Ethiopian National Transitional Council (ENTC) has continued to work on expanding its organizational reach throughout the world. This effort includes strengthening the chapters that are already established as well as forming new ones. In line with this effort, it has announced the successful completion of the formation of ENTC Norway chapter with dedicated Ethiopians.
email: [email protected]
EDITOR’S NOTE: While Ethiopia’s regime cooks up fantastic numbers to show double digit growth, the realities on the ground are more sobering and depressing. The political elite is addicted to foreign handouts and human trafficking. In an economy where unemployment runs as high as 50% and foreign exchange is continuously in short supply, the regime has embarked on a major initiative to export young women for profit. Within Ethiopia itself, poverty, bad cultural practices and the presence of so many alms givers in a destitute country is exposing poor and vulnerable children to exploitation.
Stolen Childhoods: Child Prostitution And Trafficking In Ethiopia
By Graham Peebles
Prostitution, perhaps the most distressing form of child abuse, is an epidemic throughout Ethiopia. The innocence of a childhood shattered, causing a deep feeling of shame, poisoning the sense of self and excluding the child from education, friends and the broader society. A society, which stands idly by whilst children suffer, speaking not in the face of extreme exploitation, denying the truth of extensive child exploitation and acts not, is a society in collusion.
In the capital, prostitution abounds, “It is difficult to give an exact figure for the prevalence of child prostitution in Addis Ababa but observation reveals that the numbers are increasing at an alarming rate in the city”1 The joint Save the Children Denmark and Addis Ababa City administration (SCD) study states: “Interviewing children revealed that over 50% started engaging in prostitution below 16 years of age. The majority work more than six hours per day”
There are many grades or levels of prostitution, “Some children engage in commercial sex in nightclubs, bars and brothels, while others simply stand on street corners waiting for men to pick them up.” (CPAA)
The SCD study “identified types of child prostitution: working on the streets; working in small bars; working in local arki or alcohol houses; working in rented houses/beds and; working in rent places for khat/drugs use. Each location exposes the children to different risks and hazards.”
“The major problems that have been faced by children engaged in prostitution include: rape, beating, hunger, etc. Based on the responses of children engaged in prostitution, about 45% of them have been raped before they engaged in the activity”. (CPAA)
The dangers associated with child prostitution affect the girls physical and mental/emotional health. Violent physical abuse, being hit and raped is common, Birtuken a 17 year old child sex worker (CSW), “prostitution is disastrous to the physical and social wellbeing of a person.” (CPAA)
The impact on the long-term mental health of a child working in prostitution, can often cause chronic psychological problems, “the emotional health consequences of prostitution include severe trauma, stress, depression, anxiety, self-medication through alcohol and drug abuse; and eating disorders.2
The risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases (STD’s) and HIV/Aids is great, so too the chances of unwanted pregnancies, as men, immersed in selfishness and ignorance, refuse to wear condoms. Their arrogance and macho bravado is a major cause in the spread of HIV/Aids in Ethiopia USAID3 suggests, “1.3million people are now living with the virus in the country”. It is estimated that “70 per cent of female infertility is caused by sexually transmitted diseases that can be traced back to their husbands or partners.”4 “Women in prostitution have been blamed for this epidemic of STDs when, in reality, studies confirm that it is men who buy sex in the process of migration who carry the disease from one prostituted woman to another and ultimately back to their wives and girlfriends.” (EoP)
There are various causes for the growth in child prostitution in urban and rural areas as well as Addis Ababa, arranged marriages, illegal under Federal Law is cited as a key factor, “Research carried out in 2005 established that most victims of commercial sexual exploitation found in the streets of Addis Ababa had been married when they were below 15 years of age” (SAACSEC) In highlighting the factors that drive children away from their homes and into commercial sex work, the CPAA study found that “Most of the child prostitutes came from regions to look for a job, due to conflicts at home, early marriage and divorce.
Poverty, death of one or both parents, child trafficking, high repetition rates and drop out from school and lack of awareness about the consequence of being engaged in prostitution are key factors that push young girls to be involved in commercial sex work”. (CPAA)
In addition to arranged marriage, which is a significant cause, the study found that “the major reasons identified by the children themselves for engaging in commercial sex work are: poverty (34%), dispute in family (35%), and death of mother and/or father. 40% joined prostitution either to support themselves or their parents. Quite a large number of girls (35%) have joined prostitution due to violence within the home. Thus violence within the family is the main cause for children fleeing from home.”
