A response to the NY Times Editorial “Don’t Turn on Ethiopia” by Vicki Huddleston and Tibor Nagy
By Agere Mekuria
The OP-ED piece written by Vicki Huddleston and Tibor Nagy, entitled “Don’t Turn on Ethiopia” is lacking in the profound analysis and treatment required for such serious issues as the current situation in the Horn of Africa. Its conclusions and inferences rely on unfounded reasoning and unsuccessful attempts to make direct connections between the Ethiopia Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007 (H.R. 2003, which, having passed the House, is currently in the U.S. Senate), and the long-brewing conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea. For anyone who has read the bill in its entirety, the assertion made by this OP-ED piece that the passing of this bill will “fuel the march toward war” between Ethiopia and Eritrea is preposterous. It appears that Huddleston and Nagy advance their baseless assertions with the assumption that the readership is completely ignorant of the situation in the Horn and has not, at the very least, read a synopsis of H.R. 2003. In fact, from reading the editorial, it is doubtful that the authors of the editorial have done so themselves. It is astounding to see two diplomats, with past experience as chiefs of mission in the region, taking on the role of lobbyists and making weak attempts to derail a bill whose purpose, as stated in its text, is “To encourage and facilitate the consolidation of peace and security, respect for human rights, democracy, and economic freedom in Ethiopia”.
In a tone imbued with fear mongering, Huddleston and Nagy also advance the ridiculous notion that in supporting this bill, “Congress [is] unwittingly on the side of Islamic jihadists and insurgents”. In reading this statement, one is forced to question whether Huddleston and Nagy are referring to the same bill (H.R. 2003). This is a valid question since the bill is not specifically mentioned in the editorial, although it is quite evident that the bill’s abrogation is the intent. The arguments and opposition advanced against the bill and its implied correlation to the current situation in the horn are thoroughly implausible and far-fetched.
It is clear, even for those who only take a cursory look at the bill that its contents, in letter or spirit, are not contrary to finding a solution to the “threat of insurgency and war”, as implied by Huddleston and Nagy. Instead, the bill, consistent with U.S. policy and the concept of universal human rights, “supports the advancement of human rights, democracy, independence of the judiciary, freedom of the press, peacekeeping capacity building, and economic development” in Ethiopia and establishes metrics for gauging progress in these areas and holding those in power accountable for trampling upon the inalienable rights of the Ethiopian people.
The weak case made by Huddleston and Nagy’s editorial to equate the support of the U.S. Congress for the advancement of human rights and the establishment of democratic institutions in Ethiopia with fanning the flames of conflict in the region makes one wonder about their motives for this endeavor. One possible motive is that Huddleston and Nagy are attempting to gain some ground on the inter-governmental battle for the share of the international policy-making pie for the executive branch, of which the diplomatic corps is an extension. This is hinted at by the seemingly well-meaning suggestion that “Congress should put aside its bill and instead use creative diplomacy”.
Although the efficacy of diplomacy as a contributing arm in a multi-prong approach to conflict resolution can not be disputed, trying to thwart and misrepresent the efforts of the legislative branch from achieving the same goals through legislation is, at the very least, counterproductive. As such, the suggestion that “creative diplomacy”, as argued by these two career diplomats, single-handedly, will bring about much needed democratization and transparency to Ethiopian government institutions and guarantee the protection of human rights, along with holding government officials accountable for violations against these rights is ludicrous and naïve. Furthermore, the argument that supporting the establishment of democracy and insuring the protection of human rights in Ethiopia is contrary to US interests in the region and that somehow it will further exacerbate the current situation in the Horn of Africa is equally absurd.
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Agere Mekuria can be reached at [email protected]
DADAAB, Kenya, Nov 19 (Reuters) – It was after the second beating by Ethiopian Woyanne soldiers that Abdi Bashi Jama says he decided to head for the border.
But though separated from family, far from his home village in Ethiopia’s eastern Ogaden region, and a refugee rather than a shop-owner now, Jama considers himself lucky.
“The last time they attacked the village, they collected many men and took them away,” he said, pausing in the early afternoon heat of a refugee camp in north-east Kenya.
“Some guys were hung on trees, nooses round their necks until they died … I saw it.”
