It looks like a mirage but the lush fields of cauliflower, apricot trees and melon growing among a vast stretch of sand north of Cairo’s pyramids is all too real — proof of Egypt’s determination to turn its deserts green.
While climate change and land overuse help many deserts across the world advance, Egypt is slowly greening the sand that covers almost all of its territory as it seeks to create more space for its growing population.
Tarek el-Kowmey (45) points proudly to the banana trees he grows on what was once Sahara sands near the Desert Development Centre, north of Cairo, where scientists experiment with high-tech techniques to make Egypt’s desert bloom.
“All of this used to be just sand,” he said. “Now we can grow anything.”
With only 5% of the country habitable, almost all of Egypt’s 74-million people live along the Nile River and the Mediterranean Sea. Already crowded living conditions — Cairo is one of the most densely populated cities on Earth — will likely get worse as Egypt’s population is expected to double by 2050.
So the government is keen to encourage people to move to the {www:desert} by pressing ahead with an estimated $70-billion plan to reclaim 1,2-million hectacres of desert over the next 10 years. Among the incentives are cheap desert land to college graduates.
But to make these areas habitable and capable of cultivation, the government will need to tap into scarce water resources of the Nile River as rainfall is almost non-existent in Egypt.
The plan has raised controversy among some conservationists who say turning the desert green is neither practical nor sustainable and might ultimately backfire.
Anders Jagerskog, director of the Stockholm International Water Institute in Sweden, questions the wisdom of using precious water resources to grow in desert areas unsuited to cultivation and where water will evaporate quickly under the scorching sun.
“A desert is not the best place to grow food,” he said. “From a political perspective, it makes sense in terms of giving more people jobs even though it is not very rational from a water perspective,” he added.
Regional tension?
The scope of the reclamations could also add to regional tension over Nile water sharing arrangements as in order to green its desert Egypt might need to take more than its share of Nile water determined by international treaties.
Egypt’s project to reclaim deserts in the south, called “Toshka”, would expand Egypt’s farmland by about 40% by 2017, using about five billion cubic metres of water a year.
That worries neighbours to the south who are already unhappy about Nile water sharing arrangements. Under a 1959 treaty between Egypt and Sudan, Egypt won rights to 55,5-billion cubic metres per year, more than half of the Nile’s total flow.
Ethiopia, where the Blue Nile begins, receives no formal allocation of Nile water, but it is heavily dependent on the water for its own agricultural development in this often famine ravaged country.
“The Toshka project will complicate the challenge of achieving a more equitable allocation of the Nile River with Ethiopia and the other Nile basin countries ,” said Sandra Postel, director of the United States-based Global Water Policy Project.
“Egypt may be setting the stage for a scenario that’s ultimately detrimental to itself.”
But other experts suggest that in the delicate arena of water politics, it may be more of an imperative for Egypt’s government to mollify its own population rather than heed its neighbours concerns.
Overcrowding is straining infrastructure in the cities and the government is worried that opposition groups such as the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood, which has a fifth of the seats in Parliament, might capitalise on discontent.
“The government feels it needs to reduce the number of people in high density areas, which puts a lot of pressure on resources like fertile land,” said Mostafa Saleh, professor of ecology at Al-Azhar University in Cairo.
“They are trying to spread the population to other parts of the country.”
Desert tourism
Some critics say that Egypt should look at desert tourism rather than agriculture, which might not be sustainable or particularly profitable and could destroy fragile wildlife habitats that might otherwise be a drawcard for tourists.
A desert reclamation project last decade, south of Cairo, destroyed much of the Wadi Raiyan oasis and its population of slender horned gazelles.
“The price tag on these assets is huge, both as natural heritage and as a resource for tourism,” said ecologist Saleh.
Saleh is vice-president of an Egyptian firm that built an electricity-free eco lodge, consisting of rock salt and mud houses, amid olive and palm groves in the desert oasis of Siwa.
The lodge, which costs $400 per night and has attracted guests such as Britain’s Prince Charles and Belgium’s Queen Paola, shows that the desert would be better used for ecotourism than farming, he says.
“In Egypt, water is the most critical resource and we should be careful to use it to maximise revenue,” Saleh explained. “Agriculture is not the best option for Egypt. Nature-based tourism could bring in much more money.”
At the Desert Development Centre, irrigation water comes through a canal connected to the Nile, about 15km away, where it is used to keep crops flourishing and grass green for hardy hybrid cows to graze.