The causes listed are complex and interrelated. At the epicenter of these diverse reasons though sits the family. Conflict at home is for many girls (and boys) the force driving them away from family and onto the streets of Addis Ababa, or one of the provincial towns and cities. Division and conflict grow from many seeds, repeated physical abuse at the hands of a parent or stepparent, rape at the hands of a Father, stepfather or extended family member, physical and verbal abuse, all are factors that force girls to leave the home and seek release from what has become a prison like existence of servitude, intimidation and fear. “When physical and psychological punishment becomes intolerable, it may lead to the child running away from home. Girls tend to become prostitutes when they run away from home.” (VACE2)
Another burgeoning group from which many children fall into the net of prostitution is that resulting from HIV-orphans who have lost their parents to the virus. “Ethiopia has one of the largest populations of orphans in the world: 13 per cent of Ethiopian children have lost one or both parents…the number of children orphaned solely by HIV/AIDS has reached over 1.2 million. These children find themselves at a very high risk of entering commercial sex to survive, yet there is very limited support available for them either from government [emphasis mine}.”(AACSE)
Coherent or dysfunctional, the social fabric is a tapestry of interrelated, interconnected strands. Neglect by the Ethiopian Government in areas diverse, and fundamental is the glue that is binding together a polluted stream of suffering and pain.
Bussed in Married off
In 2006/7, I worked with the Forum for Street Children Ethiopia (FSCE), running education projects for the children in their care. Girls living and working on the streets, mainly the hectic cobbled broken pathways around the Mercato Bus station. “This extremely poor neighborhood in the city has become ‘the epicentre of the capital’s illegal [emphasis mine] industry of child prostitution’5
The children at FSCE ranged in age, although many did not even know their date of birth; most the children do not have documentation “the problem is further aggravated by a widespread lack of birth registration” (CPAA). Some were as young as 11 years old, “over 50% started engaging in prostitution below 16 years of age” the study states. “In almost every case the girls come to the city from the countryside, their families cast many out, others sent to Addis to work”.
Arriving at the city’s main bus-station, shrouded in naivety and fear, with little or no education, the girls make easy pickings for the men that greet them, with a warm smile, and a cunning mind only to mistreat, use and exploit them. With nowhere else to go, and no alternatives, the girls find themselves working the street and the journey into the painful, destructive prison of prostitution has begun.
Many, according to Save the Children Denmark (STCD), come from the Amhara region, the second most populated region, with a population of over 20 million. These children arrive in the capital knowing nobody, with (probably) no money and no contacts.”Enforced child marriages, abuse, and the prospects of ending their days in the grip of poverty are factors pushing Ethiopian girls as young as nine years of age’” (VACE), to risk their childhood and their lives in the city.
According to (CPAA) “There are many factors pushing the girls away from the region, (Amhara) including poverty, peer pressure and abuse. But child marriage is one of the most common explanations we hear when interviewing the girls,” Arranged marriages are widespread in the (Amhara) region in the north of Ethiopia, where young girls, children are forced to marry adult men, all too often this ‘union’ results in rape, abuse and violence, from which the innocent child is forced to flee, only into the clutches of exploitation, violence and abuse. And do they recover, is there healing and release, is a childhood stolen, a childhood lost, let us pray it is not so.
Marriages entered into unwillingly by extremely young girls, some as young as seven years old usually in exchange for reparations of some kind, money, cattle, land, lead all too often to abuse and violence, “traditional practices like female genital mutilation (FGM) and early marriage, are causes for the increased violence against children.” 14-year-old boy 6 “in Wolmera Woreda, the practice of FGM is nearly universal since girls must be circumcised before marriage.” (VACE2) Once committed to a marriage, by parents who often regard the child as no more than an object to be traded, the girl is frequently raped and mistreated and treated as a servant. “Abduction, rape and early marriage may ultimately lead many girls to prostitution. Early marriage and abduction seldom produce successful marriages. In fact, such relationships are short-lived. As a result, most of these young girls run far away from their husbands in an attempt to start a new and happier life elsewhere. Unfortunately, many of them end up as prostitutes.’ (VACE2)
“Early marriage is illegal (except under particular circumstances), weak law enforcement [Emphasis mine] allows this practice to be widely followed throughout Ethiopia; the phenomenon is reported in almost every region of the country.
