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Car bomb blast rocks Somali town
BBC News
A car bomb has exploded in Baidoa, where Somalia's fragile interim government is based, leaving at least six people dead.
A policeman told the BBC that a female suicide bomber wearing a veil blew herself up at a check-point.
The explosion also destroyed two other cars. "There were flames everywhere," an eye-witness said.
President Abdullahi Yusuf survived a suicide car bomb attack in Baidoa two months ago, which killed his brother.
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Ethiopia parliament authorizes action against Somali Islamists
He blamed that attack on his Islamist rivals, who denied responsibility.
There are fears of widespread conflict breaking out in Somalia between the government and the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC), which controls most of the south of the country, including the capital, Mogadishu.
Attacks
There have been conflicting reports of how many bombs there were.
Deputy Defence Minister Salad Ali Jelle told the AP news agency that three car bombs had exploded at police check-points, killing the drivers and three others.
A local journalist said he had seen three bodies.
Police commander General Ali Hussein told AFP that at least 12 people had died.
"There were two suicide cars full of explosives," he said.
Mr Salad also told AP that three alleged attackers had been captured.
He said they were foreign members of al-Qaeda.
The UIC denies links to al-Qaeda but is opposed to the government and has threatened to launch a holy war to drive Ethiopian troops out of the country.
Ethiopia admits it has hundreds of military trainers helping the government but denies they are taking part in any conflict.
The Ethiopian parliament on Thursday passed a resolution authorising the government to take all necessary and legal steps against any invasion by UIC.
The resolution said there was a clear and present danger to Ethiopia from the UIC.
Story from BBC NEWS
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Ethiopia votes to "stave off" Somali Islamist threat
Reuters
Thursday November 30
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - Ethiopia's parliament voted on Thursday to let the government take "all necessary" steps to rebuff any invasion by Somalia's Islamists amid reports Ethiopian troops on Somali soil had died in a landmine blast.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi urged lawmakers last week to back his plans to fight the Islamists, who have declared jihad on Ethiopia accusing it of sending troops into Somalia to prop up the chaotic country's fragile interim government.
"Parliament hereby authorises the government to take all necessary and legal steps to stave off a declaration of holy war and invasion by the Union of Islamic Courts against the country," Thursday's resolution said.
"The parliament believes the Islamic Courts group have presented clear and present danger to the sovereignty of the country," it said. The motion was approved by 311 to 90 votes, with 16 abstentions.
In the latest report of violence in Somalia, residents said the Islamists used a landmine to blow up a lorry carrying Ethiopian and Somali troops late on Wednesday, killing several.
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Islamists 'ambush' Ethiopia truck
Car bomb blast rocks Somali town
If confirmed, the incident would be the latest in a string of small clashes reported in the Horn of Africa nation that diplomats fear could escalate into all-out conflict at any time.
In a Reuters interview last month, Meles said Ethiopia was already "technically" at war with the Islamists, whom he said were "spoiling for a fight".
On Thursday, he told parliament Ethiopia was not declaring war on the Islamists, just asserting its right to self-defence.
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"The jihadists in the Union of Islamic Courts, in collaboration with Eritrea, have already invaded Ethiopia by smuggling in rebel groups whom they trained and armed ... to destabilise and create upheaval in the country," Meles said.
The Islamists say Ethiopia has sent thousands of troops into Somalia, while Addis Ababa insists it has only sent several hundred military trainers for President Abdullahi Yusuf's administration, which is confined to provincial Baidoa town.
Residents said Wednesday's attack took place between Baidoa and Manaas town, where some government troops are based.
"I saw an Ethiopian lorry pass the town of Goof Gaduud. A few minutes later I heard a big explosion and I saw lots of smoke," resident Abdullahi Abdi told Reuters by telephone. "I also saw vehicles carrying the injured and the dead."
The number of casualties was not immediately known.
Neither the Islamists, nor Ethiopia nor the interim Somali government had any immediate comment on the reported attack.
Amid the heightening tensions in Somalia, the U.N. Security Council pledged on Wednesday to consider steps to tighten a widely ignored 1992 U.N. arms embargo on the chaotic nation.
That surprised some diplomats, who suggested Washington was pushing for the embargo to be modified to allow an African-led peacekeeping force into Somalia.
The Islamists -- who seized Mogadishu and much of the south in June in a direct challenge to the government's authority -- bitterly oppose foreign fighters operating in Somalia.
Somalia has been without a functioning government since the fall of former dictator Siad Barre in 1991 sparked the collapse of the country into a patchwork of quarrelling fiefdoms.
(Additional reporting by Hassan Yare in Mogadishu)
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Special Section: Somalia
Special report Ethiopia: I beat TB. I can beat HIV
Metro
BY AIDAN RADNEDGE - Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Senait Dender's home is no larger, nor any more luxurious, than a toilet cubicle. In fact, that is what it was before a relative made a few alterations so she and son Yonas, one, could move in.
Battle after battle: HIV sufferer Senait Dender, 22, lives with her one-year-old son, Yonas
Photo: Metro
A sunken bed, a dirt-stiff blue shawl on the wall and a grubby baby's bottle are about all she has to show in the Kirkos area of Addis.
Before coming here eight months ago, they were sleeping in the streets.
They had been thrown out of her uncle's home after a vindictive landlord's ultimatum: either the HIV girl goes, or the whole family.
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A 20-minute wait for an HIV death sentence
Special report: Ethiopia. Nazareth is Africa's so-called 'high corridor of HIV'
Generation HIV dying for £6 a pill
Senait, 22, was raped at 14 and forced to give up the child. She was infected with HIV at 18 by a boyfriend, then later deserted by her husband, Yonas's father, after being laid low by HIV and TB.
Senait can barely stand on her rheumatism-riddled legs and fears the onset of Aids' most damaging symptoms. Yet she insists she is through the worst of her sickness, having responded encouragingly to TB treatment and now a month into her course of anti-retroviral drugs.
'I hope and pray God might give me my full health back so I can work and raise my baby myself,' she says.
'I have very strong hope and faith because a couple of years ago I was so ill people were expecting me every day to die. If I've passed through those difficult days, I have hope of being fully healed. I've been ten times worse than this.'
Aged 25, a mother awaits her death
Posing for a family portrait should be a pleasure but Mikre Mesele can barely summon up the strength to lift her head from the pillow.
Miskre Mesele and care giver Photo: Metro UK
She hardly has the room either, since her rusting shack in Addis Ababa has barely enough space for the bed where she spends her days.
Her landlord wants to evict her and charge more than the £5 monthly rent she can only just afford.
The real reason for her impending homelessness seems to be her HIVpositive status.
This means more misery for Mikre, 25, and her daughters Betamariam, nine, and Alemayhu, five.
Life was made arduous when Aids claimed the life of her husband three years ago and even more so when full-blown Aids confined her to bed.
She now spends her days lying helpless, unable to stir enough even to boil a kettle or cover plates mired in cat mess.
She said: 'I'm not personally worried about myself. I just heavily regret I can't really do something good for my children. I'm scared for their future.'
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Click here for more Metro Special Report from Ethiopia and other health related news
Helping, and Hampering
Funds to combat HIV welcome in Ethiopia, but not the strings attached
By Marina Walker Guevara
The Center for Public Integrity
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — Hotels along the Djibouti corridor, Ethiopia's main trade route to the Red Sea, are lately undertaking an unexpected and disturbing role as hospices for commercial sex workers infected with HIV/AIDS.
"There were three girls working with me, and the three tested positive," said Selam Aregaya, a 21-year-old who dropped out of school after her parents died and now is a commercial sex worker in a hotel in Nazrēt, one of the busiest towns along the Djibouti corridor, 55 miles from the capital city of Addis Ababa.
"The hotel owners help the girls that are sick and let them stay there and even allow them to die there," she said on a May morning, her head covered with a bright yellow scarf. Occasionally, Aregaya said, the sex workers have been able to pool money to send some of their HIV-infected friends to die at home.
There's no systematic collection of HIV data among sex workers in Ethiopia, but the latest government survey, in 1998, found that about 70 percent of Addis Ababa sex workers were HIV-positive. A 2006 report by the Ethiopian government identified sex workers as one of the groups with "high or increasing rates of HIV." Others include refugees, mobile populations and youth.
According to UNAIDS latest statistics, only 15 percent of women and 36 percent of men ages 15-24 in Ethiopia reported using a condom the last time they had sex with a casual partner.
In a country crippled by poverty and famine, rural girls and women migrate to cities in search of jobs. Unable to find steady work, many wind up engaging in sex work along the country's main transportation corridors. Even those who get a waitress job or make it to high school often have sex in exchange for money or gifts to supplement their income. They don't identify themselves as sex workers, and they don't insist on condom use with their clients, groups working with sex workers in Ethiopia say.