Similar harrowing testimony — dismissed as rebel propaganda by the Ethiopian Woyanne government — was repeated by various Ogaden refugees who have trickled recently into different parts of Kenya’s massive Dadaab camps, home to 170,000 refugees.
In separate interviews, the Ogadenis claimed Ethiopian Woyanne soldiers had been entering villages over-and-over again to kill, rape and burn in a campaign to flush out rebels of the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF).
Stories of shooting, hanging, beating and rape abound.
“My village was attacked more than 10 times. There is a great genocide going on. Why does the international community not intervene?” added Jama, standing among a crowd of refugees near their threadbare shelters of branches and plastic.
There is, in fact, growing international concern over the Ogaden crisis since the Ethiopian Woyanne military this year launched an unprecedented offensive against the separatist insurgents.
That followed the separatist rebels’ most dramatic attack to date, on an oil-field in April, that killed 74 people.
Annoyed at the foreign pressure it has been feeling over Ogaden, Ethiopian Woyanne government officials say tales of massive rights abuses by its soldiers are a smokescreen to hide atrocities by the rebels against the population.
They say the ONLF is a terrorist group backed by Ethiopia’s Woyanne’s arch-enemy Eritrea and linked to Muslim extremists in Somalia.
Whatever the truth, the Ogaden crisis has become yet another factor — adding to the Somalia conflict, and the Ethiopia-Eritrea border dispute — destabilising the Horn of Africa, one of the world’s poorest and most war-prone regions.
“WE DREAM OF FREEDOM”
The effect of the Ogaden crisis is being felt in neighbouring Kenya, where more Ogadenis than usual have been trickling into the three Dadaab camps, although the vast majority of refugees are still those fleeing the Somalia war.
“We have been noticing more from Ogaden, especially in the past two months,” said Amy Wordley, external relations officer in Dadaab for the world body’s refugee agency UNHCR.
“They just say the fighting has brought them here, and speak of travelling for about three weeks.”
Osman Omar Abdi’s journey from the Ogaden district of Jarar began in May after, he says, his wife was shot dead in front of him, his six children scattered, and his house burned during a chaotic morning raid by foot-soldiers.
“The Ethiopians Woyannes say that all the Ogaden people are part and parcel of the ONLF, they don’t differentiate, so they kill everyone,” he said, displaying a scar on his hand that he described as a bullet-wound.
“I heard the grandparents got three of my children. I don’t know about the others,” added Abdi, revealing at the end of an interview that he had been a “member of the ONLF resistance.”
Another Ogadeni in Dadaab, Yusuf Hashi Ahmed, said he fled his home village in Bali district during an army attack at the end of 2006, leaving his family behind.
The former pastoralist farmer crossed into Somalia and reached the southern city of Kismayu, only to flee again when Ethiopian Woyanne troops advanced on Islamist fighters there during the ousting of Somalia’s Islamic Courts Union over the New Year.
“Here, I have peace. But I have lost everything else,” he said, squatting under a thornbush. “The army were given the wrong information, that the ONLF was in my village. Some were killed, others were injured. I had to flee, I was frightened.”
As ethnic Somalis, the Ogadenis blend unobtrusively into Somalia and north Kenya, which is almost entirely populated by Somali people. They also cross porous borders easily, making a mockery of the supposed closure of the Kenya-Somalia border.
By Xan Rice, East Africa correspondent
Monday November 19, 2007
The Guardian
The Islamist-led resistance in Somalia is growing in scale and aggression, with insurgents openly taking on Ethiopian Woyanne troops and African Union peacekeepers in the capital Mogadishu, in fighting that has killed dozens, possibly hundreds, in the past three weeks.
Early on Saturday two groups of rebels fired grenades at Ugandan peacekeepers and briefly entered their post before being repelled. The attack, which coincided with an internet call by a Somali Islamist extremist, Adan Hashi Ayro, for peacekeepers to be targeted, came after two weeks of fighting and reprisals between insurgents and the allied Ethiopian Woyanne and government troops that caused a massive exodus from Mogadishu.
The UN estimates that 173,000 people have fled the city since October 27, adding to the 330,000 already displaced from the capital this year. Dozens, perhaps hundreds, of civilians were killed, as both sides fired shells indiscriminately into residential neighbourhoods.
