CUDP senior leader Andargachew Tsige and Amnesty International representative Martin Hill discuss the sentencing of political prisoners in Ethiopia
BBC TV, July 17, 2007
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Hundreds of Ethiopians in Washington DC held a protest rally in front the White House on Monday. The protesters demanded the immediate release of opposition leaders and journalists who were sentenced to life in prison by a kangaroo court in Ethiopia yesterday after a sham trial.
Three of the protesters — Dr Meqdese Fekade, Ms. Lishan Akuma and Ms. Zelekash — had been arrested by the park police and secret service agents for allegedly trespassing police lines and refusing to obey police orders.
Dr Mqedese and Ms. Zelekash were released in the afternoon, but Ms. Lishan was sent to a hospital to get treatment for a dislocated shoulder which occurred while she allegedly resisted arrest. She will stay over night in a hospital, according to the police.
The rally was organized by leaders of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, Kinijit Washington DC Chapter, UEDF-DC, Tegbar League and other civic groups in collaboration with members of the media, particularly Addis Dimts Radio and Netsanet LeEthiopia Radio.
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CPJ, New York — Ethiopia’s High Court today handed down harsh criminal penalties, including life prison sentences, against six journalists and three publishers on anti-state charges in connection with critical coverage of the government during the deadly unrest in the aftermath of disputed parliamentary elections in 2005, according to local journalists.At least 200 people packed the courtroom in the capital, Addis Ababa, as editors Andualem Ayele of Ethiop, Zelalem Gebre of Menelik, Mesfin Tesfaye of Abay, and Abiy Gizaw of Netsanet were handed life prison sentences and stripped of all civic rights forever, according to defense lawyer Weneawake Ayele. The prosecution last week had requested the death penalty for Tesfaye and Ayele, according to news reports. Gebre and Gizaw were sentenced in absentia.“Receiving a life sentence for criticizing the government is not only outrageous but galling,” CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon said. “These severe penalties are out of step with international norms and undermine the democratic credentials of Ethiopia’s government.”
More than 190 people were killed and dozens of opposition leaders and 14 journalists were put on official “wanted lists,” then jailed, when authorities crushed post-election protests alleging poll-rigging by the ruling party in November 2005, following the May elections. The journalists and publishers sentenced today on “outrages against the constitutional order” charges had all produced Amharic-language weeklies that were shuttered in the crackdown. Before 2005, more than 20 newspapers flourished in the country. Today, only five publish under intense self-censorship.
Meanwhile, editor Wenakseged Zeleke of Asqual was sentenced to three years in prison, and deputy editor Dawit Fassil of Satanaw to 18 months in prison, according to Ayele. The court also ordered the civic rights of the journalists suspended for five years. Fassil, who had been released on bail in April after 16 months in prison on charges of “inciting the public through false rumors,” was returned, along with the other defendants, to Kality prison on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, according to local journalists.
Fassil’s publisher, Serkalem Publishing House, which is also publisher of Asqual and Menelik newspapers, and Sisay Publishing and Advertising Enterprise, publisher of Ethiop, were ordered dissolved and fined respectively 120,000 birr (US$13,500) and 100,000 birr (US$11,000) on related charges of committing or supporting outrages to the constitutional order, Ayele said. A third publisher, Fasil, which put out the Addis Zena newspaper, was fined 15,000 birr (US$1,700).
The journalists and publishers, who were sentenced today along with more than 20 opposition leaders, “could” appeal the sentences with Ethiopia’s Federal Supreme Court, Ayele told CPJ. But Information Minister Bereket Simon told the BBC the defendants had “admitted” to attempting to violently overthrow the government and had “asked for clemency.”
Following the sentencing today, state television reported that a plea for clemency had been submitted to the prime minister’s office, according to local journalists. The statement, bearing the signatures of all the defendants, including journalists, accepted full responsibility for the post-election violence, they said.
Two other editors, Wosonseged Gebrekidan of Addis Zena and Dawit Kebede of Hadar, jailed since November 2005, were still on trial on related charges, but did not risk life imprisonment or death, according to local journalists.
“Sadly, this is just the latest example of the authorities’ ongoing repression of the independent press which led CPJ to this year name Ethiopia the world’s worst backslider on press freedom,” Simon said.
By Stephanie McCrummen
Washington Post
An Ethiopian judge handed life sentences instead of the death penalty to 30 of the country’s top political opposition leaders Monday in a trial the prisoners have called a sham.