Mengistu Haile Mariam established the first HIV/AIDS program in Ethiopia in 1985, one of the first in Africa. It wasn't until 1998 that Ethiopia came up with a comprehensive national HIV policy.
The first cases of HIV infections in Ethiopia were reported in the mid-1980s — a time when condoms were a social taboo, advertising of family planning was illegal and some government officials didn't hesitate to call HIV "a disease of prostitutes" or bluntly deny its existence.
Despite those hurdles, Mengistu Haile Mariam, the longtime dictator who overthrew the last Ethiopian king, established the first HIV/AIDS program in Ethiopia — one of the first in Africa — in 1985. Among other measures, he allowed the distribution of about 2 million condoms among public servants.
Political unrest and other government priorities such as reducing poverty significantly weakened the HIV efforts in the '90s, when the epidemic spread into the general population. It wasn't until 1998 that Ethiopia came up with a comprehensive national HIV policy.
Source: The Center for Public Integrity
Ethiopia special report: A 20-minute wait for an HIV death sentence
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Metro
Life is lonely for those with HIV – or those about to find out whether they too are infected. In the fourth of a series of special reports to mark World Aids Day tomorrow, Metro Chief Reporter AIDAN RADNEDGE discovers how agonised young Ethiopians are responding to the country's deadly HIV/Aids epidemic.
Terrified teenager Daniel Mekonin had the nerviest 20 minutes of his life while waiting for his HIV test results
Photo: Metro
Frightened Daniel Mekonin has the worst 20 minutes of his life to get through. The 18-yearold labourer has just taken an HIV test and is anxiously awaiting the result.
'I was worried when I came here this morning. Now I am afraid,' he mumbles. 'I know what Aids is. I just don't what I'd do if they tell me I'm positive. I wish I didn't have to wait.'
Many men in Ethiopia refuse to get tested even when sick, or when their wives suffer from Aids.
But Daniel was quick to visit after an accident at work that jabbed a jagged shard of metal into his hand.
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Special report: Ethiopia. Nazareth is Africa's so-called 'high corridor of HIV'
Generation HIV dying for £6 a pill
He was aware enough about Aids to fear a possible blood infection, especially in a city where one in ten people is HIV-positive.
'I know quite a few people with Aids,' he says. 'We also got told quite a lot at school. But the counsellors here have told me even more today.'
We are sitting in the main office of an Aids service provided by church group Kale Heywet, which has 31 centres across the capital, Addis Ababa, and more in other cities.
They have to rely on plenty of volunteers – for counselling, home care and activism.
Project director Dr Henok Ghiwot says: 'We have to keep hiring all the time. You see a lot of burn-out because of the cases we deal with.'
They hope to expand into remote, rural areas and settlements crowded with prostitutes and itinerant labourers, as well as military camps.
In Addis, an estimated 10.7 per cent of the population are HIV-positive. Along the main highways, rates can rise to 30 per cent.
As other patients sit in the windowless waiting room, volunteers try to ease Daniel's nerves, but he is too fretful to be distracted for long.
By visiting the Kale Heywet/Medan Acts Aids welfare centre he risks losing up to a day's wages: 12 Birr, or 75p.
'I'm living on the edge,' he admits. 'I'd love to go back to my studies, but it's so hard to get a regular supply of food and money to live on first.
'I know a lot of charities and countries provide assistance to Ethiopia, but too often the supplies don't reach the people they need to. Either the authorities are incompetent – or resources go to people because of who they're related to.'
Finally, he is called for his test result. Charts on the walls spell out how, and for how long, counsellors should spend time with patients – depending on a positive or negative outcome. Soon, Daniel is out, beaming a relieved smile. He is one of the lucky ones. He leaves others, waiting their turn, who will receive bleaker news.
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Special Section: Health
Hope University College : New hope for students
By Groum Abate
The Capital
The construction of Hope University College , Ethiopia 's first not-for-profit liberal arts university college is going to start on a 50,000 square meters of plot around Lebu Area.
The cornerstone for the construction of the university college was laid on Saturday November 24, in the presence of government officials and ambassadors.
The institution is established with the aim of providing a first class educational establishment for the youth of Ethiopia in an effort to reduce the ‘brain drain' that is facilitated with students looking for quality education abroad.
The university college is designed to develop informed, articulate, sensitive and holistic leaders who can make a positive, transformational difference in the development of Ethiopia and the rest of the Horn of Africa.
Hope University College will start out with an anticipated number of 1,100 students with the ability to expand to 1,500 students.
The University College is expected to cost over 4.6 million euros and be completed in three years time.
The design was done by GelukTreurniet Architecten BV of the Netherlands , in collaboration with ABBA architects from Ethiopia . According to the design, the building would lay on 13,000 square meters of plot.
The total square meters is formulated from a balance between the rather spacious Western norm on the one side, and the quite crowded Ethiopian standards on the other. Accordingly, the aim of the plan is to improve the quality of the learning environment (fewer students in one space). Thirty-three thousand square meters is calculated for the grounds, which include parks, paths, gardens and sporting facilities.
Hope was founded in the early 1970s when Rev. Jack Smith, a pastor from the United States , opened a home for 20 street children in Addis Ababa , providing full care, schooling, and skill training. From this beginning, Hope was established under an Ethiopian board in October, 1971 in Addis Ababa with a mission to provide hope for the needy.
From then onwards, Hope was wrapped up in many efforts of intervention as it responded to the needs of children, youngsters, women, families and others affected by crisis.
Hope focus on childcare, education, vocational training, and preventive and rehabilitative street children's projects, relief programs for the hungry and for those displaced by an emergency.
The University College, located in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia and the seat of the African Union, is currently under construction and is due to open its doors in September 2008.
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Hope University College Ethiopia
Special Section: Education
More Plasma TVs for schools in Ethiopia
By Eskinder Michael
With the Ministry of Education poised on seeing to it that every school in Ethiopia would have a plasma TV screens, the Education Communication Agency under the Addis Ababa City Adminstration Education office purchased 885 Plasna TV Screens for shcools that did't have any before.
The Plasma TVs are to be installed in schools that did not have any before. The introduction of Plasma TVs in schools was introduced so that students all over Ethiopia could follow the same curriculum and benefit all the materials and teaching methods that students in towns enjoy.
The agency spent 47.94 million birr on this acquisition to add up to the 597 Plasma TVs it has already installed in 22 schools at a cost of over 32 million birr since the beginning of the past fiscal year.
These schools were never fitted with the new technology which allows students all over the country get access to the same level of education.
Newly built schools and those that underwent expansion systems in Addis Ababa were also fitted with 555 Plasma TVs at a cost of 30.06 million birr. It was learnt that out of the 555 TVs fitted in these schools, about 330 costing 17.87 million birr were provided by the Ministry of Education.
As the plan to equip every high school with a plasma screen gains momentum, it is believed that the Ministry of Education (MoE) still needs 1,482 Plasma TVs to ensure that every class in every school in Addis Ababa has one.
The agency believes that these new Plasma TVs will be fitted and ready for use by the beginning of the second semester this school year.
When the screens start giving service, they will be transmitting live education courses in the fields of English, Biology, Civics, Chemistry, Physics and Mathematics.
Though the idea of fitting Plasma TVs in school has been a much debated scheme in terms of its efficiency and with regards to rendering teachers redundant in classrooms as they are much less involved with students, the MoE has stuck to its plans so far.
During the disturbances in the country (June, November 2005) following the last elections several high school students' rioting had resulted in schools' furniture and windows destruction including the Plasma TVs. The Addis Ababa Education Bureau had at the time stipulated to the dismay of the parents with little income that they would have to pay for the damage so as to replace the Plasma TVs. However, nothing has been resolved so far and the newly acquired Plasma TVs will not be installed in these schools.
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Related Links
Ethiopia leaps into the information age (The Times)
Special Section: Education
"Because we are poor,we can't afford not to use technology" Meles Zenawi
Most Ethiopian high schools now have plasma-screen TVs Photo: The Times London
Eritrea, Ethiopia given a year to end border stalemate
A United Nations-appointed panel told Eritrea and Ethiopia on Wednesday to resolve a six-year border dispute within a year or face the UN taking the matter out of their hands.
Eritrea and Ethiopia both last week rejected plans by the panel, the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission, to demarcate their contentious frontier on paper.
The stalemate has left the status of the 1 000km border unclear six years after a peace deal has and raised tensions, heightened by UN reports that both nations are militarily active in Somalia.
But the panel said on Wednesday it would not let the dispute run beyond November 2007, when it will rule on boundary points closely following a delimitation decided in 2002.
