The butcher of Addis Ababa, Meles Zenawi, is going to Lisbone, Portugal, on December 7 to attend the second EU African summit.
Ethiopians in Europe have organized a protest demonstration in front of the meeting hall to show the participant world leaders that mass murderers like Meles Zenawi shouldn’t be invited to such a meeting.
From: Donald L Fischer, PhD
Psychologist and Professor, Missouri State University
To: Senators Biden and Lugar, Secretary Rice, and others
I am writing to express my concern about the widespread violations of human rights which the Meles-led Ethiopian government is committing against its citizens, particularly those in the Oromia, Gambela, Ogaden and other regions. I graduated from high school in Addis Ababa and lived in Ethiopia for several years prior to that during the 1960s while my parents were there working. I know the Ethiopian people to be wonderful human beings and my heart goes out to them in their efforts to bring democracy and the rule of law to their beautiful country.
I recently learned of the Ethiopian government’s militaristic “carpet bombing” to “flush out rebels” in the Ogaden, acts which annihilate defenseless civilians while destroying their livestock, granaries, wells and shelter. Human rights advocacy organizations like the Empowerment Initiative are calling for our government to verify that our military trainers have in no way been complicit to these actions of the Ethiopian military and that the weaponry and ordinances being used against defenseless civilians are not being supplied by the United States.
The violence which the Meles-led government commits is not limited to Ethiopian citizens living within the country. Physical assaults and the assignation of Oromo refugees in Kenya have been reported in the media and documented by the Advocacy for the Fundamental Rights of Oromos and Others (AFRO-O), a human rights organization based in Maryland. These victims were living in a guarded camp in Nairobi and are believed to be registered with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees.
International human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, are unanimous in their recognition and condemnation of the Ethiopian government’s extra-judicial imprisonment and torture of citizens who are believed to support opposition political parties and their leadership. The AFRO-O recently released the names of 148 Oromos currently being detained in this effort to suppress any opposition to the tyranny of Meles and his government.
Please help bring the fate of these victims to the attention of appropriate agencies and leaders and join with efforts to change the conditions under which Oromos and other Ethiopians suffer at the hands of the Meles-led Ethiopian government. I urge you to put the principles framed in our Constitution’s Bill of Rights and the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights into practice and act now to hold the Ethiopian government accountable for these crimes against humanity and, in particular, support HR 2003 (the Ethiopian Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007), a bipartisan bill authored by Representatives Payne and Smith which is now pending in the Senate.
Donald L Fischer, PhD
Psychologist and Professor
Missouri State University
Springfield, Missouri 65804
[email protected]
By Alemayehu Zemedkun
If you happened to have watched a video clip recently posted on Aigaforum.com or Waltainfo.com on November 27, 2007, the ruling party chairman and Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Mr. Meles Zenawie responded to question directed to him by members of the Ethiopian parliament pertaining to the war in Somalia, the recently enacted bill known as HR2003 which was passed unanimously by the United States Congress and the border conflict with Eritrea that could spill into a full blown war any moment now. The Prime Ministers response on the war in Somalia, HR2003 specifically the role of some opposition leaders for supporting HR 2003 was laughable at best comical. The audacity of the Prime Minister in accusing opposition party members for supporting HR2003 who are currently member of the parliament, the possibility of war with Eritrea was theatrical display that even Hollywood best directors couldn’t not muster.
The premier is obviously trying to distort the public by providing false information and misleading facts which does not reflect the reality on the ground. This is deliberately designed to evade the public’s attention from the culminating storm since the elections in May of 2005. Let’s examine some of the points:-
1. Prime Minister Meles Zenawie, attempted to reduced the whole mission of HR 2003 as a bill designed to just establish an independent election board which comprises of opposition party members. He deliberately didn’t want to recognize other crucial points which are in the bill, such as bringing an independent, equitable and transparent justice system. Bringing to justice those who are responsible for the massacre of over 200 innocent people after the total crackdown of the peaceful protest following the May 2005 elections. Finally his attempt to compare apples to oranges by distorting the American election system providing facts which are not compatible with the Americal electoral system. You don’t have to be a legal scholar or an election expert to know that the United States political system had a Federal Election Commission that monitors the financial as well as some administrative procedures during elections. Moreover, each state has an election board that enacts election procedures and work to resolve election disputes.
2. The premier, criticized member of opposition parliament members who supported HR 2003 as “shameful”. The Prime Minister justified his critics by referring to these elected representatives as authors of legislative or rather “law makers” of the country yet are traveling abroad to plea with leaders of foreign countries to enact laws on their behalf. Can the Prime Minister point to one specific incident in the history of EPRDF that opposition party members got the opportunity to initiate, debate freely and finally enact a law for the better of the country?
3. The Prime Minister boasted of his government’s patience and restraint for not throwing CUDP leaders in jail for being invited to testify in front of the United States congress on behalf of HR 2003. According to his analysis, testifying before the United States Congress is a crime but, the government prefers to wait in patience even if they have the right to express their idea in whatsoever manner. However, we all know the main case here is that the government has no choice but to refrain from arresting the CUDP leaders because nothing else can reinforce better what the world has know all along that the EPRDF government is dictatorial and brutal. Second incarcerating the CUDP would bring down the wrath on the US Senate on the Prime Minister and would be the final nail in his coffin.
