NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — A leading human rights group on Tuesday accused Ethiopian Woyanne troops in Somalia of killing civilians and committing atrocities, including slitting people’s throats, gouging out eyes and gang-raping women.
In a new report, Amnesty International detailed chilling witness accounts of indiscriminate killings in the Horn of Africa country and called on the international community to stop the bloodshed.
Ethiopia’s government Woyanne said the report was unbalanced and “categorically wrong.”
The London-based rights group said testimony it received suggested all parties to Somalia’s conflict have committed war crimes. But it singled out Ethiopian Woyanne troops, who are in the country to back Somalia’s U.N.-sponsored government, for some of the worst violations.
The rights group said it obtained scores of reports of killings by Ethiopian Woyanne troops that Somalis have described as “slaughtering like goats.” In one case, “a young child’s throat was slit by Ethiopian soldiers in front of the child’s mother,” the report says.
Ethiopia’s Woyanne Information Minister Berhanu Hailu said the report was “totally unfounded.”
“Normally when they report they do not balance it out. They have to go and see the reality for themselves. They shouldn’t report from abroad saying this is happening,” he told The Associated Press in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa.
In western Ethiopia, UNHCR has officially closed two of the four camps hosting refugees from South Sudan following a successful repatriation season in which some 23,000 refugees from the two camps — Bonga and Dimma – went home. The returns were assisted by UNHCR, mainly to Blue Nile state and to a number of other states in South Sudan. About 2,000 refugees made their way home using their own means.
Before the start of the return operation in March 2006, the two camps, which opened in the early 1990s, had a combined population of nearly 28,000 refugees. Last week’s closures bring to three the number of camps which have been emptied in western Ethiopia since last year. Yarenja was closed in March 2007.
The repatriation operation has now halted for the rainy season and is scheduled to resume again in November. Some 3,000 refugees remaining in the two camps will be transferred either to Fugnido in the Gambella region or to Sherkole camp in the Benishangul-Gumuz region. Some of the refugees awaiting camp transfer have indicated that they will be returning home to Sudan later in the year using their own means.
UNHCR is now working with the government and other partners, particularly the UN Country Team in Ethiopia, to rehabilitate the camp environment and infrastructure, including water systems, schools, health centres, warehouses, office and residential premises, skills training workshops and equipment. These facilities will be handed over to the local administration for use by the local community.
The regional administration in Gambella has already decided to convert Bonga camp into an agricultural training centre. UNHCR is enlisting the support of other organisations such as UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) to help transform the camp facilities. In Dimma, there are proposals to use the facilities to set up a technical training college.
In a separate development yesterday (Monday), the return home of Sudanese refugees from Sherkole camp in north-western Ethiopia came to a halt ahead of the rainy season, which makes the roads impassable. Between mid-March and 5 May, a total of 4,523 of the more than 6,000 refugees were helped to return, mainly to the Upper Nile State in South Sudan. So far, UNHCR has helped more than 30,000 Sudanese refugees to return home from Ethiopia since the launch of voluntary repatriation.
Overall, some 275,000 Sudanese refugees have returned to South Sudan Since 2006 from various surrounding countries, including Uganda, Ethiopia, Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Kenya. Some 125,000 have returned with UNHCR assistance. This year alone, some 47,000 Sudanese refugees have returned home, mainly with UNHCR assistance.
Ethiopians for Obama invites all Ethiopians in the DC metro area to Duke City on Tuesday, May 6th to watch the results of the Indiana and North Carolina Primaries.
Tuesday will be a historic night, it could mark the night that Obama wraps up the Democratic nomination and takes a decisive step towards the White House. Duke City will broadcast the primary results live, you will be able to hear the broadcast loud and clear through the premium sound system. Once Obama delivers the victory speech, DJ Yared will be playing the best of Ethiopian and American music to celebrate this momentous event.
Duke City is located in the heart of “Little Ethiopia” on U St NW Washington DC. The upstairs section is reserved for Ethiopians for Obama, all are welcome to watch history in the making.
Event Details:
Place: Duke City
Address: 1208 U St. NW Washington DC
Time: 7:00 PM-victory
Cost: Free all night
Please RSVP at [email protected] We look forward to meeting you and witnessing history in the making. Please forward to all your friends and family. See attached document for the official flyer.
An Ethiopian rebel group has accused the government of Somalia’s semi-autonomous Puntland region of detaining Ethiopians and handing them over to Ethiopian Woyanne security forces. The Ethiopian government Woyanne denies the accusation that follows similar reports of increased security cooperation between Ethiopia Woyanne and Puntland. Derek Kilner reports for VOA’s East Africa bureau in Nairobi.
The Ogaden National Liberation Front, which is waging an insurgency in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia that borders Puntland, said Puntland officials detained several Ethiopians from Ogaden on May 1, handing at least five over to Ethiopian Woyanne officials.