"If, by the end of that period, the parties have not by themselves reached the necessary agreement and proceeded significantly to implement it ... the commission hereby determines that the boundary will automatically stand as demarcated by the boundary points" defined by the panel, it said.
The commission's warning comes amid growing tension between the two countries that many fear could lead to a renewal of their war and spill over into Somalia, threatening a wider regional conflict.
When a border war between both countries ended in December 2000, they pledged that they would implement any frontier decision by the panel.
While Eritrea accepts the panel's current plan, which awarded it the flashpoint town of Badme, but wants it to be physically laid out, Ethiopia, which rejects the boundary, said the commission was acting outside its mandate.
Eritrea last week warned that the current stalemate is "not sustainable" and refused to rule out a new war with its arch-foe Horn of Africa neighbour.
At the same time, Asmara repeated denials that Somalia had become a proxy battleground for it and Addis Ababa amid reports the two countries are backing rival factions there to settle scores from their bloody 1998 to 2000 conflict.
Last year, Asmara restricted patrols by the UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) and then expelled all of its North American and European staff, rebuffing UN Security Council demands to reverse the steps.
Since September, Eritrea has expelled five UNMEE staff for alleged espionage, and sent troops into a demilitarised buffer zone along the border in what the UN said is a "major breach" of the 2000 ceasefire. -- AFP
Ethiopia says fails to agree Starbucks deal
By Tsegaye Tadesse
ADDIS ABABA, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and the chief executive of U.S. coffee shop giant Starbucks failed to agree a trademark row during talks in Addis Ababa, Ethiopian officials told reporters on Wednesday.
There was no immediate comment from Starbucks chief Jim Donald, who left the capital after Tuesday's meeting with Meles to visit coffee growing regions in the south of the country.
Addis Ababa and British charity Oxfam accused Starbucks last month of trying to stop Ethiopia trademarking its best-known coffee beans -- Sidamo and Harar -- and denying farmers potential income of more than $90 million.
Starbucks rejects the charge.
At a news conference on Wednesday, the head of Ethiopia's Intellectual Property Office said no deal had been reached.
"Starbucks has not yet recognised Ethiopia's trademark ownership of the (two) specialty coffee names, despite Prime Minister Meles' offer of a royalty-free licensing agreement," Getachew Mengistie said. Getachew said Meles had told Donald that Ethiopia wanted to boost farmers' incomes and stop them cutting down coffee bushes to plant more profitable crops of khat, a mild leafy narcotic.
Related Links
Starbucks CEO to travel to Ethiopia - The Times
Oxfam said a trademark deal could bring huge benefits to some 15 million Ethiopians who depend on coffee for a living.
"Ethiopian farmers produce some of the world's finest coffees, including ones sold under Starbucks' Black Apron Exclusives line for up to $26 a pound, but receive only 5-10 percent of the retail price," said regional director Abera Tola.
"Small-scale coffee farmers are economically vulnerable because large foreign buyers, such as Starbucks, are dictating trading conditions with their extraordinary market power," he told Reuters.
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Oxfam presses Starbucks to let Ethiopia trademark its coffee
AFP
Oxfam has pressed US coffee giant Starbucks to let Ethiopia trademark three coffee beans and end a dispute in which the company has been accused of heavy-handed tactics.
The charity made the call after Oxfam chief Jim Donald and Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi held talks in a bid to end the row, which has allegedly denied the impoverised Horn of Africa nation its rightful due.
"It is significant that after a year of trying to engage Starbucks on trademarks, the company finally sat down to discuss the issue directly with Ethiopia," said Abera Tola, Oxfam America's Regional Director on Wednesday.
"Starbucks must now follow up with immediate action to recognize Ethiopia's rights to own the names of its coffees to ensure that coffee farmers get a fairer share of the value of their crop," he explained.
The Oxford-based charity said Starbuck should "stop dragging its feet before the holidays, and instead recognize Ethiopia's ownership of its coffee names and the enormous benefits that ownership could bring to the 15 million poor Ethiopians who depend on coffee for their livelihood."
Ethiopia had applied to trademark its most famous coffee names, Sidamo, Harar and Yirgacheffe, enabling it to control their use and allow farmers to receive a greater share of the retail price.
But in mid-August, the US Patent and Trademark Office ruled in favour of a protest by the National Coffee Association (NCA), which represents US coffee roasters including Starbucks, against the trademark application.
The NCA said the bid was bad economics and bad for Ethiopian farmers, and Starbucks said that Ethiopia would be better served by cooperating to give its coffee beans geographical designations.
But the patent office's examiner said such names had become too generic as descriptions of coffee to be trademarked. Ethiopia can appeal the decision.
Oxfam accused Starbucks of being behind the NCA protest, saying the US chain was denying Ethiopian producers an estimated 47 million pounds (70 million euros, 88.5 million dollars) a year
Source: AFP
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Related articles about the dispute between Ethiopia and Starbucks
Published in San Francisco Chronicle
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Ignoring the judge's advice, one of two brothers accused of fatally shooting three of their dead brother's in-laws on Thanksgiving in Oakland proclaimed in court Tuesday that he acted in self-defense.
"Whatever happened was self-defense. Everything in the newspapers is all lies," said Asmeron Gebreselassie, 43, the accused gunman, after he and his sibling were charged with special-circumstances murder that could lead to the death penalty if convicted.
Gebreselassie's comments came after Alameda County Superior Court Judge Trina Thompson Stanley warned him against speaking in court. Neither he nor his brother, Tewodros Gebreselassie, 39, entered a plea.
The court appearance coincided with an outpouring of grief by students and teachers at Berkeley High School for one of the victims, a popular senior and soccer player. They raised more than $3,000 in small donations for his family, who hope to bury the victims in their native Eritrea.
The Gebreselassie brothers are charged with killing their deceased brother's widow, 28-year-old Winta Mehari, her brother Yonas Mehari, a 17-year-old Berkeley High student, and their mother Regbe Bahrenegasi, 50, during a Thanksgiving Day party in an apartment complex in the 5300 block of Telegraph Avenue.
Family fund
Donations to the Mehari Family Fund can be deposited at any Bank of America branch under account number 0560942210.
A sign asking for contributions is on display, Tuesday. Chronicle photo by Lacy Atkins (San Francisco Chronicle)
Yonas Mehari was one of the three people killed in a triple homicide. Photo by Lauire Baurer
See Photo Gallery from Chronicle
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Three fatally shot during Oakland Thanksgiving dinner
U.S. Peacekeeping Plan for Somalia Criticized
Sending Intervention Force Could Create Wider War With Islamic Militias, Some Fear
By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 29, 2006; A19
UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 28 -- The United States has finalized a draft U.N. Security Council resolution that would authorize a force of East African peacekeepers to intervene in Somalia to prevent the overthrow of the country's struggling government at the hands of Islamic militias. But some European diplomats and other critics expressed concern that the initiative could trigger a wider war in the region.
The U.S. proposal comes as an alliance of militias, known as the Conservative Council of Islamic Courts, is extending its military and political control over Somalia and threatening the country's weak interim government. Ethiopia has sent thousands of troops to help prop up the government while its rival, Eritrea, has deployed thousands of troops to fight alongside the militias, according to a recent U.N. report.
The U.S. text, which is backed by China, Russia and key African states, would permit an East African protection force to provide security for Somalia's transitional federal government, based in Baidoa. It would partly lift a 14-year arms embargo so East African troops could train a Somali security force and import weapons to fulfill their mandate. And it would also commit the Security Council to "consider taking measures" against states that try to "overthrow" the interim government, threaten regional stability or "seek to prevent or block" peace talks.
An alliance of seven East African governments, known as the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, first proposed such a regional force to protect Somalia's interim government more than 1 1/2 years ago, before the Islamic militias emerged as a major power. The troops probably would be drawn primarily from Uganda, council diplomats said, but Ethiopia and Kenya have also expressed an interest in participating.
The African Union subsequently backed the proposal, but it then languished at the United Nations.
The case for an intervention force became more urgent this past summer, after the militias seized control of Mogadishu, Somalia's capital, from a loose alliance of Somali warlords. U.S. and African diplomats, along with others at the United Nations, are worried that the militias are poised to drive out the government. They have encouraged the interim government and the Islamic Courts Union to negotiate a political settlement to end the fighting.
European and U.N. officials have privately voiced concern that the establishment of the force, which the militias oppose, could provoke a new military offensive against the government. They have also expressed fears that the conflict could reignite fighting between Ethiopia and Eritrea, which ended their border war in 2000.
"We need to . . . encourage the Somali parties to continue the dialogue," said U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan. "What is also important is we need to make sure that neighboring countries do not get drawn in, because there is a tendency for some of the neighboring countries to get drawn in."