Nationwide, 19 per cent of girls were married by the age of 15 and about half were married by the age of 19; in Amhara region, 50 per cent of girls were married by the age of 15. “When the marriage finally collapses, the girls usually migrate to urban areas since breaking a marriage arranged by their relatives is considered a shameful act and they are no longer welcome within their families and communities.
Once in larger towns they end up living in the streets given their lack of skills to find employment. Such dire circumstances lead many girls to be exploited in commercial sex.” (CPAA)
To break free of a forced marriage entered into against the child’s will, and be punished by banishment from the family home, is a form of social injustice based on traditions, which have long failed to serve the children, the family or the community at large. It is time long since past that these practice’s where changed. Education, cultivating tolerance and understanding of the Human Rights of the Child are keys to undoing such outdated destructive sociological patterns, together with the enforcement of the law to deter parents and prospective ‘husbands’.
No options, no hope
No child enters into prostitution when they have a choice, “prostitution is seen as a social ill that is unaccepted, prohibited and fought in most parts of our continent. Prostitution is not only a question of morality but a human problem, a problem of human exploitation, a problem of societal failure in providing equal opportunities.” (CPAA) “At the end (of the interview) Belaynesh said that no girl/woman would like to be a prostitute but the problems force them to be in such a situation.” The circumstances that lead a young girl away from the games and innocence of childhood and what should be, the love and gentle kindness of her family, into the shadows of prostitution, may vary and circumstances differ, suffering though is common to all those forced into such a lifestyle, the impact long lasting and severe, the consequences dire, destroying many lives.
The children at FSCE in Mercato told us their stories, often with shame, through tears and embarrassment, always with pain. A thread connected them all, yes poverty, was a major issue, so too poor education however, the stream that united the group of wonderful 11 to 18 year olds, was a breakdown in human relationships, of one kind or another.
Once outside the family, and society, young girls desperate to survive have little choice but to work as CSW. For those recruiting and selling girls It is a business, for the children on the streets it a torture. “Almost all respondents do not like prostitution (99%). Almost all the girls are involved in prostitution not because they like what they are doing but due to other factors, to support themselves or their families.” (CPAA) “Child prostitution [is] a big business involving a whole series of actors from abductors at bus stations, to blue taxis and bar/hotel owners who tend to see children as the spices of their trade. The business actors, oblivious to pervasive taboos, have long abandoned recruiting adult prostitutes.” (CPAA)
Trafficking lives
Child prostitution and trafficking of children are inextricably linked. They are of course both illegal. All international conventions, from The Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) to International Labor Organisation (IL0), as one would expect, outlaw them. So too do Ethiopia’s Federal laws, “The 1993 Labor Proclamation forbids employment of young persons under the age of 14 years.
Employment in hazardous work is also forbidden for those under 18. The Penal Code provides means for prosecuting persons sexually or physically abusing children and persons engaging in child trafficking including juveniles into prostitution. Federal Proclamation no.42/93 protects children less than 14 years not to engage in any kind of formal employment.” (CPAA) And yet both child prostitution and the trafficking of minors goes on, and on and on. “The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) reported that girls are trafficked both within the country and abroad to countries in the Middle East and to South Africa.”7
Children are brought from rural areas of Ethiopia to the capital city by brokers, “ttraffickers, who feed on parent’s low awareness with false promises of work and education for their offspring.” The numbers are staggering, the money tiny, the damage unimaginable “up to 20,000 children, some 10 years old, are sold each year [for around $1.20 to $2.40] by their parents and trafficked by unscrupulous brokers to work in cities across Ethiopia.”8 And who would do such a thing. Who would ‘sell’ an innocent child; condemn a child to slavery and brutal exploitation, pain and acute distress? “These traffickers are ‘typically local brokers, relatives, family members or friends of the victims. Many returnees are also involved in trafficking by working in collaboration with tour operators and travel agencies.”9
“The Code of Conduct for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation in Travel and Tourism has not been signed by any travel and tourism company in Ethiopia.” (CPAA) The Ethiopian Government acting in the interest of the children upon their homeland, and their responsibilities under international law, should rightly and immediately make all tour operators sign the afore mentioned treaty, or face closure, and criminal prosecution.
