia's powerful clans work out a political settlement that can quiet Mogadishu. That conference, however, has been postponed twice, with no clear date for its resumption. And diplomats worry that the TFG's stance that its opponents are all terrorists makes reconciliation impossible. Although the Islamic Courts did have extremist elements, there were also many moderate elements among them, particularly from the powerful Hawiye clan, which is dominant in Mogadishu. "Before you can have a national conference you need to solve this problem in Mogadishu," said Mario Raffaelli, the Italian envoy for Somalia. "To stop blasts like this, you need to have support of the population."

TFG officials, however, seem to be in denial. The only problem, said government spokesman Hussein Mohammed, is that "Al Qaeda is hiding in the city," which otherwise is generally safe. He claims that bombs are being smuggled in from Iran with Farsi writing on them. "Most of the clans don't want to fight, they're too tired. The people linked to Al Qaeda want to kill all the time, they want to continue fighting," he says. The government has denied there was any mass flight from Mogadishu, saying there were only 40,000 who fled and many had returned-another point aid workers dispute. As for complaints from the aid community that authorities were blocking relief efforts, Mohammed called that a "totally baseless claim."

Officials at the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs say their tallies of refugees from Mogadishu are based on long experience and a widespread network of aid agencies working in Somalia, and no one in the aid community disputes the estimates. What's less clear is what percentage of those who fled is getting aid. Raffaelli said it's as low as 15-20 percent; the WFP puts the figure at 80 percent, although nationwide only 40-50 percent of Somalis are being reached now, particularly because of problems getting access to flooded areas. In any case, hundreds of thousands of Somalis are in a perilous condition, and even those refugees who have received food aid often don't have shelter or medical care. In many areas warlords have reasserted their power, aligned to no particular side, taxing aid shipments and demanding half of the aid that individual recipients receive. To make matters worse, there's fear of another cholera epidemic, with 20,000 suspected cholera cases and 700 deaths so far this year in south and central Somalia. Incredibly, two weeks ago prime minister Gedi gave a radio interview in which he accused the World Food Programme of spreading cholera through its food shipments, on which most of the population of southern Somalia depends. Throughout Middle and Lower Shabele provinces, there are reports of refugees arriving in areas where there's already a severe crisis due to flooding and blocked aid deliveries, and being forced to take refuge under trees-and even being obliged to pay rent for those trees. In the Dibiyada district just outside Mogadishu, NEWSWEEK's Abukar Albadri found a group of people who fled Mogadishu huddled under a large acacia tree on a farmstead, plastic sheets tied to the trunk. "We are eight families living under this tree," said Hani Hussein, 27, a mother of three. "We're neighbors and we wanted to stay together. At night all the men sleep on one side, the children and women on the other." For that privilege, she said they paid the local farmer $3 a family for a month, in advance, $24 in all. Farmer Hundubow Ali Hared laughingly acknowledged it. "People are destroying the grass in our farms that we need to feed our animals," he said, and "they are using our fields as toilets."Under another tree not far away, a midwife, herself a displaced person, delivered a baby to another refugee, with no hot water or medical supplies. In all, an estimated 20,000 families are taking refuge in the Dibiyada district, local aid workers said.

The WFP has had growing difficulty getting food supplies into Somalia, as fewer and fewer shipping companies agree to carry grain shipments after a renewal of Somali piracy along the coast. Piracy had been stamped out during the Courts' time, as the Islamists shut down their land bases. Now pirates operating from Puntland in the north seem to do so with impunity. And with normal commercial ports in Mogadishu and Kismayo closed by fighting or instability, the WFP has been offloading supplies onto beaches-a laborious process. "Somehow we still manage to do it," said Goossens.

Lately even American officials have been critical of the TFG. "I think it is very clear that the key to solving the situation in Somalia and stabilizing it is to have this inclusive dialogue," the U.S. assistant secretary of state for Africa, Jendayi Frazer, told Voice of America recently. "And so trying to get the Transitional Federal Government to reach out to the various clans and sub-clans is a large part of our diplomacy." If they don't, said Raffaelli, the danger is that more and more Somalis will want to see a return of the Islamic Courts, who at least provided peace and stability in Mogadishu when they were in power last year. "People are already saying, for six months we have tasted security. We need desperately to come back to this."