The International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think tank, issued a warning Monday that the U.S. resolution "could trigger all-out war in Somalia" and destabilize the Horn of Africa.
"You don't win in Somalia by picking one side and support it and funneling arms to it," said Nick Grono, an expert on Africa at the organization. He said the Islamic militias have warned that they would respond to foreign intervention with the declaration of a holy war. "That is a recipe for jihad," he said.
France and other European governments have asked the United States to consider amendments designed to assure the Islamic militias that they are not taking sides in the war. For instance, they are calling for the exclusion of the countries bordering Somalia -- Ethiopia, Djibouti and Kenya -- from participating in the force.
A U.S. spokesman said the United States probably will present its draft resolution to the 15-nation council on Wednesday. Other council diplomats suggested that the U.N. dispute may delay that.
John R. Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said the United States is "trying to move as fast as we can" to call for a vote on the resolution. But he said he is still "seeking agreement from a number of countries on some critical points."
"We need to do something as opposed to just watching the situation deteriorate," he added. "But we want to get it right."
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Special Section: Somalia
ANALYSIS-U.S. may be heading for new setback in Somalia
By C. Bryson Hull
- Twice badly burned in Somalia, the United States appears to be pursuing a third intervention that many Western and regional diplomats say could set off a disastrous war in the Horn of Africa.
Sent into a policy tailspin by its backing of Mogadishu warlords toppled by Islamists earlier this year, Washington has resurrected a two-year-old plan to send African peacekeepers into Somalia.
Peacekeeping, Somalia and the United States have proved a volatile mix. Washington abandoned a joint operation with the United Nations after 18 U.S. soldiers were killed and hundreds of Somalis slaughtered in the 1993 "Black Hawk Down" incident.
U.N. diplomats say Washington is expected this week to unveil a draft Security Council resolution authorising the peacekeeping mission.
But a chorus of voices from Western and regional diplomats to independent analysts say deployment is likely to trigger war between a shaky, Ethiopian-backed interim government and the powerful Eritrean-backed Islamist movement.
"If they take the cheap, easy option for peacekeepers, without recognising there is a very expensive follow-on like they did in Iraq, then they are going down the same track," said a Western military expert who follows Somalia.
With the Islamists trenchantly opposing any foreign intervention -- particularly Ethiopian -- and saying it will be grounds for holy war, even an indirect American hand in Somalia's crisis could set east Africa ablaze, experts say.
Diplomats say Washington is pushing a plan originally backed by IGAD, a seven-nation east African diplomatic grouping that is itself split over Somalia and the thousands of troops deployed there by U.S. ally and member Ethiopia.
Ethiopia has acknowledged sending in several hundred military trainers but denies sending combat troops.
"The argument being advanced is that this is to prevent Ethiopian intervention, but you cannot prevent something that has already happened," said a European diplomat. "Washington is running against the tide of international and regional opinion."
"SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY"
Diplomats say Britain and France back Washington, but are trying to reduce the force's mandate and cut out the participation of soldiers from neighbouring east African nations -- which the Islamists oppose as a violation of sovereignty.
A U.N.-commissioned report earlier this month said at least 10 nations -- including five of IGAD's seven members -- are militarily backing the Somali rivals, adding fuel to an already combustible mixture.
"The region is sullied by its associations with both parties," the European diplomat said. "Ideally, there wouldn't be any Security Council resolution."
A war of leaks and propaganda designed to paint the anarchic nation either as a battleground for the West against terrorism or for Islam versus Western-backed invaders from Ethiopia, has ratcheted tensions to breaking point.
"Neither side seems to want to call this a simple struggle for power that could be resolved through negotiation," regional analyst Matt Bryden said. "If the international community acquiesces and approaches this problem as another war on terror, that will become a self-fulfilling prophecy."
The U.N. report, on violations to Somalia's widely flouted 1992 arms embargo, warned this month that fighting between the Somali factions would drag in Ethiopia and Eritrea and could result in terrorist attacks in Kenya and Ethiopia.
That report also included some widely questioned accusations about Iranian and Hezbollah backing for the Islamists that diplomats say were likely planted by Western intelligence agencies to demonise the latter.
Those accusations came soon after two letters surfaced that were said to be written by a top Islamist advocating assassinations, suicide bombings and the instigation of uprisings among ethnic Somalis in Ethiopia and Kenya.
Though experts question their authenticity, diplomats say the United States opted for deployment of peacekeepers rather than dialogue after Somalia's government produced them to back its and Addis Ababa's accusation that the Islamists are led by terrorists.
"All of these moves push us to the threshold of war. We are at that threshold now. Anything else like this will push us over," the military expert said.
All that may be keeping the dogs of war at bay, he added, was rain -- which is flooding much of Somalia and making it hard to move soldiers and weapons around.
----------------
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Special Section: Somalia
02:16:43 am, by nazret.com, 686 words, 259 views 
Believers seek AIDS cure at Ethiopian springs
By Tsegaye Tadesse
ADDIS ABABA, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Shivering under a tattered blanket, a young woman tries to sleep at the foot of the mist-shrouded Entoto Mountain, north of the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.
Nearby, a mother and child huddle together in the early morning cold.
"I decided to come to Entoto to seek a cure from the holy water after a doctor told me that I am HIV-positive," Abebech Alemu, 35, said.
"I am a follower of the Orthodox faith. I strongly believe that I will be cured by drinking the holy water rather than drugs," she added.
Ethiopia is one of the countries hardest hit by the AIDS epidemic, with more than 1.5 million people, including 100,000 children, living with the HIV virus.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) says the epidemic was previously an urban problem, but the virus has started to spread to rural areas where an estimated 85 percent of the country's 75 million people live.
In Ethiopia's remotest corners, awareness of health and medical issues is very low, and many in isolated communities believe HIV infection is akin to a plague or curse from God.
Abebech is among thousands of Ethiopians who trek from far-flung parts of the Horn of Africa nation to what they believe are holy springs, searching for cures. Many hope to rid themselves of HIV/AIDS.
At the site of the holy spring on Entoto near St. Mary Church -- built by Emperor Menelik II at the end of the 19th century -- a priest holding a large wooden cross stands on high ground.
Below, partly naked and trembling patients line up to be immersed in the water and blessed by the priest. Each patient carries away about five litres of the water, which they drink every day believing it will cure their ailments.
Monks have built awnings made of sticks and straw around St. Mary Church to shelter the wealthier visitors, but most live in the open, surviving by begging.
"THE ALMIGHTY'S CURE"
"I know about the free distribution of HIV medicine, but I have decided not to take it. I am convinced I could be cured by the holy water," Abebech said.
Head priest Bahetawi Gebremedhin Demise said he came to Entoto 10 years ago after God told him in a dream to go to the deep ravine under the mountain where a holy spring would cure the sick.
"Once they feel better, I send them back to the hospital where they were declared HIV-positive. They come back with a negative certificate," he said.
Bahetawi Gebremedhin said 1,390 HIV-positive people had been cured in the past year alone, according to his records. He said the spring had healed more than 500,000 people, including many foreigners, suffering from different ailments.
"This is a place of God where all those who believe in the Almighty are being cured. People from all walks of life who seek God's mercy come to us and we try and help everyone irrespective of their creed, religion or nationality," he said.
But Dr. Solomon Zewdu, administrator of Johns Hopkins University HIV/AIDS Drugs Distribution Centre in Addis Ababa, said he had appealed to the Orthodox Patriarch to tell HIV-positive people that they can take anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs) along with the water.
"HIV drugs are life-saving. Those who are drinking the holy water can also take the drugs. I do not see any contradiction," he said, adding he had seen patients abandoning their hospital beds and the ARV regime, opting for holy water.
Only 33,000 people in Ethiopia are receiving ARV treatment, according to the WHO. In many developing countries, life-saving drugs are either unavailable or too expensive for millions living with the virus.
"Those possessed by the devil come in chains, others on a wheelchair or on the backs of men, still others, who lost their eyesight, are led here by friends," Bahetawi Gebremedhin said.
"After a few weeks of intense prayer and religious rites, they are baptized with the holy water and they get cured."
-----------------
Related Links
Special report: Ethiopia. Nazareth is Africa's so-called 'high corridor of HIV'
Special report: Generation HIV dying for £6 a pill
The Jihadists are coming! The Jihadist are coming...
