The Tigray People’s Democratic Movement (TPDM) has killed 11 Woyanne soldiers and wounded five others in an attack on weyane soldiers stationed in Mereb Lekhe District (northern Ethiopia), said the TPDM’s military committee.
During the attack on 5 September on members of the 1st Brigade 14 Division, stationed near Rama town, the TPDM forces killed the town’s deputy police commissioner and his allies who were harassing residents in the town, the military committee added.
The military committee also said that the TPDM combatants foiled a counterattack, which the weyane regime tried to carry out against its forces.
Meanwhile, on 5 September, the TPDM forces distributed leaflets and magazines to residents of Aksum town detailing the group’s objectives.
It will be recalled that the TPDM forces had put out of action some 35 weyane soldiers during ambush it carried out on 27 August at Medri Felasi, in Laelay Adiyabo [all places in northern Ethiopia].
Source: Voice of the Broad Masses of Eritrea, Asmara, in Tigrinya
ADDIS ABABA — Ethiopia on Wednesday inaugurated a $14-million state-of-the-art bridge constructed over the Abay (Nile) River located 208 kilometres north of Addis Ababa.
The 300-metre-long and 9-metre-wide bridge, the first cable-stayed bridge in East Africa, was designed by Oriental Consultants Company Ltd of Japan.
The bridge was constructed alongside a 60-year old bridge built by an Italian construction firm. The government of Italy covered the cost of the older bridge as a compensation for the war damages it had caused during its brief occupation of Ethiopia in the 1930s.
Source: APA
Witnesses in the southwestern Somali city of Baidoa say a gunman has shot and killed a member of parliament.
The witnesses say Mohammed Osman Maye was killed late Tuesday as he was leaving a mosque in Baidoa, where the Somali parliament meets.
In a statement posted Wednesday on its Web site, the Islamist militant group al-Shabab claimed responsibility for the killing. It said Maye was one of the staunchest supporters of Ethiopian Woyanne troops in Somalia.
The group says the killing should be a warning to other members of parliament.
Heavy fighting broke out today between Islamist insurgents and Ethiopian Woyanne-backed government troops in parts of the capital, Mogadishu. Deaths and injuries were reported, although casualty figures are not available.
Sources: AP and Reuters.
By Terry Jessup
DENVER (CBS4) ― Denver police say a suspected drunk driver ran a stop sign and killed a cab driver Saturday.
The accident happened at 18th Avenue and Williams Street. The victim was an Ethiopian immigrant who left behind a wife and two young children.
Solomon Abraham was a driver for Yellow Cab who risked his life just to get to this country to be granted political asylum. Among other things, he was a deacon at his church and a leader in the Ethiopian community.
Abraham, 33, was a teacher and lawyer in his native country and a cab driver who worked a minimum 16-hour day in Denver.
“He was such a wonderful, humble person that we ever had,” friend Teklu Abraha said.
Abraham’s wife and two young children were among grieving family members who gathered Tuesday. Abraha says are lost without him.
“She was dependent on him. She has these small, two kids, so she’s like blind to the whole world for her, it’s so sad,” Abraha said.
Darian Blackwell, 21, is charged with crashing into Abraham’s cab while driving drunk. Police say Blackwell was traveling at a high rate of speed when he ran a stop sign.
“Solomon for me is my cousin, nice person, he’s a hard worker,” cousin DJ said.
DJ said he still stunned Abraham’s life was cut short so suddenly and wonders how his family will make it.
“She can’t survive right now, maybe somebody will help her,” DJ said.
Church members said Abraham had risked his life just to get to America, fleeing Ethiopia and then passing, even walking through several countries before he got to South America and finally got political asylum in the United States.
“He believed that America had the best democracy in the world, and so that’s why he came here and he was hoping to raise his children in peace,” Abraha said.
Yellow Cab has now set up a donation fund where they will match donations coming from his fellow drivers. Many of the drivers also came to Denver from Ethiopia.
Blackwell is being held in jail with a $75,000 bond, charged with two counts of vehicular homicide.
A benefit fund has also been set up in the name of Solomon Abraham through U.S. Bank.
MOGADISHU (AFP) — At least eight people were killed in the Somali capital on Wednesday in fighting that erupted after Ethiopia Woyanne-backed government troops raided a suspected rebel hideout, residents said.
Government troops and insurgents clashed using machine-gun fire and rocket-propelled grenades in northern Mogadishu near a military camp, they said.
“I saw four civilians and two Somali soldiers who were killed by mortar shells,” said Hassan Abdullahi Abdulle, a resident.
The Somali army said it killed two insurgents while three of its men were wounded in the clashes.
“Two insurgents who were killed in the fighting were carried by their colleagues for burial after fighting stopped,” Somali army spokesman Dahir Mohamed Hirsi told AFP.
Residents said stray shells wounded at least 13 civilians — many of them children — in Huriwa, one of the most volatile districts in the seaside capital.
Several residents confirmed the clashes that came after days of calm in a city that is contested between the UN-backed government and Islamists accused of links to Al-Qaeda.
In Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian Woyanne defence ministry said at least 15 insurgents died.
“Fifteen Shebab (Islamist) insurgents were killed by the transitional government troops this afternoon in defensive measures taken after an attack on their military barracks in Mogadishu,” it said in a statement.
“Scores of others were injured while a number of weapons were captured during the attack,” it added, but the veracity of the statement could not be confirmed.
In Nairobi, Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki pleaded with the world to help Somalia end nearly two decades of suffering that has been worsened by chronic food shortage.
“Indeed, the recent developments in that country will require a new impetus in bringing all the parties in the conflict to a process of dialogue that will guarantee the people of Somalia peace and security that they so much desire,” Kibaki said in a statement.
Kenya chaired a regional peace panel that helped reach a peace accord that brought Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed to power in 1994, but the aging ex-warlord has failed to restore stability in his nation.
Book Discussion
The Crown and the Pen: Dr. Bereket Selassie
Sep 15 2008 2:30pm
This event has been marked as open to the public.
This event requires a ticket or RSVP
Description
The Mortara Center for International Studies and the African Studies Program invite you to a book discussion on The Crown and the Pen: The Memoirs of a Lawyer Turned Rebel
featuring
Bereket Habte Selassie
Distinguished Professor of African Studies and Professor of Law at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Former Chairman of the Constitutional Commission of Eritrea (1994-97)
The discussion will focus on Dr. Bereket’s memoir, which recounts the extraordinary story of a man straddling two worlds – a progressive lawyer and high-ranking official of the government of Emperor Haile Selassie who struggled for justice within an archaic system. Dr. Bereket took part on the pan-africanist formations of the 1950s and 60s, joined a revolutionary front to fight for Eritrea’s independence, and helped to write the constitution of the new nation.
Reception and book signing to follow.
To RSVP for this event, please visit the link below.