The Ogaden National Liberation Front says the incident was part of a broader security agreement between Puntland and Ethiopia Woyanne to send Ethiopians suspected of involvement with the rebels into Ethiopia Woyanne custody.
The May 1 incident follows a trip by Puntland’s president Adde Muse to Ethiopia Woyanne last month and has been reported in the Somali media in recent days. But Bereket Simon, [propaganda] advisor to Ethiopian Prime Minister dictator Meles Zenawi, denies the existence of an agreement with Puntland.
“Basically, we cooperate with regional governments in many respects,” Simon said. “Of course, fighting terrorism is a common agenda for all of us because terrorism is a menace in this part of the world. But we have no deals that infringe on the rights of citizens. So basically, it is a wild accusation.”
Last month, the Ogaden National Liberation Front said two of its members were arrested by Puntland authorities and delivered to Ethiopian Woyanne officials. The rebels say such actions violate international law, because the detainees face a substantial risk of torture or execution by the Ethiopian government Woyanne.
Puntland officials have denied those claims. VOA was unable to reach Puntland officials for comment on the rebel’s recent accusations.
The Ogaden National Liberation Front has been operating for more than two decades in Ethiopia’s Ogaden, an ethnically Somali region that has been contested in the past by the governments of Ethiopia and Somalia.
Many Ethiopians displaced by the conflict have fled across the border to Puntland, and Ethiopia Woyanne says members of the Ogaden National Liberation Front have organized operations from Puntland.
Puntland has warm relations with Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government, whose president, Abdullahi Yusuf, is a former president of Puntland and has supported Yusuf’s cooperation with the Ethiopian government Woyanne. But Puntland has generally avoided the conflict that has wracked southern Somalia, and the extradition of Ethiopian citizens is seen as a new development.
Ethiopian Woyanne troops have occupied Somalia since December 2006, when they backed Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government in wresting control of the capital Mogadishu from the Islamic Courts Union. But since then, a variety of Islamist and clan-based groups have been waging a growing insurgency against the Ethiopian Woyanne presence.
New York, May 5, 2008—Police in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, have detained a journalist and three support staffers of a private entertainment magazine since May 2. Local journalists say the detentions are related to a cover story about the high-profile trial of Ethiopia’s most popular pop singer, Tewodros Kassahun.
Deputy Editor and owner Alemayehu Mahtemework and the three media workers from the monthly Enku remained in police custody today without charges and were expected to be taken to court on Tuesday, according to the same sources. Local journalists also reported that Editor-in-Chief Fekadu Mahtemework went into hiding after being summoned for questioning on Saturday.
Mahtemework and the others were picked up early Friday evening as they carried 10,000 copies of the current edition from the printer to their offices. The police impounded all the copies of the paper, allegedly after receiving a tip from an informant at the printer that the cover story could lead to “incitement,” according to local journalists. The story focused on the trial of jailed pop music icon and government critic Kassahun, better known as Teddy Afro, and included interviews with his lawyer and fans.
“The seizure of Enku and the arrests of its staffers is a continuation of the Ethiopian government’s ongoing efforts to stifle the private press from freely reporting on important public issues,” said CPJ’s executive director Joel Simon. “We call on the Ethiopian authorities to abandon these crude tactics of intimidation and release our colleagues immediately. We also condemn this flagrant act of censorship and ask that the authorities return the confiscated copies of the magazine.”
Speaking to CPJ via telephone today, Ethiopian Information Ministry spokesman Zemedkun Tekle claimed no knowledge of the matter, but declared that the police had the right to intervene if there are “problems” with any content. He referred inquiries to the police. CPJ’s calls to Ethiopian federal police were not immediately returned.
Kassahun was arrested and charged last month in connection with a hit-and-run incident in 2006, according to news reports. Kassahun’s popular song, “Jah Yasteseryal,” became a popular anthem of anti-government protesters during unrest following the disputed 2005 parliamentary elections, according to local sources.
Despite releasing 15 Ethiopian journalists who were jailed on trumped-up anti-state charges last year in connection with a brutal 2005 media crackdown, Ethiopian authorities have not relented in their long-standing pattern of repression of independent media through intimidation, arrests, criminal prosecutions, and legal and administrative restraints, CPJ research has found.
In February, police detained three journalists from Islamic newspapers for two weeks and confiscated equipment and filed criminal defamation charges in connection with a public petition critical of the education minister. Meanwhile, three independent journalists acquitted and set free last year have been blocked from launching new newspapers, and two Eritrean journalists, arrested in 2006, continue to be held incommunicado in Ethiopia.
CPJ is a New York-based, independent, nonprofit organization that works to safeguard press freedom worldwide. For more information, visit www.cpj.org.