“The International Organization for Migration (IOM) stated that Ethiopian children are being sold for as little as US$ 1.20 to work as domestic servants or to be exploited in prostitution.” The Middle East is the major international destination of choice for traffickers, “Many Ethiopian women working in domestic service in the Middle East face severe abuses indicative of forced labor, including physical and sexual assault, denial of salary, sleep deprivation, and confinement. Many are driven to despair and mental illness, with some committing suicide. Ethiopian women are also exploited in the sex trade after migrating for labour purposes – particularly in brothels, mining camps, and near oil fields in Sudan – or after escaping abusive employers in the Middle East.”10 “At least 10,000 have been sent to the Gulf States to work as prostitutes.”(CTE)
Let us not even begin to look at the complicity of such states in the destruction of the lives of these children and women, the ‘little ones’ that dance upon the waters of life, seeking only a gentle heart to trust, finding the dark days of Rome, and in despair we cry “Men’s wretchedness in soothe I so deplore,”11
Meles Zenawi loves to ‘talk the talk’ to his western allies, the US, Britain, the European Union and the like, whilst turning a blind eye, a deaf ear to the cries of the child being beaten, the young girl being raped and traded for sex and the teenager separated from her family, her friends and her childhood, sold into servitude and abuse within Ethiopia and across the Red Sea in the oil rich ‘Gulf States’.
(This article is part of a series).
Notes:
1. Addis Ababa City Admin Social & NGO Affairs Office (SNGOA), Save the Children Denmark (SCD) and ANNPPCAN-Ethiopian. Child Labor in Ethiopia with special focus on Child Prostitution Study. ‘Child Prostitution in Addis Ababa 2006 (CPAA)
2. Health Effects of Prostitution (EOP), Janice G. Raymond
3. http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/global_health/aids/Countries/africa/ethiopia.html
4. Jodi L. Jacobson, The Other Epidemic
5. Sofie Loumann Nielsen. The Reporter 10 September 2010
6. Violence against children in Ethiopia (VACE). Africa Child Policy Forum
7. http://www.childtrafficking.org/cgi-bin/ct/main.sql?ID=2067&file=view_document.sql
8. ILO. http://www.childtrafficking.org/cgi-bin/ct/main.sql?file=view_document.sql&TITLE=-1&AUTHOR=-1&THESAURO=-1&ORGANIZATION=-1&TOPIC=-1&GEOG=-1&YEAR=-1&LISTA=No&COUNTRY=-1&FULL_DETAIL=Yes&ID=2067. (CTE)
9. Ecpat Global Monitoring report status of action against commercial sexual exploitation of children, Ethiopia. (AACSE)
10. http://ovcs.blogspot.com/2008/01/ethiopia-is-source-country-for-human.html
11. Faust Part One, Mephistopheles.
(About the author: Graham Peebles is Director of The Create Trust, a UK registered charity, supporting fundamental social change and the human rights of individuals in acute need. He may be reached at [email protected])
Review by Lisanu Betaw
The recently released book by Dr. Aklog Birara (hereafter referred to as the author) on Ethiopia titled “The Great Land Giveaway” is a phenomenal piece of work reflecting the {www:culmination} of a dedicated research effort by an economic pundit with a hallmark of professional excellence and {www:experiential} richness. It goes into great depth of analysis of the socio-economic and political realities of Ethiopia today and, predicated on the outcome of the analysis, foresees a looming misfortune befalling Ethiopia if the present anomaly of land giveaway and socio-economic mismanagement are to be allowed to continue to prevail in the times to come. Summarized in broad terms, uncontrolled access, by invitation, to fertile farm land by outsiders with no veritable returns to Ethiopia, corruption and nepotism at all levels of the system, insatiable greed at the highest level, ethnic and political considerations for entitlement to economic assets including land and, in total, unbounded control of the economic and social life of the people are the troubling features that the author brings out in the book. Towards the end the author highlights painstaking measures to be taken in unity if the travesty of development and the menacing trend are to be reversed. Mirrored in the book are the arbitrariness of socio-economic management and the looming dangers facing Ethiopia not just vis-a-vis the generation today but also as a recorded history for posterity.
What are the salient issues that the author underscores in his intensive and extensive analysis of Ethiopia’s socio-economic disorder? Are there other authoritative Africa-wide and other findings of studies and established experiences that underpin the author’s findings and arguments about Ethiopia?