4. His points on the war with Eritrea, that as long as the Eritrean government does not hamper Ethiopia’s economic development plans, the Ethiopian government will not go to war for minor provo vacations by the Eritrean’s according to the Prime Minister. In the case of Somalia his defense was Ethiopia’s involvement in Somalia was to curve the possible future danger from the “Islamic extremists” which must be confronted before it gathers into a storm. This analysis by the Prime Minister clearly reflects the double standard foreign policy of the Ethiopian government and subjugates Ethiopians to server the interest of foreign nations. Second, the war on terror as has become a lucrative business and will win you many friends in the West these days as long as you can stomach mowing down and torturing innocent civilians.
Going to war with Eritrea will result in huge consequence for both sides and with the Ogaden crises, political tensions and growing numbers of rebel’s fighting throughout in Ethiopia the Prime Minister is left with fewer and fewer choices.
In conclusion I believe that President John F. Kennedy said it best “The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.”
___________________
Ato Alemayehu Zemedhun can be reached at [email protected]
By Alexandra Hudson
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – An international commission charged with setting the border between Ethiopia and Eritrea dissolved itself on Friday, leaving the two states who fought a border war that killed some 70,000 people to work it out alone.
Thousands died in World War One-style trench warfare in the 1998-2000 clash between the Horn of Africa neighbours and, according to the United Nations, the two sides have again amassed thousands of troops and artillery at the frontier.
The Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission, part of Permanent Court of Arbitration, fulfilled its mandate of determining the border in 2002. But a deadline for the two states to demarcate the boundary expired on Friday, with neither complying.
“Until such time as the boundary is finally demarcated, the delimitation decision of 13 April 2002 continues as the only valid legal description of the boundary,” the commission said in a statement on Friday.
Tensions between the countries have ratcheted up in recent weeks with the approach of the deadline to physically mark the 1,000-km (620-mile) frontier.
Asmara and Addis Ababa have been at odds over the border since the boundary commission gave Eritrea the flashpoint town of Badme in 2002.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi dismissed the commission’s deadline and called its demarcation ruling “legal nonsense”, but tried to allay concerns that a new border war could break out.
“We will never, ever go to war with Eritrea, unless there is full scale invasion,” Zenawi said on Thursday.
“I do not think that the Eritrean government would launch a full scale invasion, because it would be suicidal for them.”
Last November, the commission said it was fed up by the lack of progress with the border and gave both nations one year to make moves to mark the frontier or it would fix it on international maps.
CONFLICT FEARS
The United Nations and the United States have urged both countries to show restraint, and analysts were at odds over whether further violence might ensue.
“I don’t think the commission will stop the drift towards some sort of conflict,” said Patrick Smith, editor of the London-based Africa Confidential newsletter.
However, David Mozersky of the International Crisis Group think tank said he did not think the border commission’s end would trigger a move from either side, adding both countries were still bound by the terms of the internationally-brokered peace agreement which ended the war.
On Thursday, the U.S. State Department said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit Ethiopia next week for meetings on the conflicts in the region.
Rice is scheduled to meet leaders from the African Great Lakes region — Rwanda, Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda — in Addis Ababa on December 5.
WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States said Friday it has urged renegade general Laurent Nkunda to surrender and go into exile to avoid a bloody showdown with Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) government troops.
Jendayi Frazer, the assistant secretary of state for African affairs, told reporters that diplomat Timothy Shortley, her senior advisor for conflict, had spoken to Nkunda, a Tutsi leader, to give him the message.
“And we clearly conveyed the message to him that he should surrender, go into exile and allow his forces … to be demobilized,” Frazer said when asked if Washington wanted Nkunda disarmed by President Joseph Kabila’s forces.
“Clearly as a sovereign government, President Kabila has the right to try to exercise territorial sovereignty … he has right to use his forces against what is essentially a rebelious general from his own military,” she said.
“But our concern is that the civilian population not be caught in the middle of such an offensive against Nkunda so we’ve been urging Nkunda, the government of Kabila to try to end this through peaceful means,” she said.
Nonetheless, Frazer, who spoke before US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice travels to Ethiopia next week for a summit with leaders of African Great Lakes states such as the DRCongo, noted that Nkunda has resisted proposed exile.
On Tuesday, community leaders in the DRCongo joined forces to demand that the government track down Nkunda and hand him over to the courts.
The troubled eastern province of Nord-Kivu has seen heavy clashes since the end of August between some 4,000 insurgents loyal to the former general, and more than 20,000 government troops.
Nearly 400,000 civilians have been displaced by fighting in Nord-Kivu since the end of last year, according to the United Nations, in addition to some 800,000 who fled their homes following previous clashes.
Villagers have been displaced by fighting not only between the army and Nkunda, who claims to be protecting the minority Congolese Tutsi population, but also between Mai-Mai militia and Hutu rebels from Rwanda, who are hostile to Nkunda.
The United Nations has stepped up its criticism of Nkunda in recent days, leading the renegade general to accuse the world body’s mission in DRCongo of siding with government forces and warn of retaliation.
Sana’a – A total of 27 African illegal immigrants were killed Friday in a boating accident near the Yemeni coast, wintesses and police sources said. A boat carrying 120 illegal immigrants near the coast in Mayfa’h area in Hadramout province, 900 kilometres south-east of the capital Sana’a, capsized, the sources added.
The illegal immigrants, mostly Somali and Ethiopian, were heading from Somalia to Yemen.
Forty-five passengers survived while about 48 others were still missing.
No further details about the cause of the accident were immediately available.
Source: DPA