Addis Ababa – Ethiopia launches activities to make Africa’s first mosque -Al Nejashi Mosque – as a tourist destination and a world heritage site by UNESCO in the coming few years. The Ethiopian Ministry of Culture and Tourism said that it is undertaking various activities to make the mosque and the city of King Ahmed Nejashi a tourist destination, which is located in the Tigray regional state, some 900 km north of Addis Ababa, capital of Ethiopia. “Activities are also underway to register the mosque as a world heritage site by UNESCO,” said the Ethiopian State Minister for Culture and Tourism Mahamuda Ahimed Gaas.
He said that the design works for the construction of a center is underway in the area to make it a tourist destination. The center to be constructed in the town involves 15 projects including a modern hotel and an Islamic university, as well as a research center, the African Press Agency report reported quoting Ethiopian radio. The center has already received 110,000 square meters of land to build the research and other facilities. The mosque is named after Ethiopia King Ahmed Nejashi who welcomed Muslim refugees some 1,400 years ago. The mosque is considered a symbol of religious co-existence in Ethiopia. That action of the king enabled the Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him) to substantiate that Ethiopia was a country of brotherhood and sympathy.
Islam in Ethiopia date back to the year 615 AD when the first Muslims, among them Prophet Mohammad’s wife came to Ethiopia as refugees and settled in Negash, a small village located 60 km east of Mekele, the capital of Tigray Region. The Quraysh sent emissaries to bring them back to Arabia, but the King of Ethiopia refused their demands. The Prophet himself instructed his followers who came to Ethiopia, to respect and protect Ethiopia as well as live in peace with Ethiopian Christians.
The Negash or Nejashi Mosque is as old as the faith of Islam in Ethiopia. It is the first mosque in Africa. The mosque was built in the 7th century AD and is considered by many as one of the most sacred places of Islamic worship and rightly dubbed by some as “The second Makkah”. Negash has been a place of great historical and religious significance in a sense that it is a symbol of peaceful coexistence between the Muslim and Christian religions. Even though Negash is considered as one of the important places in Ethiopia, there are also other important Muslim places like the Sof Omar Caves and the fourth most important city for Islam Harar with it’s 90 mosques.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Investigations would reveal that there is far more extrajudicial killing by Meles Zenawi’s security agents in Ethiopia. Last month, for example, several bodies were seen inside the Ethiopian Federal Police detention center (Maikelawi), when a building came down after a bulldozer hit its foundation by accident. Previously, an inquiry commission that was formed by Meles Zenawi himself accused his regime of engaging in widespread extrajudicial killings. But since Meles is the puppet of the U.S. Government, every thing swept under the rug and some of the inquiry commission members, including the chairman, Judge WoldeMichael Meshesha, were forced into exile.
(CNN) — A U.N. investigator accused Kenyan police of widespread extrajudicial killings, and called Wednesday for the removal of the East African nation’s police commissioner and its attorney general.
“Killings by the police in Kenya are systematic, widespread and carefully planned. They are committed at will and with utter impunity,” U.N. Special Rapporteur Philip Alston said in a written statement on his preliminary findings after his visit to the country.
The Kenyan government said it rejected Alston’s findings. “The government finds it inconceivable that someone who has been in the country for less than ten days can purport to have conducted comprehensive and accurate research on such a serious matter, as to arrive at the recommendations he made,” government spokesman Alfred Matua said in a written statement.
He said the government was concerned Alston made “such far-reaching conclusions and recommendations on the basis of his interim report,” and said the findings were released without government response.
Alston said he heard “overwhelming” testimony of the killings, which he said occurred regularly. The police commissioner and other senior Kenyan police officials denied the accusations, he said.
The police may kill for personal reasons, for extortion or for ransom, Alston said. He added, “Often they kill in the name of crime control, but in circumstances where they could readily make an arrest.
He cited as an example James Ng’ang’a Kariuki Muiruri, 29, whom he said police shot and killed last month in the capital, Nairobi.
“After a disagreement at a hotel, a police officer stopped the car James and his brother were in, and ordered James to handcuff himself. When he asked why he was being arrested, James was shot three times,” Alson said in the news release.
“The only exceptional things about the case were that James was the son of a former Member of Parliament, and the incident had been witnessed,” he said.
Alston said there was no accountability for the alleged police killings; there is no independent police internal affairs unit.
He called for Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki to fire the police commissioner. “Any serious commitment to ending the impunity that currently reigns in relation to the widespread and systematic killings by the police should begin with the immediate dismissal of the police commissioner. In the absence of such a step it will be impossible to conclude that there is a strong commitment at the very top to deal with this problem.”
As for Attorney General Amos Wako, Alston’s comments were severe, and he called for his resignation. “Mr. Wako is the embodiment in Kenya of the phenomenon of impunity.”
Alston also accused government security forces of torturing and killing hundreds of men in a March 2008 crackdown on a militia in the Mt. Elgon district, in western Kenya. And he said there was compelling evidence that what he called police death squads were operating in Nairobi and Central Province with a mandate to “exterminate” suspected Mungiki gang members. “These are not ‘rogue’ squads, but police who are acting on the explicit orders of their superiors,” he said.
The Mungiki militia, which are loyal to Kibaki’s Kikuyu tribe, began as a religious sect, but over the years has morphed into a gang that runs protection rackets — particularly in the slums.
The U.N. investigator suggested Kibaki acknowledge the alleged police killings and commit to stop them. He also advocated that an independent civilian police oversight body be created, and said the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court should investigate violence after the 2007 election. He also said the government should create a witness protection program.