1. Issues that have taken centre stage in the book
1.1 Giving away fertile farm land (at nominal fees) to foreign companies and individuals (with a select few of local elites also having some share) in the name of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).
The foreign investors are given an unprecedented carte blanche. With no binding and enforceable conditions included in the grant the foreign investors use the farm lands to grow products of their choices, use technologies to maximize production and export the produce to their countries of origin and, what are left there-from, to the highest external bidders. The continued wellbeing of the communities they displace and the growth and development of Ethiopia at large as well as the protections of environmental resources including wildlife do not go into their calculations. What is left for the displaced communities is the chance of seasonally selling their labour for meagre compensations.
The official arguments of (i) promoting growth and development through the land grant and (ii) the grant being only of unoccupied or unutilized land are a travesty. First, the author convincingly argues that the nation’s genuine and sustainable growth and development can occur only when Ethiopians own economic assets including land, produce what they consider are possible and economical, process their raw outputs into final use products and finally offer the fruits of their labour to the markets within and without. Second, there is no unoccupied or unutilized land except those lying fallow or are grazing areas left to regenerate. Further, the highlands of Ethiopia constituting areas above 1500 metres above sea level and representing 40 percent of the nation’s land mass are home for over 80 percent (87 percent to be exact) of the population and correspondingly of the farming households. The farming households are in dire need of farm lands. Contrary to the land use master plan of the 1980s (jointly produced with FAO and UNDP) which prevents cultivation of land with inclination of 30 percent and above, small holding farmers continue to expand their cultivation of hillsides thereby degrading the vitality of the soil on them.
In the context of these vivid lines of the author’s arguments, the role of the Government should have been one of creating enabling conditions through distribution of land with the right of ownership, building of farm and market infrastructure and provision of inputs (including fertilizers) in the types and magnitudes required.
In a rare occurrence and providing the validity of the author’s argument the new Head of FAO and a Kenyan prominent businessman (the latter taking Ethiopia as a case in point) in an interview with Aljazeera, call land grant a complete failure.
1.2 Development for the author, as for others, means improvement of the lives of Ethiopians across the land. Fundamental in this argument is that when Ethiopians are not empowered to be active role players in their own development and continue to be side spectators development in the nation’s context becomes a misnomer. Growth can occur without development but only to raise the fortunes of a select group of elites and to improve income for the state treasury.
1.3 A misconceived view of the regime in power that the author brings to light in his researched findings is that development is faster and impacting when it is state-led. This, of course, is antithesis to the recorded experiences of development. The lessons from the defunct command economies of the past did not seem to have made a dent in the understanding of the power controlling the economy. Present day Vietnam, according to Greg Mills (Greg Mills, 2010) raised itself from a net importer of agricultural commodities including rice to the world’s second largest exporter of rice and coffee only after its land reform in which private ownership created a stake for those working on the farms.
1.4 The private sector, normally considered as the engine of development has been, according to the researched findings of the author, wantonly weakened principally through monopoly of the major business and industry sectors by the state-cum-party enterprises but also through discouraging policies, tax burdens and bureaucratic machineries to reduce the level playing field. Evidenced by the findings is that there is a void in the enabling environment for the sector to function with freedom, fairness and unfettered drive.
A researched revelation by Greg Mills about private sector in Africa in his book “Why Africa is Poor” shows great similarities to the fate of private sector in Ethiopia. The following is what Greg Mills writes:
“Africa’s people are poverty stricken not because the private sector does not exist or was unwilling to work in sometimes difficult settings. These people and companies do exist, though the private sector is often not private at all, but rather an elite-linked system of rent seeking. Even where there is a degree of independence, government attitudes towards private businesses range from suspicion to outright hostility.
1.5 Ethiopia, as truly and convincingly explained in the book, possesses bountiful supply of natural and human resources. The troubling reality, however, is that there is a web of man-made factors that continue to militate against the deployment of these resources to its growth and development: They included distorted policies, divisive and non-inclusive governance, state and party control of the economy, nepotism, rampant corruption, weakening of the private sector, absence of fair and impartial access to opportunities and declining relevance of education to growth and development. The regime in power preaches about agro-based industrialization which is a travesty in the absence of Ethiopians owning economic assets, playing the roles of producers, processors, exporters, importers and, in general, participants in their nation’s growth and development. The concept and practice of what the author calls “virtuous cycle” take root only when the latter conditions prevail.