Alemayehu G. Mariam
Here we go again! Trot out the Somali jihadist bogeyman (aya jibo). Get out the smoke machine and mirrors. Show time! Act I: Narrator Zenawi: “Somalia is becoming a haven for terrorist. The sheiks of terror have declared an unholy war on Ethiopia, and the U.S. of A. They are on the outskirts. This is the time for all good men and women to come to the aid of their country. Patriots and countrymen, defend the homeland!” Blah, blah, blah…
When the going gets tough, the Zenawi Road Show gets going. And these are indeed very tough times for Zenawi. The floodlight of truth has been trained on him over the past couple of weeks, and he has had no place to hide. He desperately wants to divert the attention of Ethiopians and the international community. Enter: Somali jihadist bogeyman. Let’s get the show on the road! Not just yet, buddy…
No doubt, the last two weeks have not been kind to Zenawi. He has been stuck on the international stage with the spotlight on him, and the world saw him for what he is: An emperor with no clothes. No more talk about the “new breed of African leader,” first among equals in a “new generation of African leaders” committed to human rights, democracy and economic development.
The truth about the post-election massacres came out in the most unexpected forum. Zenawi had planned to have his Inquiry Commission put on a show for his parliament. But he couldn’t stage manage it. Instead, the truth was hand delivered to the United States Congress in a briefing, by none other than Inquiry Commission chairman and senior judge Frehiwot and vice chair and senior judge Woldemichael.
The facts ascertained by the Commission are shocking and incontrovertible: at least 193 men, women and children protesting the election results were murdered by Zenawi’s security forces. Over a thousand demonstrators shot and wounded. 65 prisoners of conscience executed in cold blood in a hail of machine gun fire in Qaliti prison. (Compare all this to the Sharpeville Massacre on March 21, 1960 when apartheid South African police opened fire and killed 69 African demonstrators protesting pass laws and injured as many as 300.)
But that was not all: The commission determined that no property was destroyed by protesters. Not a single protester was armed. Shots fired by government forces were intended not to disperse the crowd, but to kill protesters by directing fire to their heads and chest areas.
The report was not sensationalized. It was a dispassionate factual account of the Commission’s investigation, and the forensically meticulous methodology used in documenting the killings and the gross abuses of human rights. In the final analysis, Judges Frehiwot and Woldemichael presented a devastating indictment of Zenawi and his regime for crimes against humanity.
Zenawi desperately tried to keep a lid on the truth. But truth always has a way of getting out, even though Zenawi tried to keep it from seeing the light of day by turning off the power that lighted the offices of the Inquiry Commission.
Zenawi knew the jig was up, but he pleaded with the Inquiry Commission for hours:
“Please, pretty please, change your conclusions. Just don’t say it is the government’s fault.” He tried to seduce them: “I will give you riches, whatever your heart desires. Just do it the way we did the Anuak report. Blame the victims.” Frehiwot and Woldemichael sat in stony silence, listening to Zenawi ranting and raving.
Then he gave the commissioners a stiff lecture on the jurisprudence of “excessive use of force.” (Such legal buffoonery must have amused the judges, but I suspect they must have reserved a measure of pity for Zenawi.) He cajoled them: “Your report is very important to Ethiopia’s international image. Your conclusions about government responsibility in the massacres will harm the country. I appeal to your sense of patriotism.
Destroy this report and issue and new one favorable to the government.”
When he sensed his words were falling on deaf ears, he reminded them of his standard operating procedure: “You change your analysis and conclusions, or.…” That was it! Time to get the hell out of Dodge. And the two judges were out of there before sundown, with the evidence bagged and in tow -- reports, documents, videos, audios, the whole kit and caboodle.
What a great disappointment -- and a shocking surprise -- it must have been to Zenawi when Frehiwot and Woldemichael looked him straight in the face and said with steely resolve: “No deal, Zenawi. We don’t sell the truth. We expose it!” How proud we are of these men of courage and valor!
“What now?” Zenawi must have asked himself in stunned disbelief. “Are there really Ethiopians who will not sell their souls in exchange for a house, a car or luxurious lifestyle? These guys would rather live with nothing in a strange land than live a life of luxury and comfort at the cost of a little white lie? What the hell is happening in Ethiopia!?”
Well, I can imagine why Zenawi would be flabbergasted. No offense to anyone, but these are the “new breed” of African leaders, “vanguards of change” that Tony Blair and Bill Clinton were really talking about. Woldemichael Meshesha, Frehiwot Samuel, Mitiku Teshome, Alemayheu Zemedkun, Getachew Jigi, Teshale Aberra, just to name a few among thousands of other young Ethiopian leaders who would rather live in exile than continue to serve a tyrant, and be tools of terror and oppression against their own people.
Zenawi says, “but they worked for my government all these years. Now, they are saying these lies just to get political asylum in the West. They can’t be trusted.” Sure, they desperately tried to be instruments of good in an evil system, but in the end these young people learned that in an evil system one has very limited set of choices: be part of it and try to change it, and in the process risk being changed by it, destroy it or in the process be destroyed by it, or escape from it. In the end, they chose to escape, and did so by the skin of their teeth. Now, Ethiopians the world over salute these heroes, champions of human rights who used the truth not only to bring light on the darkness of Zenawi’s regime, but
also to defend their people and set them free. Hallelujah!
But Zenawi does not want to talk about the truth. No, he wants to talk about the jihadist bogeyman from Somalia. (By the way, when did the warlords grow up to be jihadists, anyway?) He wants to tell the world that the Somali jihadists are on the warpath; and watch out Ethiopians, and Americans too for supporting Christians and Jews. Pleeease, give me a break!
Classic Zenawi: When the going gets tough, distract the public’s attention. These are hard times for Zenawi. Recently, he went to the European Union to deliver a speech on development and good governance. (It reminded me of a speech once given by Idi Amin on human rights.) Someone remarked that Zenawi’s speech at the EU was not unlike the
devil preaching the gospel. But he did not get to preach. The crowd in the gallery booed and jeered him. He had to stop after a few minutes, visibly shaken. But there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. He could not arrest or jail his hecklers. Impolite and rowdy hecklers, but free people nonetheless who have the right to say whatever they wanted, including the epithets “murderer,” “killer” and “dictator.” If the shoe fits, wear it, I say.
But I wondered how Zenawi must felt at that moment, to have a rowdy bunch shut him up cold; and prevent him from speaking, expressing his thoughts and ideas about things he feels are important to Ethiopia and Africa. It couldn’t have been a good feeling. But that moment, Zenawi must understand, is “groundhog day” for ordinary Ethiopians who are trapped in a time loop where everyday is like the day before: Not allowed to speak
their mind, not allowed to read their favorite newspapers, magazines or books. Not allowed to visit their favorite websites. Not allowed to listen to their leaders. Not allowed to be themselves. Not allowed…(Zenawi ought to share his feelings about his experience at the EU with the journalists enduring in his jails. I bet they would have something common to talk about.)
But that day at the EU, Zenawi learned a real lesson in democracy and human rights: The right to free expression means not only the right to expound on sublime and lofty ideas, or profess the party line or regurgitate the official ideology. Freedom of speech also embraces the right to heckle, pester and tease politicians! Heckling, even if it is rude, is a protected form of expression in the West, particularly when a politician is on the stand. So, the hecklers won the day, and Zenawi did not finish his speech.
In a way, I wish he had completed his speech. Perhaps he might have been able to share with the world his special expertise and insights in the use of indiscriminate killing of rambunctious but harmless demonstrators to establish good governance, or the special use of mass arrests and imprisonments to accelerate the economic development of Ethiopia. We’ll never find out now.
But, in all sincerity, Zenawi could have stolen the show at the EU and earned the respect of the world, and enjoyed watching his hecklers and critics dumbfounded and confused.
He could have started his speech with something like: “The foundation of good governance is admission of mistakes by leaders; and God knows I have made my share of mistakes, as has my regime and party. It was a tragic mistake that 193 men, women and children were shot and killed and hundreds more wounded by my security forces. It was a terrible mistake to imprison the opposition leaders. It was wrong to have allowed the massacre of the Anuaks…. But, it is never a mistake to acknowledge a mistake and make
amends…I am deeply sorry…”
Zenawi would have set a new standard, a historic milestone, of transparency and accountability in the practice of good governance. That was his golden opportunity to redeem himself in the eyes of his people and in the court of world public opinion. But in his usual style, he will not miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity; and so he let the
hecklers win the day.
Back to the jihadists. The Somalis say they want to drive out the Ethiopian invaders from their country and reclaim their territorial integrity and sovereignty. Ethiopia admits having a contingency of expeditionary forces in and around Baidoa. The Somlais say Ethiopia is preparing to make war against Somalia and break up their country into
permanent clandoms. They have no choice but to fight, they say.