In aid-worker jargon, the Somalis seem to have developed "extreme coping mechanisms." Whatever nature and man throw at them, they seem for the most part to survive it-although a large part of the credit goes to a massive relief effort involving hundreds of NGOs and U.N. agencies. Goossens worries however that this latest phase could prove the most dangerous. If the Islamists' campaign of roadside and suicide bombing reaches the widespread, indiscriminate level seen in Iraq, it could make it impossible for those agencies to function. Those who fled Mogadishu went to areas where U.N. surveys already reported previous levels of malnutrition above the emergency threshold of 15 percent, and in some cases above 20 percent of the population. "You can't just send food to an area, you have to send people to make sure something useful happens to that food," he said. "And if bombing stops our people from going, I might as well dump that food into the water." In other words, for all Somalia's travails, it could still get worse.

With Abukar Albadri in Mogadishu and Scott Johnson in Nairobi

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18745786/site/newsweek/page/4/

Somalia: An Ethiopian convoy undergoes a roadside bomb explosion

2007-05-21T07:18:00.000-07:00

Somalia: An Ethiopian convoy undergoes a roadside bomb explosion

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 21, May.07 ( Sh.M.Network) An Ethiopian military convoy narrowly escaped from a roadside bomb explosion in early Monday morning. The convoy was passing the main road in Dayniile district, northeast of the Somali capital Mogadishu.

Witnesses told Shabelle that the bomb was hidden in a pile of junk on the roadside and was remotely detonated as the Ethiopians passed. Wariiri Ali Gabow, a resident, told Shabelle that the Ethiopians shot dead a civilian and detained one suspect. “None of the Ethiopian forces was harmed in the explosion,” he said.

Gabow also said the victim was killed after he ran as the Ethiopians were telling him to stop.

In a Similar incident yesterday, Mogadishu mayor survived from a bomb blast. Mohammed Dheere told journalists that an Islamic insurgent was intending to kill him.

“The bomber was on top of a tree closer to the road which my convoy was passing. My bodyguards shot him down after the explosion,” Dheere told journalists Sunday.

At least three bomb explosions occurred in Mogadishu in the past 24 hours.

Somalia’s transitional government promised a crackdown on the insurgents following its seizure of the capital early this month.

Somali and Ethiopian troops supported by tanks and helicopter gunships defeated the remnants of the Islamist fighters in Mogadishu’s fiercest battle that happened between 24 March and 12 April.

Residents including relatives of the victim came out after the incident and took the deceased to his home nearby.

Somalia: A bomb blast kills five Ugandan troops in Mogadishu

2007-05-16T02:50:00.000-07:00

Aweys Osman Yusuf

Mogadishu 16, May.07 ( Sh.M.Network) At least five AU/UPDF forces were killed in a bomb explosion on Wednesday morning. AU spokesman in Somalia, Paddy Ankunda, has told Shabelle that five Ugandans perished in the bomb blast that was targeted at an AU convoy passing near former Finance Ministry in Mogadishu’s Hamar Weyne district, an area frequented by Somali government troops.

AU spokesman in Somalia, Paddy Ankunda

Witnesses told Shabelle that they saw pieces of human flesh on the ground where the explosion occurred.

Government soldiers soon sealed off the area after the incident.

AU troops in Somalia have been busy de-mining Mogadishu lately as they seemed to gain confidence from the population in Mogadishu. They have never been targeted until Wednesday morning.

The Somalia government has not commented on the event which came as the volatile country’s president, Abdulahi Yusuf, is in the Ugandan capital, Kampala where he and his counterpart Mussevani, appealed for the deployment of more African peacekeepers in Somalia.

Meanwhile Mogadishu mayor, Mohammed Dheere, imposed a curfew on Heliwa district, north of Mogadishu, the Somali capital, after the district commissioner, Abdulahi Sheikow, was killed.

Dheere said the curfew will be in place until security is improved.

Abdulahi Ibrahim Sahal, Hamar Weyne chairman, said two children were wounded in the explosion.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s bomb attack

African Liberation Fronts and al Qaeda: a Most Disastrous Confusion

2007-05-13T13:20:00.000-07:00

Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis
May 8, 2007
We have repeatedly illuminated the dangers ensuing from the continuation of the existence of the bogus-Ethiopian Tyranny; Tigray dictator Meles Zenawi’s involvement in Somalia made the situation even more difficult, as it exposed numerous Liberation Fronts to the eventuality of a fruitful cooperation with the Islamic Courts of Justice, al Qaeda’s most notorious ally in Africa. This is no good news for the West, and the entire world…

This combination of struggles, of oppressed African nations for Independence, and of fanatic Islamists for World leadership, would bring forth the ultimate collapse of the West, helping Africa become a vast tinderbox from the Horn of Africa to the Atlas mountains. The effects would be cataclysmic if compared with the insignificant repercussions of 60 years of Palestinian ‘problem’ and the somewhat important consequences of the failed US-led invasion of Iraq.