Experts at the centre believe greening the Sahara might be Egypt’s best hope of bringing prosperity to its people.
Workers graft fruit-bearing plants onto the stems of plants that survive well in the desert. Favourite fruits are citrus as they flourish in hot climates and can land on supermarket shelves in Europe hours after harvesting.
Proximity to markets in Europe and a lack of pests, which usually thrive in humid environments, make desert farming economically viable, said Richard Tutwiler, director of the Desert Development Centre at the American University in Cairo.
Water supply, Tutwiler said, shouldn’t be an issue at least for the next ten years. It makes sense, he says, to expand agriculture onto land that was once useless.
“There is no frost and there is sun all the time here,” he said. “Plants just go nuts.”
The Reporter in its latest edition reports that Sheraton Addis, which is owned by Ethiopia’s billionaire businessman [and drunkard womanizer] Ato Mohammed Al Amoudi may be put on the auction block to pay for 170 million birr debt that the parent company, Midrock, owes to the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE).
The Reporter’s editor, Amare Aregawi, who almost died after he was savagely attacked last month by three thugs who were suspected of being hired by Al Amoudi, is going after the billionaire with a vengeance. Both Al Amoudi and Amare are registered and high-profile members of the ruling Tigrean People Liberation Front (Woyanne). So this is nothing more than a feud among a family of thieves.
For the survivor who chooses to testify, it is clear: his duty is to bear witness for the dead and the living. He has no right to deprive future generations of a past that belongs to our collective memory. To forget would be not only dangerous but offensive; to forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time. The witness has forced himself to testify. For the youth of today, for the children who will be born tomorrow. He does not want his past to become their future. (Elie Wiesel, a Nobel laureate and Holocaust survivor)
It is Still Winter
I remember November. And June, too. I remember 2005. It was our season of hope and redemption. As Shakespeare might have put it, 2005 was “the winter of our discontent/ Made glorious summer by the victory of Kinijit. And all the clouds that low’r’d upon our country/ In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.” Today, it is still winter in Ethiopia. Our discontent festers like a cankerous sore under the dark and oppressive clouds of a monstrous dictatorship. But I remember the Angels of November — the 193 innocent men, women and children who were massacred in cold blood in 2005 because they stood up for freedom and democracy in Ethiopia. I remember the thousands who were sprayed with bullets but miraculously survived. I remember the tens of thousands swept off the streets indiscriminately and caged in beastly jails. I remember the countless who disappeared without a trace. I remember the untold numbers of refugees from a reign of terror. In November, I remember the 80 million who are inmates in a virtual Prison Nation.
November is to Remember
In November, I remember Krystallnacht (Night of Broken Glass). That was 1938 when the Nazis burned thousands of Jewish synagogues and businesses throughout Germany, killing nearly 100 and arresting and deporting over 30,000 to concentration camps. It foretold the Holocaust. I also remember March in November. That was March, 1960 when apartheid policemen in the township of Sharpeville, South Africa sprayed 705 bullets in two minutes in the backs of unarmed protesters and murdered 69 Africans; and severely wounded hundreds. And I remember June and November, 2005. I more than remember. I hear the faint voices of the 193 unarmed men, women and children massacred — shot in the head, in the chest and in the back — as they protested peacefully.[1] I hear their swan song: “Give us justice! Don’t let them get away with murder? Bear witness for us!”
Angels I Remember in November
The Angels of November I remember: ShiBire Desalegn, a beautiful young high school graduate shot in the neck and killed as she and her friends tried desperately to block passage to a torture camp in Sendafa. Then there was Tensae Zegeye, age 14, shot in the head with a high caliber bullet. And Debela Guta, age 15. And Habtamu Tola, age 16. And Binyam Degefa, age 18. Behailu Tesfaye, age 20. Kasim Ali Rashid, age 21. Teodros Giday Hailu, age 23. Adissu Belachew, age 25; Milion Kebede Robi, age 32; Desta Umma Birru, age 37; Tiruwork G. Tsadik, age 41. Admasu Abebe, age 45. Elfnesh Tekle, age 45. Abebeth Huletu, age 50. Etenesh Yimam, age 50; Regassa Feyessa, age 55. Teshome Addis Kidane, age 65; Victim No. 21762, age 75, female. And there was Victim No.21760, male, age unknown. I remember them all — those with names, and the nameless ones who are just numbers — permanently registered in my Directory of Angeles of November.[1]
Profiles in Courage: The Unsung Ethiopian Heroes
I also remember the unsung heroes who heard the voices of the angels, whose consciences seared with righteous indignation, refused to remain silent and stood up to tell the truth. I remember the two courageous judges, Frehiwot Samuel and Woldemichael Meshesha, the chairman and vice chairman, respectively, of the regime-established Inquiry Commission into the so-called post-election “disturbances”. I remember the daring lawyer Teshome Mitiku, a member of that Commission. These exemplary citizens refused to whitewash the regime-sponsored crimes and atrocities. Exactly two years ago to the day, they briefed the United States Congress on their findings in the massacres of June and November, 2005.[2] Their investigative work was as thorough as their findings were horrifying. They examined 16,990 documents, and received testimony form 1,300 witnesses. They visited prisons and hospitals, and interviewed members of the regime’s officialdom.