1.6 Finally, the book makes extensive coverage of small holder farms and the inherent economic benefits they create. In particular, the following superior values of the farms are articulated:
– Intensive use of land
– Capacity for rural labour absorption
– Crop-livestock integration
– High labour input per unit of area
– High responsiveness to incentives
– Great opportunity for land augmenting
Some living examples reinforcing the author’s down-to-earth analysis and convincing conclusions are the pathway to development followed by South Asian countries in the past and the remarkable development performance of Vietnam today which placed emphasis on small-scale agriculture.
To the deserved credit of the author, he does not underestimate the significance of large-scale farming. In fact, he reminisces about graduates of the then Alemaya agricultural college and retired citizens of the nation going into operating large-size farms with impressive successes. His prime contention is that that ought to be left to native Ethiopians.
2. “The primary reason why Africa’s people are poor is because
their leaders make this choice” (Greg Mills, 2010).
A few statements are quoted from Greg Mills in some of the preceding paragraphs to support the arguments of the author about some of the issues on Ethiopia. Greg Mills, in fact, highlights many more retarding factors regarding the development of Africa which have astounding similarities to those that the author discusses on Ethiopia. The following are some of them:
– Reliance on primary commodities for exports and incorrect policies and procedures to facilitate trade
– Inefficient land use
– Ruinous and self-interested decisions taken by single parties and with no bottom up pressure
– A system thriving on corruption and nepotism
– Land holding structure in which it is distributed on the basis of political allegiances thereby impeding ownership and entrepreneurship
– Top down imposition of the will of governments and resulting institutionalization of weak governance
– Bad choices in place of better ones in the broader public interest because the latter is not in the leaders’ personal and often financial self-interests.
– Leaders externalizing their problems making them the responsibility of others.
An interesting conclusion comes out visibly from the research outputs by Greg Mills about Africa and by the author on Ethiopia: The issues highlighted for Africa as a whole and for Ethiopia as part of Africa greatly coincide. This certainly is not because the two authors came together and shared or reconciled findings but rather each independently carrying out his own research supported by his own vast experiences led him to the conclusion that happened to be similar to that of the other. This is a telling evidence that the book by the author on Ethiopia is the outcome of a dedicated research by one who has his country at heart. The regime in power opted for almost all the failing strategies that stunted and still continue to stunt the development of Africa. The book deserves not only to be read but also owned by all Ethiopians and by those whose hearts go out to Ethiopia.
Final Point:
A considered suggestion to the author is to produce an abridged version of the book both in English and Amharic to serve as handbooks of this historic work. This, of course, implies more in terms of effort, time and material resources but the potential rewarding impact will outweigh all of these.
By Talila Nesher | Haaretz
Women say that while waiting in transit camps in Ethiopia they were coaxed into agreeing to injections of long-acting birth control drugs.
Women who immigrated from Ethiopia eight years ago say they were told they would not be allowed into Israel unless they agreed to be injected with the long-acting birth control drug Depo Provera, according to an investigative report aired yesterday on the Israel Educational Television program “Vacuum.”
The women say that while waiting in transit camps in Ethiopia prior to immigration they were placed in family planning workshops where they were coaxed into agreeing to the injection – a charge denied by both the Joint Distribution Committee, which ran the clinics, and the Health Ministry.
“We said we won’t have the shot. They told us, if you don’t you won’t go to Israel And also you won’t be allowed into the Joint (American Joint Distribution Committee ) office, you won’t get aid or medical care. We were afraid… We didn’t have a choice. Without them and their aid we couldn’t leave there. So we accepted the injection. It was only with their permission that we were allowed to leave,”
recounted Emawayish, who immigrated from Ethiopia eight years ago. She was one of 35 women, whose stories were recorded by Sebba Reuven, that relate how they were coaxed and threatened into agreeing to receive the injectable birth control drug.
The birth rate among Israel’s Ethiopian immigrant population has dropped nearly 20 percent in 10 years.
According to the report, the women were given the Depo Provera injections in the family planning workshops in transit camps, a practice that continued once they reached Israel. The women who were interviewed for the investigation reported that they were told at the transit camps that having many children would make their lives more difficult in Ethiopia and in Israel, and even that they would be barred from coming to Israel if they refused.