Alston traveled to Kenya after the government invited him, staying from February 15 until Wednesday. He will issue a final report of his findings, but it was not immediately clear when it would be released.
An Ethiopian judge from south Gondar region of Ethiopia, Ato Abuye Ayalew, has joined the Ethiopian People’s Patriotic Front (EPPF) earlier this month, according to EPPF sources.
While he was still in Ethiopia working as a judge, Abuye Ayalw had been assisting EPPF by performing various organizational works.
Judge Abuye Ayalew will give a televised interview shortly, which will be posted on EPPF’s web site: www.eppfonline.org
EDITOR’S NOTE: Most of the exporting is being done by companies that are owned by the Meles crime family, including his wife Azeb Mesfin. The money stays in the U.S. and Ethiopia gets no benefit.
ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA (Reuters) – Ethiopian tax-free exports to the United States more than doubled to $18 million last year from $8.9 million in 2007, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) said on Wednesday.
“Ethiopia is one of the few African countries to show such steady, marked increase under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA),” the agency said in a statement.
The textile and garments sector accounted for the most exports, increasing to $9.3 million from $4.5 million in 2007. Other sectors that benefitted under AGOA included agricultural products, minerals and metals, the USAID statement said.
It said total Ethiopian exports to the United States rose 172 percent to $152 million last year from $86 million in 2007.
Many sub-Saharan African countries are eligible under AGOA to export goods to the United States without paying duties. Congress approved the programme in May 2000 in a bid to spur economic growth in one of the world’s poorest regions.
EDITOR’S NOTE: The stupid regime in Ethiopia yesterday asked for $400 million in emergency food aid, and yet it cannot even get delivery of food aid caught up in the Djibouti port.
ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA (PANA) – Ethiopian authorities said Tuesday efforts were underway to transport more than 60,000 metric tonnes of food aid caught up for months in the Port of Djibouti following congestion at the facility. State Minister for Agriculture and Food Security Mitiku Kassa said the government had made arrangements to free at least 3,000 metric tonnes of food aid, delaye d at the Port of Djibouti, further inland.
Ethiopia has no port and the government has to arrange for its imports to move further inland, using heavy trucks.
The delay in having the food aid delivered inland saw government cancel the food aid distribution for January.
However, Kassa said the country did not face any emergency food aid distribution in January and there was no need for urgent distribution.
“We had to move sufficient number of trucks to Djibouti to ferry the food to the central warehouses inland,” the minister said after unveiling Ethiopia’s nation a l appeal for food aid assistance for 2009.
Ethiopia uses the Port of Djibouti for its imports but the port lacks sufficient storage capacity, often leading to congestion.
“There is congestion in Djibouti. We are working to avoid this. This has been du e to the lack of warehouses. We have discussed with the Ethiopian Embassy in Dji b outi and the port officials. The issue now is about transport and lack of wareho u ses,” the minister told journalists.
Ethiopia is facing acute famine this year, which could affect up to 4.9 million people unless well-wishers provide enough funds to enable the country buy food a i d.
The country requires some 591,000 metric tonnes of relief food.
Efforts to have the 60,000 metric tonnes of food still locked up in Djibouti are , however, progressing.
“There are 3,000 metric tonnes of food crossing into Ethiopia daily,” the minist er disclosed.
The government says it has been forced to use some of the cereals in its national grain reserves on loan basis to provide assistance to those in dire need of food.
However, the amount of food already utilized from the national food reserves mus t be returned when the food aid arrives in the country.
Ethiopia keeps between 400,000 to 500,000 metric tonnes of food aid for emergencies.
The government also says the national food reserves have recently improved by so me 170,000 metric tonnes.
ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA (PANA) – Ethiopia, battered by the effects of climate change and exceeding national hunger, launched an appeal on Tuesday for some 4.9 million people on the verge of starvation. State Minister for Agriculture Mitiku Kassa said the government requires emergency cash injections to plug a food gap while sustaining the livelihoods of an additional 7.57 million people on state-run food distribution
The appeal for US$ 454 million will help feed some 4.9 million people across the country, facing renewed threats from famine this year after a series of failed rains and poor harvests across the country.
The money is urgently required to finance the acquisition of cereals, edible oils, foods and non-food items and offering medical help to those in need, the minister said.
The authorities need some 591,000 metric tonnes of food aid.
The humanitarian appeal is meant to help save those facing acute starvation this year while a certain number of the food dependants, numbering about 7.57 million are also receiving funds from the government to meet food needs rise.
The government says some 1.5 million people, who had been reliant on state-run food programs were excluded from this year’s food distribution as a result of improved crop yields in western Ethiopia, where food production increased.
However, those on permanent government-operated food distribution appeared to have surged from 5 million in 2005 to 7.5 million in 2008.
The government says some 35,000 people, however, graduated from this food dependency.
“The only sustainable solution to reduce the emergency dependence is to increase agricultural food production,” the state minister in charge of disaster management and food security said.
The western part of the country produces the food that serves the urban population, including the capital, Addis Ababa.
The highest number of those in urgent need of food aid is in the Somali regional state, east of Ethiopia, where the number of those in need of urgent food aid has been computed at 1.55 million, followed by the Amhara state in the North.
Somali region, mostly inhabited by the pastoralists, has missed good rains for the past three years, leading to acute losses of animals and leaving most animals in poor physical condition, the minister said.
“The food aid distribution in the Somali region was most challenging, but now, we have improved the rate of distribution and 91 per cent of the food is now reaching the recipients,” Kassa told journalists at a news conference here.