The Western administrations have no other choice but to satisfy the need for Independence, Democracy, Self-determination, and Freedom of numerous African peoples, from the Oromos, the Sidamas, the Afars, and the Ogadenis of Abyssinia, to the Furs, the Nuers, the Dinkas, the Bejas, and the Nubians of Sudan, and from the Berbers of Kabylia to the Banaadiris of Somalia.

It has to be immediately assessed and ultimately understood that numerous decades of political oppression and economic dispossession of natural resources, and two centuries of cultural alienation and colonial education have created an explosive amalgamation of extreme despair and utmost deception; when you have nothing more to lose, you can cooperate – in order to get your national target materialized – with absolutely anyone.

This has not happened so far; the African Liberation movements displayed refrain and reserve of an unparalleled political maturity. The US administration must seize the opportunity as long as it stands. Perpetuating the despair and the deception or pushing African Liberation leaderships to the menacing embrace of al Qaeda can bring only disaster – to the West, not to Africans, as they have already attested disaster, it’s nothing new to most of them.

The Game is Over: you Cannot Save Tyrannical bogus-Ethiopia!

In this regard, it is of seminal importance for world diplomats and apprentice mass media representatives to refrain from making the confusion of the utmost catastrophe, namely the equation between the African Liberation fronts and the al Qaeda allies. In reality, the former are numerous and the latter are scarce.

Under terms of true judgment and accurate estimation of the African societies’ conditions, the former control vast oppressed masses and few guns, whereas the latter, being few, have already formed a vast arsenal that they intend to make available to the former within the context of an Anti-Western alliance.

The situation is at the brink of abyss, with irresponsible UN diplomats and corrupt media representatives having crossed the Rubicon only to weep tremendously on their fallacious assumptions.

We take as example a recent press release issued by the OLF (Oromo Liberation Front) whereby the leading Oromo Liberation organization denounces categorically the unwise discourses of the UN Monitoring Group on Somalia that shamelessly associates the OLF with the Islamic Courts Union.

The press release that we publish hereby integrally reports a similarly irresponsible attitude displayed by the Associated Press.

The UN, the African Union, the US, China, the EU and other global players must realize as soon as possible the reality:

- You cannot save the collapsing, bogus-Ethiopian Tyranny; save at least Africa from the clutches of Islamic Terrorism!

UN Monitoring Group on Somalia and the Associated Press; they have it wrong!

In October 2006 the UN Monitoring Group on Somalia reported to the Security Council Committee on Somalia that that the OLF was fighting on the side of the Islamic Courts Union. At the time the OLF rejected this baseless Ethiopian propaganda that turned into UN news stating as a matter of policy the OLF does not interference in neighboring states internal affairs, and that Somalia is no exception. The UN Monitoring Group on Somalia simply copied Ethiopian propaganda without any legitimate substantiation and converted it to "news".

The occupying forces of Ethiopia in Somalia have captured thousands of Ethiopian refugees who lived in Somalia for years, killed many of them, and tortured even more to submission and admission of guilt. These individuals are then used through state owned Ethiopia mass media as evidence of OLF armed presence in Somalia. Because of the track record of the Ethiopian regime, this propaganda should not have been trusted. For example, in a letter dated March 22, 2007, the Human Rights Watch, in its letter to Kenyan Director of Political Affairs, Mr. Thomas Amolo, wrote the following:

"Human Rights Watch fears that many of the detainees will face mistreatment

and possibly torture or execution in Ethiopian custody. Human Rights Watch has previously documented that Ethiopian forces routinely engage in torture of criminal, political and military detainees, and in its recent human rights country report on Ethiopia, the US State Department noted that in Ethiopia “There were numerous credible reports that security officials often beat or mistreated detainees. Opposition political parties reported frequent and systematic abuse of their supporters by police and regional militias. . . . in detention centers police often physically abused detainees... Ethiopian security services may suspect some individuals of having connections to Ethiopian insurgency movements, in which case they may face torture or even summary execution if delivered into Ethiopian custody."