The Joint said in a response to “Vacuum” that its family planning workshops are among the services it provides to immigrants, who learn about spacing out their children’s birth, “but we do not advise them to have small families. It is a matter of personal choice, but we tell them it is possible. The claims by the women according to which ‘refusal to have the injection will bar them from medical care [and] economic aid and threaten their chances to immigrate to Israel are nonsense. The medical team does not intervene directly or indirectly in economic aid and the Joint is not involved in the aliyah procedures. With regard to the use of Depo Provera, studies indicate that is the most popular form of birth control among women in Ethiopia,” the Joint said.
In its response to “Vacuum,” the Health Ministry said it did not “recommend or try to encourage the use of Depo Provera, and that if these injections were used it was against our position. The Health Ministry provides individual family counseling in the framework of its well baby clincs and this advice is also provided by the physicians of the health maintenance organizations.”
The Jewish Agency, which is responsible for Jewish immigration from abroad, said in response that it takes a harsh view of any effort to interfere in the family planning processes of Ethiopian immigrants, adding that “while the JA has never held family planning workshops for this group in Ethiopia or at immigrant absorption centers in Israel, the immigrant transit camp in Gondar, as the investigation noted, was previously operated by other agencies.”
By Salem Solomon | New York Times
ON Sept. 2, Ambassador Susan E. Rice delivered a eulogy for a man she called “a true friend to me.” Before thousands of mourners and more than 20 African heads of state in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Ms. Rice, the United States’ representative to the United Nations, lauded the country’s late prime minister, Meles Zenawi. She called him “brilliant” — “a son of Ethiopia and a father to its rebirth.”
Few eulogies give a nuanced account of the decedent’s life, but the speech was part of a disturbing pattern for an official who could become President Obama’s next secretary of state. During her career, she has shown a surprising and unsettling sympathy for Africa’s despots.
This record dates from Ms. Rice’s service as assistant secretary of state for African affairs under President Bill Clinton, who in 1998 celebrated a “new generation” of African leaders, many of whom were ex-rebel commanders; among these leaders were Mr. Meles, Isaias Afewerki of Eritrea, Paul Kagame of Rwanda, Jerry J. Rawlings of Ghana, Thabo Mbeki of South Africa and Yoweri K. Museveni of Uganda.
“One hundred years from now your grandchildren and mine will look back and say this was the beginning of an African renaissance,” Mr. Clinton said in Accra, Ghana, in March 1998.
In remarks to a subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations that year, Ms. Rice was equally breathless about the continent’s future. “There is a new interest in individual freedom and a movement away from repressive, one-party systems,” she said. “It is with this new generation of Africans that we seek a dynamic, long-term partnership for the 21st century.”
Her optimism was misplaced. In the 14 years since, many of these leaders have tried on the strongman’s cloak and found that it fit nicely. Mr. Meles dismantled the rule of law, silenced political opponents and forged a single-party state. Mr. Isaias, Mr. Kagame and Mr. Museveni cling to their autocratic power. Only Mr. Rawlings and Mr. Mbeki left office willingly.
Ms. Rice’s enthusiasm for these leaders might have blinded her to some of their more questionable activities. Critics, including Howard W. French, a former correspondent for The New York Times, say that in the late 1990s, Ms. Rice tacitly approved of an invasion of the Democratic Republic of Congo that was orchestrated by Mr. Kagame of Rwanda and supported by Mr. Museveni of Uganda. In The New York Review of Books in 2009, Mr. French reported that witnesses had heard Ms. Rice describe the two men as the best insurance against genocide in the region. “They know how to deal with that,” he reported her as having said. “The only thing we have to do is look the other way.” Ms. Rice has denied supporting the invasion.
More recently, according to Jason K. Stearns, a scholar of the region, Ms. Rice temporarily blocked a United Nations report documenting Rwanda’s support for the M23 rebel group now operating in eastern Congo, and later moved to delete language critical of Rwanda and Uganda from a Security Council resolution. “According to former colleagues, she feels that more can be achieved by constructive engagement, not public censure,” Mr. Stearns wrote recently on Foreign Policy’s Web site.
Ms. Rice’s relationship with Mr. Meles — which dates from 1998, when she was a mediator in an ultimately unsuccessful effort to prevent war between Eritrea and Ethiopia — also calls her judgment into question.