In all fairness, their argument is not unlike the arguments Zenawi made when Badme was occupied by Eritrean forces. Back in 1998, Zenawi’s Foreign Ministry declared: “Eritrea has committed aggression against Ethiopia in violation of international law. Eritrea's unprovoked and naked aggression is a crime which cannot be justified by any pretext of border dispute.” See any parallels there?
But Zenawi spins a nice yarn about the threat of radical Islam in the Horn, and the insufficient response from the international community to deal with the threat. “The international community could have done more, and should have done more,” he said. The drumbeat for war on the Somali jihadists is deafening. “Somalia is going to be another Iraq or Afghanistan. The Horn is teetering on the brink of war. Al-Quieda is
spreading its tentacles throughout East Africa. All the Westerns experts agree. CNN says it’s real, so does the BBC. We need to get the international community to support Ethiopia in its fight against terrorism and Somali jihadists. Ethiopians, quick, circle the
wagons! The Somali jihadists are coming!” (I wonder if the jihadists are telling their people: “The infidels are already here! The infidels are in Baidoa! Let’s drive them out!”)
But wait just a cotton pickin’ minute! Amnesty International, Human rights Watch and the U.S. State Department all say, Zenawi’s regime is among the worst violators of human rights in the world. Western experts say Zenawi’s regime commits gross violations of human rights, and he keeps thousands of political prisoners in the country, and conducts mass arrests and extrajudicial killings. The U.S. House of Representatives
has made legislative findings on gross violations of human rights in Ethiopia in H.R. 5680. CNN has reported on it, as has the BBC. To echo Zenawi: “The international community could have done more, and should have done more.” About human rights in Ethiopia, that is. But it hasn’t.
So, we got a problem. Mr. Zenawi says the Somali jihadists are lurking behind every desert rock and boulder. He wants Ethiopians to come out and fight them in every hamlet, town and city. We say, the gross violations of human rights continue unabated. We want Ethiopians to come out of the jails and prisons and rejoin their families. We want them to
come out into the streets and peacefully express themselves, show their opposition to government policies and actions, engage in constructive dialogue with their fellow citizens and enjoy basic human rights, which according to Zenawi’s constitution is the natural right of every Ethiopian citizen. So, what do we do? Which way do we go?
Surely, Zenawi must know that it is pointless to ask Ethiopians to come out and circle the wagons when they feel they are themselves victims of a political war he has declared on them. They seem infinitely more afraid of his regime and security forces than any wild-eyed Somali jihadist they had never seen. Pray tell: What would the Somali jihadist do to them that Zenawi’s regime has not already done to them anyway? Ummm!
Common sense would suggest that it is hard to convince Ethiopians to come out and fight a jihadist bogeyman when they are themselves fighting for survival, everyday, against a regime that terrorizes them and keeps them in a state of perpetual fear and misery. It is hard to excite them to rise up in a fit of patriotism and rummage the featureless Ogaden desert in pursuit of an invisible jihadist when they are themselves hunted down like rabid dogs in their city and town streets, jailed, tortured and murdered.
It seems futile to sound the bugle of nationalism and jingoism when thousands of Ethiopians languish in jails for no other reason but for supporting democracy and exercising their human rights. The problem is the Ethiopian people can not fight two wars at once: defend themselves in a political war declared on them by Zenawi and his regime, and mount an attack on a distant and invisible enemy rattling sabers somewhere in the
“failed state” of Somalia; an enemy, by the way, that seems incapable of bringing the whole of Somalia under its control let alone expect to win a war against a vastly superior Ethiopian military (so say the experts).
But the whole jihadist business smacks of political fantasy. It’s surreal. Mr. Zenawi says the Somali jihadists and their Al Qaeda partners should be opposed and defeated because they are undemocratic, anti-democratic, oppressive and authoritarian. The jihadists don’t believe in human rights and do not allow political or social dissent. They are fanatics who
want to impose one-party rule, and do not believe in a democracy where the people elect their representatives. Duh!!! Has Mr. Zenawi looked at the mirror lately?
Now, we have a choice to make. We can follow along the Zenawi Road Show and entertain ourselves with stories of Somali jihadist bogeymen, Mickey Mouse and the Easter Bunny. Or we can stay focused on the real issues of human rights, civil liberties, the rule of law and democracy in Ethiopia.
I shall keep my eyes fixed on the 800 pound gorilla in the living room that Zenawi does not want to talk about or acknowledge: How about freedom, democracy and human rights in Ethiopia, Mr. Zenawi?
Well, if you are not inclined to answer my question, good luck on your road show: "The Jihadists are coming, the Jihadists are coming… "
Please visit my blog and share your comments:
http://almariamforthedefense.blogspot.com/
Ethiopia accused of Somalia attack
Listen to VOA report audio clip
Al-Jazeera
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 2006
18:44 MECCA TIME, 15:44 GMT
About 10,000 Somalis held a rally ahead of UN talks on sending peacekeepers to Somalia
Somalia's Union of Islamic Courts has accused neighbouring Ethiopia of shelling a town about 630km north of the capital, Mogadishu.
Somalis shouted
“Down with America! Down with Ethiopia!”
In response, thousands of enraged Somalis gathered in the capital shouting “Down with America! Down with Ethiopia!”
About 10,000 Somalis held a rally ahead of UN talks on sending peacekeepers to Somalia
Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, an Islamic courts leader, told a crowd of more than 10,000 people: "Ethiopian soldiers have massed around Bandiradley and started firing missiles".
"They are about 10km away from the town where our fighters are," he said, though the claim could not be verified.
The Islamic courts seized Bandiradley earlier this month from a local militia allied to Somalia's transitional government. The government, though backed by Ethiopia, is largely powerless.
The move took the Islamic courts to within 100km of the semi-autonomous region of Puntland, where the authorities have vowed to resist their advance.
Puntland has ties with Ethiopia, and when Bandiradley fell on November 12, residents of the region's main town, Galkayo, reported large movements of Puntland troops accompanied by Ethiopian military convoys.
UN peacekeepers meeting
The protests in Mogadishu took place on the eve of a planned United Nations Security Council meeting which is expected to discuss a resolution on the deployment of peacekeepers to Somalia.
"We call on the world to avoid a war that will affect the Horn of Africa"
Sheikh Yusuf Mohamed Siyad, security chairman for Islamic courts
Sheikh Yusuf Mohamed Siyad Indhaade, the national security chairman for the Islamic courts, said: "Our door of jihad is open for all Muslims around the world if the Security Council approves the deployment of foreign troops in Somalia.
"We call on the world to avoid a war that will affect the Horn of Africa."
Sheikh Fu'ad Mohammed Khalaf, the head of the Islamic courts' education department, said: "When the first shot is fired, all schools and universities will be closed and students and teachers will go to jihad."
Experts say Somalia could become a proxy battleground for Ethiopia and Eritrea, which broke away from Ethiopia in a 1961-91 civil war and then fought another 1998-2000 border war with its rival.
Eritrea supports the Islamic courts, while Ethiopia backs the interim government.
Source: Agencies
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Armed and veiled Somali women point their rifles during a rally in Mogadishu. Powerful Somali Islamists claimed to have fought Ethiopian troops in central Somalia and warned of importing foreign fighters to join their holy war if the United Nations authorizes peacekeepers.(AFP)
Related Links
Ethiopian forces 'clash' with Islamists
Somali Militia Puts Troops Near Ethiopia
We are ready for war, Ethiopia warns Somalia's Islamists
Including Speech in Ethiopian Parliament
Special Section: Somalia
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Ethiopian News updated 24/7 www.nazret.com/news/
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Agency Wants 28m Br before Returning Nazareth Factory
AddisFortune
By DANIEL KIFLE Special WRITER to Fortune
The Nazareth Soap Factory, which was established by two businessmen in 1976, was returned to its rightful owners 26 years after forced nationalisation; but although the return was publicly announced in September 2006, the proprietors have yet to receive the Factory.
The reason for the delay is that the owners are expected to make a 28 million Br payment before the hand-over is actualized. The money request is a reimbursement for three machines that were installed at the Factory during state ownership.
The soap Factory, which was founded by Makonnen Abate and Alemu Gebru in Nazareth [Adama], 100Km from Addis Abeba, on the road to Sodere Hot Spring Resort, was unlawfully nationalized in 1980 during the socialist Derg regime.
Even though the Privatization and Public Enterprises Supervisory Agency (PPESA) publicly announced the return of Nazareth Soap and Nazrawi Oil Factory, the two factories that were taken over at the time, the owners of both entities have not yet received their properties
Alemu, one of the soap Factory founders, told Fortune that they were told to make the payment in order to receive the property.
According to PPESA, the Factory was estimated at 33 million Br, but because five million Birr was invested by the founders when they first established it, that amount was exempted.
