Sources inside the regime of Tigrean People Liberation Front (TPLF) in Ethiopia have disclosed that a secret military court has passed death sentences on four air force pilots who sought political asylum in 2006 while on a training mission in Israel.
According to the sources, a TPLF-appointed court at the Air Force has passed a “guilty” verdict and a death sentence in absentia on Capt. Samuel Getachew, Lt. Himanot Gebre Mariam, Lt. Fikresleasie Feleke, and Lt. Yitabrek Takele.
The TPLF regime’s military is currently plagued with a series of defections. During the past few years, senior officers, including generals and colonels, as well as scores of junior officers and privates have defected to other countries seeking asylum.
It is also to be recalled that a few weeks following the May 2005 fraudulent elections, Lt. Behailu Gebre and Lt. Abiyot Manguday fled to Djibouti flying a military helicopter. Ethiopians around the world made a vigorous effort to rescue those officers from being handed over to Meles Zenawi’s regime while they remained in Djibouti. Reversing the initial promise it gave to provide them with protection, the Government of President Omar Gulleh sent them back to Ethiopia, to certain torture and death, in flagrant violation of international conventions and protocols that accord protection for political refugees. After their forcible return to Ethiopia, Lts. Behailu and Abiyot have disappeared without a trace. It’s believed that they have been executed.
Other Air force pilots who fled the country, including veterans such as Captain Teshome Tenkolu and eight pilots who were on a training mission in Belarus, have managed to resettle in European countries where they are protected and far away from the sad and cruel fate befallen Lts. Behilu and Abiyot.
Withing the past year, General Alemshet Degefe, head of the Air force, and his deputies were summarily dismissed after a fall out with officials of the ruling party, TPLF, and replaced with party loyalists from Tigray region, including, General Molla Hailemariam, head of the air force; General Tadesse Worede, head of Military Staff School; General Seyoum Hagos, chief for eastern command; and General Yohannes Gebremeskel, chief of central command. General Samora Yunus, a TPLF Central Committee member, remains Chief of Staff.
The TPLF regime’s military continues to face serious discontent and low morale, in part, due to lack of a merit-based system and professionalism. The crisis facing the military is compounded by the quagmire in Somalia.
EDITOR’S NOTE: The ‘opposition’ won only one seat in Addis Ababa, and the guy is not even alive, as reported by The Reporter. The election was a total joke.
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By Tsegaye Tadesse (Reuters)
ADDIS ABABA — Ethiopia’s ruling party swept local polls largely boycotted by opposition parties who accused the government of intimidating voters and blocking their candidates, results released on Sunday showed.
The National Election Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) declared Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) victor of the first vote in the Horn of Africa nation since 2005 elections ended in deadly violence.
Out of 623 districts, the EPRDF won 559 seats and won all but one of 39 parliament seats up for grabs in by-elections, the board said.
The largest opposition party in parliament, the United Ethiopian Democratic Forces, pulled out three days before the April 13 start of the polls. The Oromo Federalist Democratic Movement pulled out before a second round was held a week later.
“The election in which a total of over 3.5 million candidates from 30 political parties participated were conducted in a free and peaceful manner and in accordance with the law of the country’, the Election Board said.
It said out of a total over 26 million registered voters, 24.5 million or 93 percent voted.
EPRDF also won all major seats in the administration of the capital Addis Ababa.
It had been run by caretaker administrators after opposition politicians who won most of the seats there were jailed on charges of usurping the state after the 2005 polls.
They have since been pardoned after a genocide and treason trial that dragged for two years and drew widespread criticism from human rights and democracy watchdogs.
Two rounds of post-election violence saw more than 200 people killed in battles between security forces and opposition protesters. The violence and an ensuing crackdown on opposition leaders tarnished Meles’ once-sterling Democratic credentials.
But analysts say the courtroom pursuit of the opposition effectively splintered its cohesion, just after it had made its biggest-ever political gains at the ballot box.
Endrias Eshete, who is known as the butcher of Addis Ababa University, has arrived at Dulles Airport in Washington DC today. He was taken to a van provided by the Woyanne embassy in a wheelchair. The tutor of Meles Zenawi’s daughter, Samuel Assefa, who also acts as an ambassador of Ethiopian in Washington DC, was at the air port to greet him.
Meles Zenawi appointed Endrias Eshete as head of the Addis Ababa University to stamp out any criticism of the Woyanne regime by the university’s faculty and students. Endrias allowed, and often invited, Meles’s death squads, the Agazi special forces, and the notorious Federal police to enter the AAU campus and attack the students. Under Endrias’s watch thousands of AAU students have been savagely attacked, tortured, imprisoned and killed.
Endrias Eshete and Ambassador Samuel Assefa are old time drinking buddies and close friends of Meles Zenawi’s family. Samuel is a personal tutor and chaperon of Meles’s older daughter. When she was admitted to Georgetown University in Washington DC about two years ago, Meles removed the previous ambassador, Kassahun Chekol, and sent Samuel Assefa, who has no diplomatic experience, to DC as an ambassador. Samuel’s main job, however, is not diplomacy. He is a personal servant to the dictator’s daughter.
Endrias Eshete, who is known as the butcher of Addis Ababa University, has arrived at Dulles Airport in Washington DC today. He was taken to a van provided by the Woyanne embassy in a wheelchair. The tutor of Meles Zenawi’s daughter, Samuel Assefa, who also acts as an ambassador of Ethiopia in Washington DC, was at the airport to greet him.
Meles Zenawi appointed Endrias Eshete as head of the Addis Ababa University to stamp out any criticism of the Woyanne tribal junta by the university’s faculty and students. Endrias allowed, and often invited, Meles’s death squads, the Agazi special forces, and the notorious Federal police to enter the AAU campus and attack the students. Under Endrias’s watch thousands of AAU students have been savagely attacked, tortured, imprisoned and killed.