In fairness, in her eulogy, Ms. Rice said she differed with Mr. Meles on questions like democracy and human rights. But if so, the message did not get through; under Mr. Meles during the past 15 years, democracy and the rule of law in Ethiopia steadily deteriorated. Ethiopia imprisoned dissidents and journalists, used food aid as a political tool, appropriated vast sections of land from its citizens and prevented the United Nations from demarcating its border with Eritrea.
Meanwhile, across multiple administrations, the United States has favored Ethiopia as an ally and a perceived bulwark against extremism in the region. In 2012 the nation received $580 million in American foreign aid.
Eritrea is no innocent. It has closed itself off, stifled dissent and forced its young people to choose between endless military service at home and seeking asylum abroad. But I believe that the Security Council, with Ms. Rice’s support, went too far in imposing sanctions on Eritrea in 2009 for supporting extremists.
President Obama has visited sub-Saharan Africa just once in his first term — a brief stop in Ghana. One signal that he plans to focus more on Africa — and on human rights and democracy, not only economic development and geopolitics — in his next term would be to nominate someone other than Susan Rice as America’s top diplomat.
Salem Solomon is an Eritrean-American journalist who runs Africa Talks, a news and opinion Web site covering Africa and the global African diaspora.
By Dashiel Bennett | The Atlantic Wire
December 10, 2012
Republican Senators have gotten little traction trying to pin the Benghazi disaster on U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, but new details about the role she’s played in the ongoing Congolese war might be more damaging to her possible nomination for Secretary of State. The New York Times has a damning report today on the relationship between Rice and the government of Rwanda, which was a client of hers when she worked for a Washington consulting firm a decade ago.
Since being appointed U.N. ambassador in 2008, Rice has frequently intervened to protect Rwandan president Paul Kagame from criticism and condemnation for his support for the rebel group M23. The militant army has been accused of gross human rights violations, including mass rape, executions, and the use of child soldiers in the conflict in the Congo, which is Rwanda’s neighbor. Rwanda’s backing of M23 is seen as a major factor in prolonging the decade-long conflict that has been filled with horrific brutality and violence.
On more than one occasion Rice has stepped in to soften the language of Security Council resolutions and blocked attempts to publicly shame and criticize Kagame. Last week, Foreign Policy reported that two months ago, during a private meeting with her French and British counterparts, Rice objected to the idea of “naming and shaming” Kagame, saying, “This is the D.R.C. [Democratic Republic of Congo.] If it weren’t the M23 doing this, it would be some other group.”
Rice’s relationship with Kagame goes all the way back to her days in the Clinton Administration, when she was one of the leading members in the administration on African affairs. She served on the National Security Council during the Rwandan genocide in 1994, which ended when Kagame’s party took over the government. After leaving the White House in 2000, Rice became a managing director at Intellibridge, a “security analysis” firm that had Kagame government’s as a client.
Rice and other American diplomats have argued that silent diplomacy is the best course of action in the Congo, and that publicly attacking Kagame or Rwanda would undermine ongoing peace negotiations. However, with the Congolese war so far from being resolved—and over three million dead in the last decade—its hard to see the wisdom of that approach. The failure of U.S. and U.N. to take more decisive action against the Rwandan genocide is still seen as a major black mark on the Clinton administration’s legacy. (“Bystanders to Genocide” is what Samantha Power called them in The Atlantic in 2001.) There are many who feel those same mistakes are being repeated in the Congo today.
As a purely political matter, however, the stories are resurfacing at the worst time for Rice. The ties between her and Rwanda are not a secret, and have been reported in depth elsewhere. But as with any previously under-the-radar issue, a banner headline on The New York Times website goes a long way toward turning a footnote into a scandal. It’s clear that should Rice be nominated to be the next Secretary of State, she’s going to face a lot of tough questions beyond just her statements on the Benghazi mess. It’s also clear that those who are opposed to her nomination are going to play up any and all angles that might reflect negatively on her foreign affairs credentials. Rather than a petty squabble over a harmless set of talking points, Rice’s actual conduct in the halls of the United Nations should have a much bigger impact on whether or not she gets the big promotion she’s been waiting for.
Rice herself said back in 2001 that, “I swore to myself that if I ever faced such a crisis again, I would come down on the side of dramatic action, going down in flames if that was required.” Even if she doesn’t stop the war in the Congo, the going down in flames part could still happen.
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