The OLF is an Oromo secular political organization rooted inside Oromia, and has no military objectives in any other country than Oromia. It boasts diplomatic presence around the world, including the USA. The OLF abides by international laws and standards, and rejects targeting civilians and terror as a means of achieving its objectives.

In a more recent incident, the Associated Press has attempted to connect an

Ethiopian-born U.S. citizen named Sisaye Dinssa, recently convicted of currency smuggling as an "OLF financier". The said culprit is neither a member of the OLF; neither do we have any record of his financial support to the OLF. We regret that AP sensationalized such news item to the extent of labeling and defaming a legitimate political organization. The OLF channels all its business in North America, financial included, legally, through its bureau in Washington DC. We see no reason to resort to illegal smuggling or use of one.

=======================

Note: in the picture we see that more than half of Abyssinia's territory belongs to the oppressed Oromos who fight for Independence and Democracy.

African Liberation Fronts and al Qaeda: a Most Disastrous Confusion

2007-05-13T09:50:00.000-07:00

Africa: Better off without us?

2007-05-06T18:41:00.000-07:00

Africa: Better off without us?
Cover story
Robert Calderisi
Monday 26th June 2006

A year on from the G8 and Live 8, parts of Africa are making good progress. But it's not thanks to the money and the debt relief that often prop up the wrong kind of leader. By Robert Calderisi

Cameroon's president, Paul Biya, looks at the world upside down. In power for almost a quarter-century and seen by almost no one except his aide-de-camp, Biya regards his country's saintly Catholic cleric Christian Tumi as an opposition leader because of his strong support for human rights. "I was born a Cameroonian," the down-to-earth cardinal told me, "and became a Christian and priest. Why can't I have views about what is happening in my country?" On May Day this year, the international community voted for Biya rather than Tumi by awarding the country $4.9bn in debt relief.

Another winner in the moral sweepstakes has been the small Republic of Congo, run by a man who overthrew an elected government in 1997. The African Union once vowed to shun anyone who took power militarily. Yet, five months ago, the continent's supreme political body chose Congo's Denis Sassou-Nguesso as its chairman. True, he was a compromise candidate, as it was Sudan's turn to take charge and a last-minute sense of decency prevailed. But the AU might as well have installed Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe. The world was also kind to Sassou-Nguesso, writing off $2.9bn of Congolese debt in March. To his credit, the World Bank president, Paul Wolfowitz, tried to block this measure on learning that Sassou-Nguesso had chalked up an $81,000 bill at a New York hotel. He was overruled. The World Bank press release said grudgingly that something would have to give if the money was "not to be hijacked by vested interests".

Such stories show why many Africans are disgusted with their governments, and with the west's well-meaning efforts to help. As many sceptics predicted, progress towards implementing the decisions taken at last year's much-hyped G8 summit - especially doubling aid by 2010 - has been slow.

Africa has made significant strides over the past year, but none of them was a consequence of Gleneagles.

The most important development was probably also the dullest. In February, Nigeria was given a formal credit rating by international bond agencies for the first time. This was due not just to high oil prices, but also to the determination of the finance minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who has reversed decades of economic mismanagement. Nigeria still has a long way to go to gain the full confidence of the international community - and its own people - but good economic housekeeping in the continent's most populous country is good news for all.

Economic growth has been rising, too, giving African governments breathing space, after decades of being choked between burgeoning populations and falling markets. Unfortunately, most of that growth was the result of the oil boom rather than improvements in agriculture, the source of Africa's greatest wealth. Oil has also filled the coffers of some unsavoury regimes (Angola, Gabon, Cameroon, Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea), most of whose leaders have been in office for more than 20 years. The dean of the group, Omar Bongo of Gabon, came to power when Harold Wilson was managing a now-forgotten sterling crisis in 1967.

Over the past year, however, some of Africa's "big men" got their come-uppance - or at least an inkling of their limitations. Liberia's Charles Taylor was arrested on the Nigeria-Cameroon border and taken into custody by the international tribunal in Freetown, which will probe his role in human-rights abuses in Sierra Leone's civil war era. Kenya's president, Mwai Kibaki, suffered a humiliating defeat in the November referendum on a revised constitution that would have given him more power. The Ethiopian prime minister, Meles Zenawi, faced street battles over the dubious results of the May 2005 elections. In Uganda, Yoweri Museveni settled for 59 per cent of the vote. And in Nigeria, the senate, not western editorial writers, killed President Obasanjo's chances of revising his country's constitution and running for a third term.