After months of intense investigation, the Commission concluded1 on an 8-2 vote that 1) none of the protesters possessed used or attempted to use firearms against the regime paramilitary forces; 2) none of the protesters possessed, used or attempted to use any type of explosives; 3) no protester was observed carrying a stick or a club to use as a weapon; 4) no protester set or attempted to set fire to public or private property; and 5) no protester robbed or attempted to rob a bank. The Commission established the paramilitary government forces used live ammunition, batons and tear gas. Almost all of the 193 victims were shot deliberately in the head or upper torso indicating that the shooters’ sole intent was to kill the protesters. The number of persons who suffered severe gunshot wounds was 763. Over 30,000 civilians were arrested without warrant, and held in detention without legal cause. The commission documented that on November 3, 2005, during an alleged disturbance in Kality prison that lasted 15 minutes, prison guards fired more than 1500 bullets into inmate living quarters. The body count from that shooting spree was 17 dead, and 53 severely wounded. The Commission laid to rest regime claims that its security officers were killed by protesters. No evidence was found to substantiate that claim. The Commission concluded, “Security forces which are alleged to be killed by demonstrators were not taken to autopsy, even there is no evidence of either photograph or death certificate showing the reason of death couldn’t be produced for police as opposed to that of civilians.”
These three individuals did something that has rarely been done in Ethiopian or African history. They risked their lives, the lives and welfare of their families, their professions and economic well being – EVERYTHING — to bring out the truth about the massacres of 2005. Perhaps some may not appreciate the steely nerve of these Ethiopians in standing up to a thuggish dictatorship, but there is no doubt that when the modern history of Ethiopia is written, their names will be listed at the top for courage under fire, audacity in the face of despair, bravery in the face of personal danger, and unflinching fortitude in the face of extreme adversity. We can only thank them. Let them know that “Never have so many owed so much to so few!” They will always be our heroes!
The Forensics of Atrocity: “Riot Reconstruction”
There is one question that begs an answer: What was the justification for massacaring 193 unarmed civilians and grievously wounding 763 others? Forensic techniques and policy analysis may yield some insights into this question. First, the fundamental premise in all police riot control countermeasures is not to massacre or maim rioters but to safely manage crowds with the aim of preventing unnecessary injuries and confrontation. This premise is based on a more fundamental principle of riot control which holds that almost all riots are incited and led by a few individuals who manifest intense interest in particular issues or seek to gain some advantage or outcome from a violent confrontation with police. Longitudinal studies (over a long period of time) of riots and “mob disturbances” have repeatedly demonstrated that most people show up at riot “events” because they are attracted by something exciting, or are bystanders who are sucked into a situation governed by “mob mentality”. The data show that most participants would opt to escape in riot events when faced with the possibility of violent confrontation with police or possible arrest. Most countries (and localities) have designed their riot control policies and procedures along such premises. As a result, riot police routinely use a variety of non-lethal means of riot control including chemical agents (tear gas), blunt force rounds (rubber pellet-type impact munitions that do not penetrate the skin) and combine them with effective psychological tactics that disperse rioters and crowds without the use of excessive force. Deadly force is used against rioters by police in a narrow set of circumstances, e.g. police acting in self-defense where there is reasonable fear of death or serious bodily harm, against looters observed causing major property damage (not breaking store windows) with risk to life, looters brandishing or using firearms in riot events, against snipers firing into the crowd or at police, rioters engaged in arson, or in propelling Molotov cocktails or homemade explosives in clashes with riot police and others engaged in serious or violent crimes.