Ahmedou Ould-Abdullah, the UN secretary general’s special representative for Somalia, said last week that the huge displacement, coupled with high child malnutrition rates and extreme difficulty in delivering aid, had made this Africa’s worst humanitarian crisis.
Few people believe that the situation is about to get better. Several experts interviewed by the Guardian say that the insurgents are becoming more powerful. A military analyst and a western diplomat to Somalia, neither of whom wished to be named, warned that the angry mood and conditions that allowed an Islamist movement to defeat a gang of warlords and take power in Mogadishu last year were returning. “We are on a merry-go-round and it’s back to 2006,” said the analyst. “The insurgents are gaining not only in physical strength, but in moral strength too.”
African Union commanders told diplomats last week that the insurgents were actively fighting in 70% of Mogadishu’s neighbourhoods. There are also signs that the resistance has spread beyond the capital. Islamic courts are reported to have taken control of two towns in the far south, while Hassan Al-Turki, a radical Islamist on the US terror list, is understood to be expanding his influence up the coast from his base near the Kenyan border.
Analysts say that the situation reflects a chronic miscalculation by the Ethiopian prime minister dictator, Meles Zenawi, who sent his troops into Somalia late last year, and by the US, which backed that decision. The goal was to rout the Somali Council of Islamic Courts (SCIC), which had brought a measure of calm to Mogadishu for the first time in more than a decade, but which was accused by Washington and Addis Ababa of close links to al-Qaida.
Ethiopian Woyanne troops easily swept through the Islamist fighters and installed the weak and unpopular Somali government in Mogadishu. The calm did not last long. Remnants of the SCIC’s military wing, the Shabaab, launched a low-scale insurgency, using hit-and-run tactics and remote-controlled bombs to target Ethiopian Woyanne and government troops. Many ordinary Somalis also resented the presence of tens of thousands of troops from Ethiopia. Soon warlords, clan leaders and businessmen were aiding the resistance with money, arms and their own militias.
ETHIOPIAN-AMERICANS and FRIENDS of ETHIOPIA in OKLAHOMA
For H.R. 2003
Announcement
Week-two of Peaceful Protest at Senator Inhofe’s OKLAHOMA CITY Office on Tuesday, Nov. 20, 2007
1900 NW Expressway Suite 1210, Oklahoma City, OK 73118. TIME: 11:00 AM
Contact Person: Mr. Muluneh Zeleke (Spokesperson), Phone: 405-314-4560
Purpose:
1. On-going campaign to create awareness among constituents of Senator Inhofe about H.R. 2003, the “Ethiopia Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007”
2. As constituents, to continue to petition Senator James Inhofe, to give his full support to the Democracy and Human Rights Bill: HR 2003.
Open letter from Oklahoma State University Professor Ted Vestal (author of “Ethiopia, A Post-Cold War Africa State”) to Sen. James Inhofe, November 13, 2007:
I was sorry to learn of your opposition to H.R.2003, the “Ethiopia Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007.” I know you have a strong personal tie to Ethiopia and that you have been charmed by the personable Prime Minister Meles Zenawi (as have I). I believe, however, that H.R.2003 is sound legislation in holding the feet of the ruling TPLF to the fire to live up to its rhetoric about what you refer to as a positive democratization process… I hope you will reconsider your position on H.R.2003 and join your colleagues in the House of Representatives in striving to promote democracy and human rights in Ethiopia. By not standing in the way of Senate concurrence in this significant foreign policy initiative, you will be serving your constituents well. Please let me know if I can provide you with any additional information about the current situation in Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa.
EXILED ETHIOPIAN TRADE UNION LEADERS
Contacts in USA, Africa, Europe and Australia
E-Mail: [email protected]
[Sent to each senator individually]
The Honorable US Senators
SENATE OFFICE BUILDING
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20510
Dear Senators:
Re: AN APPEAL AND CRY FOR DEMOCRACY TO SUPPORT BILL H.R. 2003
We the Exiled Ethiopian Trade Union Leaders residing in the United States of America and different parts of the world would like to ask your support for H.R. 2003, “Ethiopian Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007.” This bill authored by Congressman Donald Payne (Chairman, House Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health) passed unanimously in the House of Representatives, last month, on October 2, 2007 will let democracy, accountability, good governance and transparency reign in Ethiopia.
