U.S. Congress Subcommittee on Africa Chairman Donald Payne calls Ogaden and Somalia “The Forgotten Tragedies”
Tenth District Representative Donald M. Payne, Chairman of the Foreign Affairs’ Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health, issued the following statement on Oct. 23, 2008
“Innocent civilians continue to suffer in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia. No one knows for sure how many people have died in the Ogaden in the past two years. Many have fled their homes in search of help or had no choice but to flee in the face of major atrocities being committed by government forces.
Ethiopian Woyanne security forces are deliberately targeting innocent civilians. The raping and hanging of civilians are being used routinely by Ethiopian Woyanne security to intimidate and to psychologically torture innocent civilians. I met many of these victims in a refugee camp in Kenya.
The suffering and abuses of the people of the Ogaden are well documented. Since when does starving a child or hanging a young woman publicly qualify as a counter-insurgency operation? I have witnessed many tragedies around the world, but the one unfolding in the Ogaden is by far one of the worst. I met a mother who wondered aloud how she would survive after she had been raped by men younger than her own sons.
What the Ethiopian Woyanne government is doing is planting the seeds of hatred that will last many generations. The people of the Ogaden may forgive, but I doubt theywill forget what happened to them under this regime. The Ashanti of Ghana say “There is no medicine to cure hatred.”
Meanwhile, next door in Somalia, another man-made tragedy is killing, maining, and displacing millions of Somalis. In the past year alone, an estimated 10,000 people have been killed by Somali and Ethiopian Woyanne security forces, and insurgent groups. Many of these victims are innocent civilians. In October, two United Naitons representatives were killed.
More than half of the Somali population, an estimated 3.4 million, is in need of humanitarian assistance. Hundreds of people have died while trying to flee the suffering in Somalia. As estimated 1 million people are internally displaced and many have fled to Kenya, Yemen, and Djibouti.
In January 2008, I met many of these refugees in Dabbab refugee camp in Kenya. Many of them were born in the refugee camp. United Nations are concerned that they cannot help many new comers since the camp is full. In January, I asked a number of young Somalis in the camp what is it they want badly that they do not have in the camps. They all replied that it was education they wanted most.
The people of Somalia have suffered for far too long. There is a famous African proverb: No matter how long the night, they day will come for sure. I am sure the suffering of the helpless will one day end. The question remains, when?
ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA – Haile GebreSelassie is an Ethiopian long distance track and road running athlete. Gebrselassie has achieved major competition wins at distances between 1500 metres and the marathon, moving from outdoor, indoor and cross country running to road running in the latter part of his career. He has broken 26 world records and won numerous Olympic and World Championship titles, and is widely considered one of the greatest distance runners in history. He is widely considered one of the best athletes ever because of his incredible speed, and the fact that he suffers from athletically induced Asthma which could kill him at any moment.
Gebrselassie was born as one of ten children in Asella, Arsi Province, Ethiopia. As a child growing up on a farm he used to run ten kilometres to school every morning, and the same back every evening. This led to a distinctive running posture, with his left arm crooked as if still holding his schoolbooks.
The Ethiopian legend recently broke his own world marathon record by running 2:03:59 in Berlin. His Gebrselassie_haile1eberlin07 next competition is the Great Australian Run in Melbourne, where he’ll try for a 15K world best on the roads. An enterprising Aussie journalist investigated what Gebrselassie’s life is like from “Gebrise” to “Gebset.” It begins early with a customary 20K run in the Entoto Mountains outside Addis Ababa. He’s in an office by 9:00 to begin dealing with his vast business endeavors, and, well…. click on more to read more of the crowded itinerary of this extraordinary man who is a devout Christian and, yes, a pioneering feminist in Ethiopia.
HAILE Gebrselassie, the greatest long-distance runner in history, is Melbourne-bound — for the Great Australian Run, a 15-kilometre road race around the streets of Melbourne on November 30 — and with him, he will bring some food for thought for all those elite Australian sportsmen who reckon they do it tough to achieve success. To find out just what makes him tick, we did some research about the Ethiopian runner, who this month became the first man to break two hours four minutes for the marathon (and, in all, has broken 27 world records). This is what we found out:
■ Gebrselassie rises every day at 6am, drives 25 minutes to the Entoto Mountains, where he usually runs 20 kilometres with other Ethiopian athletes. (He goes to the mountains because the air is clean, there is no traffic and it is slightly cooler than in the city of Addis Ababa.)
■ He then returns home to change and grab a quick breakfast.
■ At 9am, he is in his office, personally supervising his business empire that includes being:
CHAIRMAN of the Great Ethiopian Run, a public fun run that has been a huge success in Ethiopia with 32,000 entries; and
BOSS of a construction company that builds cinemas, convention centres, petrol stations, schools, sports stores, cafes and fitness centres.
■ He fInishes work at 4pm and heads to more training, either back to the mountains for some hard running or to the national stadium for a session on the track.
■ He is home just after 6pm for time with his family or to prepare for any evening engagements, where he is in great demand.