Forensic analysis in the form of “riot reconstruction” (similar to crime scene or accident reconstruction) can be illuminating in discrete riot events. Using various data sources (concededly incomplete and fragmentary under the circumstances), preliminary forensic analysis provided insights into the question whether the use of deadly force was justified against the post-election “rioters”. Using enhanced high resolution forensic images of deceased victims, photogrammetry of video clips, anecdotal eyewitness testimony, and documentary evidence relied upon by the Inquiry Commission, one can generate a sketch of a riot scene in Addis Ababa and address the question of the necessity of the use of deadly force against unarmed protesters. While it is extremely difficult to generate an accurate reproduction of a riot scene for all the dates specified in the Inquiry Commission investigation, it is possible to make inferences (using contextual images) on the general layout of a “riot” confrontation scene and establish a probable sequence of events.
A preliminary analysis of one “riot scene” suggests that 1) the riot police (clad in riot gear, shields, helmets, etc.) fired from a distance where their safety was not in any way at risk from stone-throwing protesters, 2) image analysis of entry and exit wounds on victims’ photographs show that the victims were running away from the police (and not rushing to confront them), 3) the shooting of the rioters was not accidental by one or a few policemen from eyewitness testimony in the fall pattern of the bodies at the “riot” scene, 4) inferences from terminal ballistics (image analysis of a round impacting the body) suggest that at one “riot scene”, protesters who were shot in the upper torso intentionally with the purpose of killing them. Others who were wounded more likely remained at a substantially greater distance from the trigger happy policemen and were in a state of panicked flight from the scene when struck by rounds. Alternate forensic conclusions are further suggested in the preliminary analysis.
The official explanation of untrained riot policemen who panicked and fired at the crowd is unsupported by eyewitness or forensic evidence. In fact, it is possible to show from forensic analysis that the riot police were trained well enough to expertly use not only live ammunition for riot suppression but also were proficient in use of other methods of deadly force. The official claim is also unconvincing at least in the incidents in Addis Ababa given recent revelations in a study by Col. Michael Dewar, commissioned by the regime to upgrade the capabilities of the riot police.[3] As of 2005, there were 2000 special riot police with basic gear. Riot control policies and practices have been in place in Ethiopia since the days of Emperor Haile Selassie. It is standard practice even during the era of Emperor Haile Selassie not to use live ammunition to control unarmed protesters. Two questions remain: Who gave the order to the riot police to shoot-to-kill? When was that order given?
The Survivor Who Chooses to Testify
ShiBire, Tensae, Debela, Habtamu, Kasim, Tiruwork, Etenesh, Victim No. 21760 and all the others died testifying for democracy and freedom in Ethiopia. Now it is our turn to testify on their behalf. Elie Weisel said, “For the survivor who chooses to testify, it is clear: his duty is to bear witness for the dead and the living.” It is our moral duty to speak up — to “force ourselves to testify” — on behalf of innocent victims of state terror, and to keep the flame of justice bright for the next generation. By honoring their memories and testifying for them, we declare to the world — and to their killers who sneer at justice — that they did not die in vain; and we have not forgotten them. Never! Never! Never again shall we stand idle in the face of such barbarous crimes against humanity.
Justice for the Victims, NOW!
The names of those who pulled the trigger in the 2005 massacres are well known to the regime. The Director General of the Ethiopian Federal Police, Workneh Gebeyehu, told Col. Michael Dewars that “As a direct result of the 2005 riots, [Gebeyehu had] sacked 237 policemen.”[http://www.ethiopianreview.com/content/5335] Gebeyehu’s statement nullifies prior regime claims that the regime has no specific knowledge of any criminal conduct by riot policemen in the killings of the protesters. Gebeyehu’s admission to Dewars conclusively establishes the existence of a list of at least 237 policemen who are now prime suspects in the massacres of peaceful protesters in June and November of 2005. THESE CRIMINAL POLICE SUSPECTS SHOULD BE BROUGHT TO JUSTICE IMMEDIATELY! Recently, the Waki Commission in Kenya recommended that a sealed list of suspects in the post-election disturbances in that country be turned over to the International Criminal Court in The Hague for possible prosecution for crimes against humanity. Ethiopians deserve no less. A sealed list of the names of the 237 police officers mentioned by Gebeyehu should be turned over immediately to the International Criminal Court for prosecution on suspicion of crimes against humanity!