Since May 1991 Ethiopian has been under the most repressive regime once again and the current Prime Minister, Meles Zenawi, dressed in democratic grab and is clinging to power for the last 16 years through the barrel of a Gun. Meles Zenawi, under fake election continued his brutal regime the same as his predecessor by following the footprints of the Dereg and deceitfully blind folding the democratic world including USA. Ever since he came to power, he has been ruling the country with an iron fist.
In May 2005 national election, 25 million of Ethiopia’s illegible voters stood in line for long hours to cast their votes. Mr. Zenawi’s regime was overwhelmingly defeated by the opposition. However, Mr. Zenawi had difficulty in accepting that the opposition had won the national election and declared himself a winner, ordered his security to shoot and kill more than 193 innocent citizens, embarked on a massive and sustained crackdown of all dissent in the country. Thousands of innocent citizens, mostly young held in 5 specially arranged Nazi type concentration Camps. There have been massive extrajudicial killings and massacres in many parts of the country and even many times in neighboring countries and continued the same international crime specially in Kenya and the Sudan using the money funneled to them from American and other tax payers.
The self crowned dictator, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi surrounded by world class criminal gangs who are above the law and using the constitution as a tool for suppression call it democracy while they take care that they will pull every string the way they want. The Addis Ababa Gang is playing with the rules not by the rules. As a result, currently, our country, Ethiopia is run by criminal Gangs which call’s themselves a government.
The regime has routinely engaged and continues to engage in torture, beatings, systematic abuse, cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment of dissidents and opponents in violation of their own Constitution. The regime of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has severely curtailed the right of freedom of associations and the right of the people to engage in unrestricted peaceful political and civic activity. The regime continues to violate the people’s right to assemble freely by disrupting or unlawfully banning opposition party meetings, arbitrarily denying or delaying or engaging in last minute revocation of public meetings or demonstration permits, and by using pressure tactics on ordinary Ethiopians, including requiring opposition members to renounce their party membership, even systematically harassing and intimidating opposition parliament members and their constituents not to hold meetings to address any issue.
The regime continues to harass, persecute publishers, editors and journalists and controls all broadcast media. Regime officials continue to manipulate the privatization process, as state and party owned businesses received preferential access to land leases and credit. The regime relies on politically appointed judges to obtain predetermined outcomes, which often result in a miscarriage of justice.
We Ethiopians have had more than our share of political crises and internal conflict due to the lack of good governance and accountable government operating under the rule of law. Our people have paid for democracy and the rule of law in terms of their blood and treasure for years. Many opportunities for development have been wasted because of the political crises, as a brand new chapter is being added to the book of scandal of the regime of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi by the day, as we speak.
Therefore, we ask you to support rule of law and democracy to prevail in Ethiopia and to use your influence to be part of the solution for the crises in Ethiopia. We say democracy and ask you to stand with our people whose rights are denied. You can right wrongs, and say enough of blood and tears in Ethiopia. That will be by supporting bill H.R. 2003 to stop the ongoing crimes being committed. We believe that, bill H.R. 2003 is the corner stone to lay ground for true democracy and rule of law with accountability in our country, as these are the measuring yard sticks to promote democracy and transparency that will make all the difference.
Thank you for all your work in supporting those whose rights are denied.
Veiled threats, 2nd party threats, rumored threats, open threats, written threats, spoken threats, these and others are some of the ways the regime is communicating with Kinijit. It is dejavue time. Dust out good old Constitution and find me ‘a charge time’. We have a saying (‘libeluat yasebbuaten Amora, jigra yluatal) Last time around it was billed as ‘Genocide’ and it was un utter failure. The whole idea was beyond revulsion. ‘Genocide’ against yourself was just plain ridiculous. The detainees were released and we all had a sigh of relief.
We thought it was another chance for peace and justice in our homeland. We all prayed that those in authority would find a common ground with the ‘true’ opposition and arrive at an equitable solution. It was time to find new ways of conflict resolution. Think outside the box, as they say here in America. What ever we have tried has not worked. The fact that we are in this miserable situation is a testimony that we have failed bringing a period of real peace and development to our country.