The defendants were among an estimated 30,000 people arrested in a widespread crackdown on opposition supporters following Ethiopia’s 2005 elections, when the opposition made major gains despite accusations that the vote was flawed.
While most of those arrested were released after an international outcry, the top leadership of Ethiopia’s main opposition party, along with journalists, a 76-year old professor and the elected mayor of Addis Ababa, have remained locked up in a dingy prison on the outskirts of the capital. One woman, a journalist, gave birth in jail.
The judge in the 14-month trial threw out charges of attempted genocide, but the prisoners were convicted last month of charges including “outrage against the constitution” and “inciting armed opposition.” The prosecution had recommended the death penalty.
In addition to giving the 30 prisoners life sentences, the judge stripped the defendants of their right to vote and to run for office. Five other prisoners were given life terms in absentia.
Eight other prisoners were given terms of one to 18 years, and the trial will continue for 10 prisoners who have chosen to present a defense, which the others had refused.
“I certainly am relieved that the death penalty has been removed,” said Rep. Donald M. Payne (D-N.J.), who has sponsored a bill calling for the unconditional release of all Ethiopian political prisoners. “But I would hope the government would go a step further and release the prisoners. They have paid a price for what they felt was simply expressing political views.”
Amnesty International said the jailed opposition leaders were “prisoners of conscience.”
While Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi had accused the opposition leaders of inciting violent protests following the elections, a government report later found that the protesters were unarmed and that Ethiopian security authorities had used excessive force, spraying crowds with bullets, targeting protesters with sharpshooters and hunting others down in their homes.
At least 193 people were killed during the crackdown, and autopsies showed that some victims had single bullet wounds to the head, according to the report.
Even as the prisoners’ trial has carried on, U.S. officials have been negotiating behind the scenes for the prisoners’ release — efforts that some of their relatives said were compromised because of Ethiopia’s alliance with the United States in fighting terrorism in the Horn of Africa. The State Department supported Ethiopia’s decision in December to invade neighboring Somalia and oust an Islamic movement, accused of having ties to al-Qaeda, that had taken control in the capital city, Mogadishu, and other major towns.
At various times in the past two months, a deal between the Ethiopian government and the prisoners seemed imminent, only to fall through. Meles has made various offers for the prisoners’ release in return for some form of apology or acceptance of responsibility for the election-year violence.
The prisoners had rejected most of those offers.
The case of Ethiopia’s imprisoned opposition leaders is only part of what U.S. officials, human rights advocates and the Ethiopian opposition say is a broader pattern of repression that continues across the country and is now occurring inside Somalia, where Ethiopian troops and their Somali allies are battling an insurgency.
In Addis Ababa, Ethiopian security officials have continued to arrest and harass people suspected of supporting the opposition, according to U.S. officials. And in Ethiopia’s ethnically Somali Ogaden region, villages have been burned, people arrested and tortured and some killed on suspicion that they supported a militant opposition group known as the Ogaden Liberation Front, according to the group Human Rights Watch and U.S. officials.
“The Ethiopian government needs to start reducing these major barriers,” said Payne. “These political problems certainly impact on the development economically and also in good governance, which the country needs.”
Special correspondent Kassahun Addis in Addis Ababa contributed to this report.
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Source: African Press Agency
American popular singer Beyonce Knowles will stage a day-long concert for the Ethiopian millennium to be celebrated on September 12 in Addis Ababa.
Beyonce, who won the Grammy Award in 2001 and 2002, has been invited by the Sheraton Hotel in Addis Ababa.
Sheraton Addis will pay Beyonce $1 million dollars and pay for the transportation of her band and equipment, APA learnt here on Monday.
The 26-year-old singer is expected to be accompanied by other singers from the United States whose identity has not yet been made public.
Sources told APA that Michael Jackson will also attend the Ethiopian millennium as a special guest together with other VIPs.
The Ethiopian millennium has been recognized by the African Union and United Nations as an African and worldwide celebration.
Over 400,000 Ethiopians from the diaspora, tourists and other invited guests are expected to come to Ethiopia for the millennium celebrations.
The Ethiopian calendar is eight years behind that used by most of the world. It is still 1999 in Ethiopia.
This is the letter allegedly written by jailed leaders of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy Party (Kinijit) to Meles Zenawi asking forgiveness. Source: The state-run Ethiopian TV. (Click here to enlarge)