Light A Candle for an Angel
Let’s say a prayer for all of the innocent victims of state terror in Ethiopia. Let’s light a few candles in their honor. Let’s honor their memories by becoming members of Amnesty International, U.S.A., Human Rights Watch or any of the other international human rights organizations. Let’s create awareness about Ethiopian human rights with our neighbors and co-workers and others in our local communities. How about installing a computer screensaver of 193 candles with the background images of the martyrs of June and November for you to remember.[3] “Justice is like a train that is nearly always late” but for the fiendishly wicked, justice always arrives in the nick of time. “If trouble hearing Angels song with thine ears, try listening with thy heart.”
—–
Notes:
* These victims were documented by the Inquiry Commission in its investigation of shootings of unarmed protesters in Addis Ababa on June 8, and November 1-10 and 14-16, 2005 in Oromia, SNNPR and Amhara regional states. Full list at:
http://www.abbaymedia.com/pdf/list_of_people_shot.pdf
http://www.mdhe.org/doc/personskilled%20.pdf
http://www.abbaymedia.com/Remembering_Victims_of_November_2005.htm
2 For full report, see http://www.qalitiqalkidan.org/commission/Testimony_Frehiywot_Samuel.pdf
MOGADISHU (AFP) — On Monday, witnesses in Mogadishu said they saw AU peacekeepers (troops from Uganda) replacing some Ethiopian Woyanne troops in southern Mogadishu.
“I saw a convoy of AU peacekeepers entering the former military academy of Jalle Siad where Ethiopians are usually stationed and they seemed to be replacing the Ethiopian forces,” local resident Abdulahi Mohamed said.
An AMISOM spokesman confirmed that a rotation was underway but refused to provide further details.
“It’s something we had planned because AU peacekeepers have to make sure that the Djibouti peace deal is implemented and that is why we deployed our forces around new locations in the capital,” he said.
The new AMISOM positions are manned by members of the Burundian contingent, which was completed last month and brought to 3,400 the total number of AU peacekeepers in Somalia.
One faction of the ARS has signed up to the Djibouti process but some elements have aligned themselves on the hardline position of the Shebab insurgents, who are opposed to any talks before a full Ethiopian Woyanne pullout.
A day after Somalia Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein blamed President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed for sabotaging efforts to create a new cabinet, UN envoy Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah scolded the Horn of Africa country’s bickering leaders.
“I appeal to all Somalis within the government, the opposition, the diaspora, the business community and other interested parties, especially as we are coming close to Eid al-Adha (the festival of sacrifice), to think of their country’s dignity and its future and end their disagreements,” he said in a statement.
Ould-Abdallah urged the pair “to agree on a new cabinet quickly because a continuing power struggle did not serve Somalia’s interests, particularly as there was now an agreement to establish a broad-based unity government.”
The Somali leaders failed to form the new government by November 12, a deadline set by the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) — a regional body — during its October summit in Nairobi.
Hussein has also accused Yusuf of failing to support October power-sharing and truce deals reached between the government and the Islamist-led political opposition, the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS), at UN-mediated talks in Djibouti.
The Djibouti deal also provides for a gradual handover of security responsibilities from the Ethiopian troops to the peacekeepers of the African Union mission in Somalia (AMISOM).
On Sunday, clashes at a checkpoint near Elashabiyaha town, 18 kilometres (11 miles) south of the capital Mogadishu, killed two, witnesses said.
The fighting was between rival factions of the Islamic Courts Union, the main group in the ARS.
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) – A river in Ethiopia’s highlands burst its banks after heavy rains, killing 11 people and stranding hundreds more, the state news agency said on Monday.
Flooding from the Wabe Shebelle river in southeast Ethiopia has submerged more than 100 villages, regional relief boss Eremdan Haji was quoted as saying by the Ethiopian News Agency.
“Inhabitants in 116 villages in an area covering a 90-km (56-mile) radius have been stranded on hillocks surrounded by the flood water,” he said.
“Efforts to rescue hundreds of marooned people have become impossible due to the extent of land covered by the flood.”
Some 6,000 head of livestock and 2,500 hectares of {www:crop} were destroyed, the official added, saying the government had sent 18,000 tonnes of food aid to the region near Somalia.
Local officials contacted by Reuters said they had no further {www:information} but were on their way to the flood area.
(Reporting by Tsegaye Tadesse; Editing by Janet Lawrence)