ALL THIS by a bloke who:
■ Is a devoted Orthodox Christian and presented his first Olympic gold medal to his local church as a token of thanksgiving for his special talent.
■ As an employer, has given half of the jobs in his businesses to women in a part of the world where equal opportunity was once never heard of.
Not your regular superstar is our Haile.
Gebrselassie will be competing against Australian elite distance runners including Craig Mottram in the November 30 race, which is open to the general public, from local joggers to fitness fanatics. What an opportunity for them! – runnersworld.com
It’s been six months since Ginbot 7 Movement for Freedom and Democracy in Ethiopia was formed. In June 2007, EthiopianReview.com wrote (read here) that the new movement has less than 6 months to prove itself. Did it prove itself to be a viable opposition party? What did it accomplish so far and what is it currently doing?
Ethiopian Review will pose these and other straightforward questions to Ato Andargachew Tsege, a senior official of Ginbot 7, in a live interview Sunday, Oct. 26, 2008, at 2:00 PM Washington DC time.
WASHINGTON DC – Ethiopians in Washington DC held a rally to protest the widespread human rights violation against innocent civilians and systematic repression of ethnic Somalis that is taking place in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia.
As reported by the international media and the recent extensive report made public by Human Rights Watch, in areas inhabited by Ogaden people in eastern Ethiopia, the TPLF/EPRDF regime security forces have raped and sexually assaulted numerous women; displaced entire rural communities and destroyed dozens of rural villages; forced residents to flee to the neighboring countries; summarily executed thousands of of civilians; arbitrarily detained tens of thousands of people; intentionally restricted the delivery of humanitarian assistance and access to food and medical supplies in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia. Similarly, in the southern and western parts of Ethiopia that are inhabited mostly by Oromo communities, tens of thousands have been detained, tortured or otherwise mistreated.
At the rally organized on Friday October 24, 2008, in front of the US State Department, Ato Fitsum Achamyeleh Alemu, a Virginia based Attorney at law and human rights activist, representing the organizers, talked about gross violation of human rights committed in the past 17 and half years by the TPLF-EPRDF regime.
Fitsum said that from 1992-2008 the TPLF-EPRDF regime killed tens of thousands, forced millions to be displaced or to leave their country, detained and tortured hundreds of thousands. He based his statement on reports US State Department, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. He also stated that the TPLF-EPRDF also instigated ethnic and religious violence.
The protesters asked the US government to take leadership and stop the violence, the killing, the torture of Ethiopians. They also asked a new, independent commission to investigate the human rights situation in every province of Ethiopia and the US, the UN and the European Union to take the human rights situation in Ethiopia seriously and to bring perpetrators of the crimes to justice.
Ato Guled Kassim, a human rights activist in the Washington DC area and originally from Ogaden, also spoke at the rally. Guled challenged the US government, US lawmakers and the international community for looking the other way when such a gross violation of human rights is committed in the Ogaden. He said that US tax payers’ money should not be funneled to dictators like Meles Zenawi.
The Ethiopian Television Network (ETN), the VOA and members of the Ethiopian media were present to provide news coverage at the rally,
At the end of the rally, Ato Fitsum Alemu, Ato Neamin Zeleke, Dr. Kassa Aylew, and Dr. Mekdes Befekdau Mr. John Wysham, head of Ethiopia Desk at the State Department, and handed him the letter addressed to Dr. Condoleezza Rice, Secretary of State.
The letter urges the US government to hold the Meles Zenawi regime accountable for its widespread and gross violation of human rights against thousands of innocent civilians in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia as in other places of Ethiopia.
It also urges the US to send a fact finding mission to the region in order to conduct an investigation of the wide spread and systematic human rights violations by the security forces of the Meles regime, identify those who are directly involved, and ensure that they receive no assistance or training from the United States, as required under the “Leahy law”.
Fresh off their successful event, “Poety night” with the ‘youth league,’ below are the top 10 events Birtukan Mideksa and her UDJ (Andinet Party) are currently organizing:
10. Non Violence Poetry night Part II
9. Peaceful stand up comedy night
8. Non violence Magic Show
7. Peaceful Baking Contest
6. Peaceful Dance Contest
5. Non violence Fashion Show
4. Peaceful donkey riding contest
3. Non violence marshal arts show
2. Dalai Lama spiritual warfare training
1. Peaceful warfare techniques symposium
ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA – Haile GebreSelassie is an Ethiopian long distance track and road running athlete. Gebrselassie has achieved major competition wins at distances between 1500 metres and the marathon, moving from outdoor, indoor and cross country running to road running in the latter part of his career. He has broken 26 world records and won numerous Olympic and World Championship titles, and is widely considered one of the greatest distance runners in history. He is widely considered one of the best athletes ever because of his incredible speed, and the fact that he suffers from athletically induced Asthma which could kill him at any moment.
Ethiopian Review will pose these and other straightforward questions to Ato Andargachew Tsege, a senior official of Ginbot 7, in a live interview Sunday, Oct. 26, 2008, at 2:00 PM Washington DC time.