“Although we are happy that the government decided to return our Factory, we still cannot afford to make this type of payment at one time, so we appealed and the Agency reduced the amount to 21 million Br,” he said.
“But since it was still too much for us to cover in one instalment, we approached the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) as well as United Bank to give us the loan; nevertheless, they did not respond in our favour; CBE went as far as telling us that the Factory did not even belong to us, so we had no reason for the loan anyhow.”
Alemu further went on to explain that they had offered PPSA to pay in instalments, but their idea was rejected. The Agency told them that a 35pc down payment with the remaining 65pc being covered over six year is a privilege reserved for those that buy public enterprises not for those that reclaim their former properties.
Nazareth Soap, which employs 175 permanent and 20 temporary workers, operates four shifts a day. The Factory has the capacity to manufacture 600 cartons a shift, with each carton containing 100 soaps.
Girma Teferi, president of the Employees Association at the Factory, told Fortune that the soap is mainly distributed in Adama and in areas of the Southern Regional State.
Both the president of the Association and the treasurer, Bezanesh Gomera, commented that they are not worried that any complications will arise in the event that the Factory is returned to its founders and former owners.
Girma explained that those with pensions will also be able to retire with their funds guaranteed; hence there would be no reason for controversy to occur.
Nevertheless, the Association is concerned about the handover process as the government’s statement of return and the reality of it not occurring could cause some destabilising disagreement.
Tadesse Getaneh, general manager of the Factory, told Fortune that whether the rightful owners choose to receive the Factory or not, according to a Directive issued by the Agency, and that as has been implemented for the first quarter of this fiscal year, the Factory will continue its operation and will not at any point stop manufacturing.
Ethiopia:
Ethiopian forces 'clash' with Islamists
Ethiopian forces have exchanged fire with Islamists in a strategic town north of the capital, officials of the powerful Islamic movement have alleged.
The Union of Islamic Courts chairman Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed told a rally in Mogadishu that Ethiopian forces began shelling Bandiradley at 0300 GMT.
Earlier this month, Islamists captured the town near semi-autonomous Puntland, which has strong ties to Ethiopia.
There is no independent confirmation of the fighting and no Ethiopian reaction.
"We will never accept surrender to Meles, we are devoted to our religion and will fight until we die" Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed UIC chairman
Last week, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said the Islamists represented a "clear threat" to his country which he said was prepared for conflict following repeated Islamist calls for a holy war.
The UIC, which is backed by Ethiopia's rival, Eritrea, and now controls much of southern Somalia, has denied claims by Ethiopia and the weak Somali transitional government that it has links to al-Qaeda.
Rally
The UIC chairman told the rally that Ethiopian soldiers had massed around Bandiradley and started firing missiles.
"Their tanks are trying to surround the area and now they are about 10km (six miles) away from the town where our fighters are based," he said.
"We will never accept surrender to Meles, we are devoted to our religion and will fight until we die. That is our promise."
The rally was held to condemn United States support for the deployment of a regional peacekeeping force in Somalia.
The US is expected to propose a United Nations Security Council resolution this week calling for African Union peacekeepers to support the interim government, and for the partial lifting of the international arms embargo on Somalia.
Regional concern
A Brussels-based think-tank, the International Crisis Group, warned that this move could easily trigger a regional conflict.
It says that the UN Security Council - rather than back one side in Somalia over the other - should apply equal pressure on the transitional government and the UIC to resume political negotiations.
Another Islamic official at the rally told the crowd they would invite foreign fighters into Somalia to fight alongside them if the UN resolution was passed.
Ethiopia denies having thousands of troops backing government forces in Somalia, but has admitted to having hundreds of military trainers there.
Eritrea equally denies claims that it has sent troops and weapons to the UIC.
Somalia's interim government only controls a small patch of territory around the town of Baidoa.
------------------
Related Links
Somali Militia Puts Troops Near Ethiopia
We are ready for war, Ethiopia warns Somalia's Islamists
Including Speech in Ethiopian Parliament
Special Section: Somalia
Related Links from nazret.com
Ethiopian News updated 24/7 www.nazret.com/news/
Ethiopian Radio and TV Page
www.nazret.com/radio/
Ethiopians Push for Bill Against Atrocities
By Osita Iroegbu
Legal Times
November 27, 2006
The cadence in Mesfin Mekonen’s voice seems to deliberately take the listener on a journey to Ethiopia, guided by his thick East African accent. With arms folded, Mekonen gazes past the droves of people moving around him in downtown Washington and into a time when, as a teenager, he worked at his father’s soap and cooking oil factory in the Ethiopian town of Nazareth.
With a work force of 300, the factory supported the Mekonen family. In Mekonen’s small community, ethnic groups got along. Muslims and Christians, Indians and Italians all lived side by side. Mekonen describes the time as peaceful.
But the tranquil place Mekonen, a leader of Washington’s Ethiopian community, knew as a child has given way to an area saturated with continuous unrest and human rights violations, most recently the killings of about 200 people, mostly demonstrators, by police in 2005 after general elections in Addis Ababa and other towns.
The incident sparked Mekonen’s drive for U.S. legislation that would hold human rights violators accountable and augment American support of democracy in Ethiopia.
What Mekonen didn’t realize, however, was that efforts by a volunteer, community-based lobby group he leads in Washington would be stacked up against those of a big-time D.C. lobby firm working on behalf of the Ethiopian government.
AN UNLIKELY FOE
In 1972 a 20-year-old Mekonen arrived in the United States to get a college education. Years later, his father’s property would be taken by the Ethiopian government’s communist regime. “It was so very sad,” says Mekonen.
Although Ethiopia is no longer under communist rule, Mekonen says the country needs direction.
“Now, there is no democracy, no freedom of speech, no freedom of the press,” says Mekonen, who himself is a manager at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. “Everything has changed. It is now a police state where anyone can be killed.”
Not wanting to stand by quietly, Mekonen, a longtime supporter of Ethiopian progress, founded the Ethiopian-American Council in Washington, a communitywide lobby and advocacy group.
Getting congressional staffers to listen to his story about Ethiopia wasn’t easy at first, but Mekonen was persistent. And that persistence eventually led to the introduction of a bill aimed at creating peace in the region and bringing the perpetrators of human rights violations to justice.
The process started when Mekonen began communicating with the staff of Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), chairman of the Africa, Global Human Rights, and International Operations Subcommittee of the House International Relations Committee. Smith was planning a trip to West Africa, and Mekonen jumped at the opportunity to suggest that the congressman make his way to the other side of the continent.
“I told him that it would be a great service to the Ethiopian people if he would take a trip to Ethiopia and get that firsthand experience,” Mekonen says.
Smith agreed. In August 2005 he visited the country and talked to community members and government officials. Ethiopia had such an impact on him that he started writing the bill — H.R. 5680, the Ethiopia Freedom, Democracy and Human Rights Advancement Act of 2006 — during his flight back to the United States.
The act calls for strengthening the U.S.-Ethiopia relationship and fostering democracy, economic development, and freedom of the press, among other things. It calls for a sanction of the Ethiopian government by cutting off nonhumanitarian aid if the African nation does not follow the bill’s call for democracy. It also seeks the release of political prisoners and the withholding of visas from key Ethiopian officials who are suspected of links to human rights violations.
The bill, which has 28 co-sponsors, passed the House International Relations Committee with bipartisan support in June, but it stopped there. It never reached the House floor for a vote.
Mekonen and other supporters blame Dick Armey, the Texas Republican and former House majority leader who now works for lobbying firm DLA Piper, for the bill’s demise. Armey and DLA Piper registered with the Justice Department in June as lobbyists for the government of Ethiopia, at a price tag of $50,000 a month.
A MATTER OF TERRORISM?
Opponents of the bill argue that because of Ethiopia’s strategic position in the Horn of Africa, proximity to the Middle East, and easy access to other major parts of the region, Ethiopia could be critical in the United States’ fight against terrorism.
In a press release, DLA Piper states, “Ethiopia remains a close ally today, particularly in the global war against terrorism. As recent events in Somalia threaten to undermine security in the Horn of Africa, it is crucial for U.S. interests to have friends and allies in this strategically important region.”
After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi sent troops to fight the Islamist militia that has assumed control over Somalia after nearly two decades of warlordism. Zenawi has also tried to show his support in the war on terrorism by working with other nations to fend off the Islamist government in Sudan.
“I know there is a war on terror, but what about human rights?” asks Mekonen, his eyes widening. He says he and members of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy, a coalition of four opposition parties in Ethiopia that combined to compete for seats in the 2005 general elections, attempted to meet with outgoing House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) to discuss the bill. In November 2005, according to the Department of State, CUD members were arrested during the post-election violence in Ethiopia, along with other civil leaders and journalists, and thousands of demonstrators were detained.