Excuses and explanations are not the answer to our backwardness. Our country is at the bottom 10 of all-conceivable progress yardstick is a sad fact. However one looks at it being bottom ten is not acceptable. We are one of the least developed countries not because we are over populated, not because we are lazy and ignorant or we lack something in our DNA. Ethiopia is a welfare Nation. Our budget is subsidized by foreigners or commonly refereed to as ‘donor nations’. Starvation is a recurrent problem. Our infrastructure like communication, roads, and power output is non-existent. We are losing the young and the brightest to migration because there is no sign of better tomorrow in our homeland. It sad but fact is fact. No amount of made up statistics will replace reality. Comparing it to yester years of sadness and misery does not make today’s suffering any better. We are where we are today because we have made wrong choices the last 40 years or so. We have flirted with psudeo socialism, Military dictatorship and one Party rule. To achieve our aims we have tried imprisoning, bombing, starving, forced migration, civil war and all kinds of evil acts. It has only made the situation worse.
So with the release of Kinijt leaders we all hoped we have turned a new page. We have seen the Irish, after years of killing each other that sat around a table and talked and solved their problem. We witnessed South Africa, which under the leadership of His Excellency Mr. Nelson Mandela choose to forgive and coexist. Apartheid was the most evil system devised by humans, but South Africans put their country and their peoples future first rather than seeking revenge. Such should be our guiding principle. The two long years of the ‘leaders’ detention have shown us that confrontation was a dead end street. Bullying and intimidation will only go so far before they hit a brick wall of resistance. As the repression intensify it opens the door for those who want to resolve the problem by ‘any means necessary’, and start the endless cycle of death, destruction, and more migration. Is this what we want?
It is time to make a choice again. Which way to go is the question? Confrontation or co-operation? Putting one’s people and country first or proving a point no mater the consequences? Those in authority would have to make the choice for us. The people have no voice in our country. The ones in charge can be forward looking and enjoy the fruits of a peaceful nation, or continue on the proven path of iron fisted rule and reap the benefits of further destruction. It is up to the ‘leaders’ chosen or otherwise. Where there is repression there is resistance. That will never change. Where there is Democracy there is peace. Being free, feeling free is the right of all human beings. It is not a gift someone dolls out, but a right we are born with. Free people accomplish miracles.
When we see all the messages sent out to show ‘intent’ to do harm again, we wonder. Didn’t we learn any lesson? What is different this time? So why all this dancing around to scare and terrify? If it did not work the first time around why try it again? What makes them think the outcome will be different. Why? It is really mind boggling to say the least. Why a few are willing to hold the many as hostage for their own perceived ‘right’ is nothing new. But when it happens to oneself is when the magnitude of the problem becomes evident.
Again we hope the regime will put its limited resources to finding ways of bringing our diverse people together under one roof. Use of force is not the answer. It is true that some have ruled for a long time using force and coercion. They have books written praising their wisdom, theatres played lauding their generosity and statues set in public squares bigger than life. But history is never kind to such. It is better to be remembered alongside Abraham Lincoln, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, rather than Ferdinand Marcos, Idi Amin, Megistu H.Mariam or Mobutu Sese Seko.
What is in it for me might be the question asked by the regime? It is a legitimate question. We are asking it to change its proven method of ‘iron fisted rule which has ‘kept it in power for over 18 years. Of course the question assumes that deep at heart those in power are ‘patriotic’ and the future existence of our homeland is their first priority. In that case this is our ‘common ground’. Our difference will boil down to basic policy difference. Ethiopians including CUDP have clearly indicated that they are willing to forgive and move forward. It is not about revenge. It is not about regime change. It is about the future of 70 million people in a very hostile neighborhood. We as a nation are better off if those in power and the legitimate opposition sit down and compromise. The rest of us will fall in line and promise to make it work. The architects of this peaceful chapter will occupy a special place in our history. It is never too late to do the right thing.
We all have to do what we believe is right. The regime might ‘accuse, fabricate charges and jail’ our leaders. Our leaders will show the same ‘iron will’ they displayed before and refuse to give in. We in the ‘Diaspora’ will dust off our placards and email list and continue and double our efforts to be doing what we believe is right. The short visit of ‘CUDP Delegation’ has showed us that our ‘Leaders’ are indeed special. That we were correct in our genuine struggle to secure the release of Kinijit Leaders and all other political prisoners. Again we pray that it will not come to this. We hope that the ‘Government’ will find it in its heart to let our people be free. All else is not important.
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Yilma Bekele can be reached at [email protected]