Endrias Eshete and Ambassador Samuel Assefa are old time drinking buddies (both full time drunkards) and close friends of Meles Zenawi’s family. Samuel is a personal tutor and chaperon of Meles’s older daughter. When she was admitted to Georgetown University in Washington DC about two years ago, Meles removed the previous ambassador, Kassahun Ayele, and sent Samuel Assefa — who has no diplomatic experience — to DC as an ambassador. Samuel’s main job, however, is not diplomacy. He is a personal servant to the dictator’s daughter.
On May 12th 2008, Suldan Fowsi Mohamed Ali, a prominent community elder and a peace activist was sentenced to 22 years in prison by an Ethiopian regional court in Jigjiga (also Jijiga). On the same date Haji Ibrahim Had, a well-known businessman and financier of an anti-ONLF (Ogaden National Liberation Front) clan based militia was also sentenced to 16 years in prison by the same court. The two detainees will be transferred to Zuway prison, in ‘Amhara region’.
On August 28th 2007, in Jigjiga, Ethiopian [Woyanne regime] security forces and the local police took Suldan Fowsi Mohamed Ali from his residence in the dead of night. And then he was transferred to an underground military detention in Jigjiga. He was among a number of outspoken critics of the Ethiopian [Woyanne] government’s policies in the Ogaden who were arrested before the arrival of the UN fact-finding mission in the region. He has been brought before the regional court several times. Each time, He was taken back to his cell for lack of evidence.
Recently, Suldan Fowsi was charged with masterminding of two hand grenade attacks which took place in Dhagaxbuur and Jigjiga, on May 28th 2007 and collaborating with the bandits,” a term Ethiopian authorities [Woyannes] frequently use to designate members of ONLF.
Suldan Fowsi was a member of a group of Ogaden elders who were mandated by the Ethiopian Prime Minister [Woyanne leader] Meles Zenawi to negotiate with the ONLF, on June 29th 2005. It should be noted that he was the mediator who successfully negotiated the release of the Chinese Workers who were taken by ONLF fighters, on 24th April 2007, in the Cobolle oil exploration field attack.
It is worthwhile to mention that Suldan Fowsi is a cousin of Bashir Ahmed Makhtal, the Canadian citizen who was handed over to the Ethiopian government [Woyanne regime] by Kenya at Mogadishu airport, on January 21st 2007.Since then Bashir is being held incommunicado without charge or trial.
Suldan Fowsi’s family members and relatives were subjected to constant harassment, intimidation, arbitrary detention and extensive torture. Those who are not in detention went into hiding for fear of their lives.
Haji Ibrahim Had was a sworn enemy of the ONLF. After the killing of his elder brother accidentally by the ONLF, he formed an anti-ONLF militia with the help of the Ethiopian Government [Woyanne]. His militia cooperated and collaborated with the Ethiopian [Woyanne] Armed Forces to undermine the ONLF. His younger brother was killed in one of the many engagements between his militia and ONLF fighters.
Haji Ibrahim Had was detained in December 2007. He was accused of collaborating with ‘the bandits,’ facilitating the Cobolle operation and having secret arrangements with the ONLF. He was brought before the regional court, in Jigjiga, on May 07th 2008, and then was taken back to his cell for lack of evidence and witnesses.
The two detainees were maltreated and denied medical care during their detention.
On April 04th 2008, when Mr. Abdi Mohamoud Omar, the head of the Somali Regional State Security and Justice Bureau, verbally attacked, Suldan Fowsi Mohamed Ali with a hateful and offensive language, during an interview with VOA Somali Section, Mr. Omar then confirmed Fowsi’s eventual condemnation. Since that day, court’s ruling had become a fait accoompli.
Suldan Fowsi and Haji Ibrahim Had pleaded not guilty. But regional court’s sentence was 22 and 16 years’ imprisonment respectively. They were not informed the particulars of the charges and reasons for their arrest, have not had access to any evidence presented against them, and were not represented by a proper legal counsel.
Hence, they did not receive fair trial in accordance with recognized international standards. On the basis of available information about their cases, the OHRC believes that there was not credible evidence for their conviction, and their trial was a mockery of justice, and considers Suldan Fowsi prisoner of conscience and Haji Ibrahim Had a victim of personal vendetta.
To the best of the Ogaden Human Rights Committee’s knowledge, Suldan Fowsi was not involved in any illegal or violent activity. He was a respectable community elder and peace activist. Haji Ibrahim Had was a notable businessman, an anti-ONLF and an ally of the Ethiopian [Woyanne] Government.
The Ogaden Human Rights Committee is concerned about their safety and well-being and opposes their transfer to the notorious Zuway prison.
The OHRC condemns the verdict of the Jigjiga Kangaroo Court and demands their unconditional and immediate release.
The Voice of America (VOA) gave a wide coverage of the formation of the Ginbot 7 Movement on its afternoon broadcast. Yesterday, Dr Berhanu Nega and colleagues had announced that Ginbot 7 Movement for Justice and Democracy will be officially created today, May 15, to coincide with the 3rd anniversary of the May 2005 elections that were overturned by Meles Zenawi’s dictatorship. Click here to listen VOA’s report
Meles Zenawi appointed Endrias Eshete as head of the Addis Ababa University to stamp out any criticism of the Woyanne regime by the university’s faculty and students. Endrias allowed, and often invited, Meles’s death squads, the Agazi special forces, and the notorious Federal police to enter the AAU campus and attack the students. Under Endrias’s watch thousands of AAU students have been savagely attacked, tortured, imprisoned and killed.