Making way

The "big men" also had to make way for Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, a survivor of many election campaigns and death threats in Liberia, whose main rival for the presidency was an international soccer star. At her inauguration, she instructed incoming ministers to open their bank accounts to public scrutiny - and promised to get the lights to stay on in Monrovia by July this year. Six hundred miles to the east, Benin, the first black African country to change ruling parties democratically in 1991, held its fourth multi-party presidential election in a row.

There was even encouragement on the HIV/Aids front, with the World Health Organisation estimating that 17 per cent of those requiring antiretroviral drugs were actually receiving them. While still woefully short of overall needs, the coverage was higher than anyone could have predicted just a few years ago.

But it is too early to be upbeat about Africa. Like slowing the spread of HIV/Aids, progress in opening up the political debate has barely begun. In 1983, the novelist Chinua Achebe wrote, in a blistering essay called "The Trouble with Nigeria" that still applies to most of Africa: "There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian character. There is nothing wrong with the Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else. The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal example which are the hallmarks of true leadership."

Africans hoped that foreign aid could be used to make their governments more open and honest. But in many places, the opposite has been true, and in the one big showdown with a dictator this year, it was the west that backed down.

The Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline was meant to be different. It was the largest private sector investment in Africa in a decade when its principal backer, ExxonMobil, invited the World Bank to help design it properly. Central to the effort was a law assigning most of the oil revenues to reducing poverty in Chad. Last December, the country changed the law to include spending on defence. The World Bank promptly shut down its operations in Chad and blocked the overseas account holding the money. This was a sound decision, even though some thought it an overreaction - as if bankers were expected to invite defaulters on mortgages for a friendly drink.

Four months later, the bank backed off when Chad's president, Idriss Déby, threatened to close the pipeline altogether. The geopolitics was understandable: rebels supported by Chad's neighbour, Sudan, had invaded the capital that month, and few people wanted the Déby government overthrown while it was hosting 200,000 refugees from the Darfur region next door. But the political impact and moral consequences were poisonous. Direct military assistance would have been better than allowing the government a free hand with the oil revenues. Like Nigeria's success in improving its public finan ces, this damp squib of a showdown in Chad had continent-wide implications - but, in Chad's case, of a negative kind.

Sticks and carrots

In other places, gangrene lurks just below the surface. On 2 March 2006, Kenya's internal security minister justified a raid on a major Nairobi newspaper and television station that had criticised the government: "When you rattle a snake, you must expect to be bitten." Certainly, the African Union's feeble efforts to corral Mugabe do not point to the "peer justice" promised in the much-heralded New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad) that the continent adopted in 2001.

Darfur's people continue to suffer terribly. Although the international community may not have been able to stop the Rwandan genocide in 1994, it could have done more to halt the carnage in western Sudan. The Rwandan killings lasted a hundred days. Darfur has been going on for three years. Despite the presence of AU troops and a series of truces, the murders, rapes and pillaging continue. Some people question the importance of "yet another" African crisis. But this is no ordinary event. Most civil conflicts in Africa, in places as diverse as Côte d'Ivoire and the so-called Democratic Republic of Congo, have been ended or checked by a combination of international sticks and carrots and the presence of foreign peacekeepers. The horrors of Liberia and Sierra Leone - though not yet Somalia - are a thing of the past. But Darfur is like a seeping sore, reminding us every day that no one has been crueller to Africans in recent decades than Africans themselves.

In the past five years, western countries have taken great steps to protect themselves (in Afghanistan and Iraq), and have stirred up a hornet's nest. Africans may rightly ask how the west can respond so forcefully to the deaths of 3,000 Americans in New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania on 11 September 2001, and yet hesitate to send troops into Sudan after the killing of 180,000 people and the displacement of two million others. US efforts to stem international terrorism in Somalia by supporting local warlords have fallen flat, as the wrong set of villains took Mogadishu this month. International efforts to save the people of Darfur, who face daily terrorism, might have proved more successful.

Which brings us back to foreign aid. As long as dictatorship prevails across much of Africa, the objectives of the G8 leaders at Gleneagles will remain a dead letter.

Countries as canny as Ghana, Mali and Mozambique, which have steadily opened their economies to private investors and their politics to different opinions, do not receive enough aid, while others such as Ethiopia and Cameroon receive far too much. The west must start using more sticks and fewer carrots. And more aid should be targeted at specific Africa-wide causes, such as establishing regional universities and researching new drugs for malaria, rather than just dispersing it over many countries, watering weeds as well as flowers.

A year on from the Live 8 concerts, energies should be aimed at other causes - for instance, barring western arms sales to unrepresentative governments, quarantining any state that imprisons journalists for expressing personal opinions, abolishing laws that make it a crime to criticise African presidents, focusing aid on the few countries that have used it properly, or seizing illicit African holdings in western banks, the way the British navy intercepted slaving ships on the high seas once the abominable trade in human beings was outlawed. Few African leaders would understand that parallel, but most of their citizens would.

Robert Calderisi's "The Trouble With Africa: why foreign aid isn't working" will be published by Yale University Press in July (£18.99)

Qilxuu Jaarsoo

Ethiopia rebels 'agree UN truce'

Why the Pit is a Bull: The treat of Tigrean nationalism

Why the pit is a Bull

Ethiopia, Somalia accused of war crimes

Oromia And Ethiopia (A new book by prof. Asafa Jalata)

Displaced Oromians race to free their homeland

Letter from U.S. Senator Feingold On Reported Ogaden Human Rights Abuses

Somalia: A Grenade blast kills an Ethiopian soldier in north Mogadishu

Questions shower Ethiopian ex-leader

Minneapolis Holds "Run for Oromia"

Ethiopian regime turns its critics into untouchables

Bipartisan duo of Ex-congressional Heavyweights Blocking action against Ethiopia

Tightening the Noose Around Zenaw

UN and Ethiopia reached agreement to allow food aid to Ogaden

Problematic Ally The moral hazards of dealing with Ethiopia's Meles Zenawi

violence kills three soldiers, four civilians in Somali capital

Congressman called for relaese of all political prisoners

Somalia: Conference venue attacked again

Somalia: Roadside bomb explosion wounds six government soldiers

HR 2003

Somalia: Conference venue attacked again

Somalia: Conference venue attacked again

Somalia: Roadside bomb explosion wounds six government soldiers

HR 2003

Somalia Pm : EU and U.S. seem to fail the country's reconciliation conference

6 killed in separate battles in Somali capital

Ethiopia life jail terms attacked

Chronicle of an African Renaissance Foretold

Somalia: Six killed in Mogadishu grenade attacks

CUD leaders sentenced to life in prison

Somalia: A roadside bomb blast targets an Ethiopian water truck in Mogadishu

Heavy shelling in Somali capital

Somalia: Seven bomb blasts kill 3 and wound 13 in Mogadishu

Heavy exchanges of gunfire underway in Mogadishu as Ethiopians search houses

Somalia: Ethiopians soldiers killed in roadside bomb blast in Mogadishu

Greg winter's report from Ogadenia

Former Somalia Defense Minister Wounded In A Roadside Bomb Blast.

OPDOf shibbisuu?

Somalia: Five bomb explosions rock Mogadishu amid second night-time curfew

Fighting erupts in Kismayo

Ethiopian Planes Carpet-Bomb Ogaden Cities

Somalia: A bomb explosion kills five including 4 Somali policemen

Qophii Galagala Aadaa Oromoo J

Ethiopian and Somali government forces come under attack in Mogadishu

Somali MP accuses Ethiopian forces of robbery

London student’s jungle war escape led to ‘rendition’ trap

London student’s jungle war escape led to ‘rendition’ trap

Ogaden National Liberation Front denies VOA report

Ogaden National Liberation Front denies VOA report Press Release June 9, 2007

On Meles interview

Press watchdog slams Somalia media shutdown

Ethiopia Faces Ethnic Fallout from Somalia Intervention

Somalia: Ethiopians kill one civilian after roadside explosion

A suicide car bomb kills seven outside the home of Somalia primer

Somalia: AU seeks Nato air support in Somalia

Somalia: One dead as double bomb blasts occur in the capital overnight

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

Amnesty International Report 2007

TPLF and Tigrean Identity politics

Somalia: Four Somali government officials kidnapped

Celebrating the Ethiopian millennium under poverty, war and oppression

Saturday, May 26, 2007

Africa's secret prisons

EPRDF MP defects

Nordland: Somalia's Rent-a-Tree Disaster

Somalia: An Ethiopian convoy undergoes a roadside bomb explosion

Somalia: A bomb blast kills five Ugandan troops in Mogadishu

African Liberation Fronts and al Qaeda: a Most Disastrous Confusion

African Liberation Fronts and al Qaeda: a Most Disastrous Confusion

Africa: Better off without us?

Ogaden National Liberation Front denies VOA report
Press Release
June 9, 2007