Calls to Hastert’s office were not returned.
Although DLA Piper acknowledges that it is working on behalf of the Ethiopian government to strengthen bilateral relations with the United States, including increasing economic and development assistance and developing trade and investment opportunities, it would not speak about its stance on the Ethiopian human rights bill. “We generally don’t talk in detail about our work on behalf of clients and specific issues,” says Ted Loud, a spokesman for the lobby firm.
Last month, Armey and the Ethiopian ambassador to the United States, Samuel Assefa, met with Smith in an effort to persuade the congressman to back away from the bill, says a spokesman in Smith’s D.C. office.
“They met for a couple of hours. Mr. Armey and the ambassador presented their sides, and the congressman presented his side,” says spokesman Patrick Creamer. “As far as I know, they [Armey and the ambassador] were arguing that the bill was not necessary.”
By the end of the meeting, Rep. Smith hadn’t budged.
“Mr. Smith is adamant about the need for the bill, and he doesn’t think there will be reform in Ethiopia without it. He believes that in order for democracy to grow in Ethiopia, the U.S. has to put some pressure on the Ethiopian government,” Creamer says. “He hopes to get the bill up for votes the week of December 4. There is a small window of opportunity then.”
If the bill doesn’t reach the House floor next week, supporters are looking forward to it getting to the 110th Congress.
A FAILED ARGUMENT
Ethiopia remains one of the poorest countries in the world, with more than half of the population living on less than $1 per day. Ethiopians have suffered for decades due to drought, famine, disease, and regional instability, including violent unrest with neighboring Eritrea and the brutal dictatorship of the military junta under Mengistu Haile Mariam. Under that regime, hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians were killed. According to the bill, some of the members of the regime are said to be living in the United States.
With the downfall of the Mengistu regime in 1991, U.S.-Ethiopia relations improved dramatically, and legislative restrictions on nonhumanitarian assistance to Ethiopia were lifted, according to the Department of State. Total U.S. government assistance to the African nation between 1991 and 2003 was $2.3 billion. During Ethiopia’s severe drought in 2003, the United States provided a record $553.1 million in assistance, of which $471.7 million was food aid, according to the State Department.
Donald Yamamoto, deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of African Affairs at the State Department, is currently visiting Ethiopia. Jennifer Schaming-Ronan of the State Department’s press office said that in Yamamoto’s absence, no one was available to comment on the State Department’s stance on the bill.
Mauro De Lorenzo, resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., rejects the criticism of those who contend that the United States should not interfere with Ethiopia because of its importance in the U.S. fight against terrorism, adding that the United States should continue to play a role in Ethiopian security and military forces.
Just because Ethiopia is “a very important partner in the war on terror,” the United States should not remain mute when the country slides back on its responsibility to create economic freedom and democracy, says De Lorenzo.
“It’s a failed argument for the Middle East and it’s a failed argument for Ethiopia. Some people think that pushing us away from Ethiopia is going to drive Ethiopia out of our arms and into China’s.”
De Lorenzo says China has been gaining influence in several African countries.
BEARING WITNESS
Two weeks ago the Ethiopian Commission of Inquiry, an independent team of Ethiopians investigating the post-election violence, arrived on Capitol Hill to discuss its findings that 193 people had been killed during and after the elections, a stark contrast from the body count of 43 the Ethiopian government initially reported.
Rep. Donald Payne (D-N.J.), a co-sponsor of the human rights bill and ranking member of the Africa Subcommittee, chaired the intense meeting, along with the founder and chairman of the Congressional Ethiopia and Ethiopian American Caucus, Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.).
“It was the first time members of the Ethiopian community had a chance to hear from the [Ethiopian] commissioners, who fled the country after they were being forced to change numbers in the report,” says Noelle LuSane, a committee aide to Payne.
“Congressman Payne has made it clear that he wants to see a vote on the bill before the 109th Congress adjourns,” LuSane says. “We’re hoping that that happens.”
If it does, Mekonen says, it will not only help reshape his country but also set a precedent for U.S.-Ethiopian relations.
In September Congress passed a similar bill to the Ethiopian bill, the Darfur Peace and Accountability Act, which punishes those who have committed genocide during the unrest in Sudan and expands peacekeeping operations. The act’s passage is encouraging to proponents of the Ethiopia bill.
Almost every Saturday, Mekonen’s voice is heard across the airwaves on Washington, D.C.’s Radio Abisinia. Some listeners call in asking what they can do; he urges them to ask members of Congress to support the bill, which he calls a beacon of hope for Ethiopians.
“We all came to this country loving freedom,” Mekonen says. “This legislation is the one hope for the Ethiopian people. It will at least show that the U.S. is on our side.”
Osita Iroegbu can be contacted at oiroegbu@alm.com
Special report: Ethiopia
Monday, November 27, 2006
Metro UK
The eastern trade routes through Ethiopia are not only carrying much-needed resources – often out of the country, rather than in – they are also, increasingly, helping to spread Ethiopia's Aids epidemic. In the second of five reports ahead of this Friday's World Aids Day, Metro Chief Reporter AIDAN RADNEDGE travels along Africa's 'high corridor of HIV' to the country's second city of Nazareth.
Nazareth is Africa's so-called 'high corridor of HIV'
Photo: Work time: Hirut Semu, 25, tends crops at an Aids/HIV welfare centre
THE main road into Nazareth can be busy, bleak and treacherous – but the city itself is even more so.
Nazareth is Africa's so-called 'high corridor of HIV', where commercial desperation combines lethally with a lack of basic healthcare.
Prostitutes and their clients, as well as needy farm and factory workers, flock to Ethiopia's second city in search of survival.
But too often, what they find instead is one of the most concentrated and relentless Aids epidemics in the region.
At least here, relief workers have established a government-approved welfare centre on the outskirts of the city, 100km south-east of the capital, Addis Ababa.
But the farther east you travel in Ethiopia, the less likely you are to find support – the scorching Sun is too forbidding, the Muslim-dominated communities too fragmented and remote.
In Nazareth, Christian and Muslim volunteers work together to try to address the needs of the many people blighted by both HIV and poverty.
Women who move to the city from tiny farming villages find themselves forced to compete with men for arduous work as labourers.
Far more frequently, though, they are dragged into what the United Nations and aid workers coyly describe as 'commercial sex work'.
They find a regular clientele among the factory workers or truck drivers stopping en route to or from the capital, or the port of Djibouti.
Nazareth is also home to at least 100,000 refugees, mainly from Sudan, Eritrea and Somalia.
The city's hot springs and the nearby spa town of Sodere indicate that not everything here runs dry – and attract a steady stream of tourists.
But the strain on civic services can be seen everywhere. Goats, donkeys and emaciated horses ramble along the roads, past flimsy scraps of canvas propped against walls. Only on closer inspection is it clear these are homes.
Yet Nazareth, as a destination, remains alluring to poor, rural Ethiopians. Selmawit Benti was orphaned as a child and dropped out of school with little education and few prospects.
She walked the 300km from her home village of Dredor to Nazareth's illusory bright lights. The only work she could find was in a brothel.
'I didn't know anything else, I could not do anything else,' she says, sadly.
Perhaps inevitably, it was in the brothel she was infected with HIV. As many sufferers do, she first needed and received treatment for tuberculosis – becoming so sick that she was kept in hospital for two years.
Meanwhile, Hirut Semu discovered she was HIV-positive only when her husband died of Aids and while she was pregnant with a son, now four.
'I was terrified. I really wanted to kill myself,' she says. To that end, she swallowed a rat poison but her neighbours managed to get her to a hospital.
Hirut and Selmawit, both 25, are among 70 HIV-positive women signed up to a self-help farming scheme run by the Kale Heywet religious group, backed by the Tearfund charity and the Medan Acts project.
Its campaigners help to educate and alleviate suffering, working in 25 schools and 23 churches.
HIV-positive women who are still strong enough to work arrive early each morning to till the plots of land they are allocated.
This allows them to keep up their strength, morale and selfrespect – while also letting them grow and sell fruit and vegetables.
Hirut says: 'When I am working here in my garden, I forget all my old traumas. I can hope.'
Similar principles govern an 'income-generating scheme' in the city which since June 2002 has enrolled 2,400 women into alliances that pool their savings, investments and profits.
They provide business training and backing for Nazarene women to earn livelihoods through grocery stalls, fattening cattle, baking soggy 'engura' bread or making embroidery.
While husbands were sceptical, the mood has changed. Their HIV-infected wives can bring home up to 100 Ethiopian birr, or £6.25 a day – a pittance in the West, but a reasonable income in Ethiopia.
However, in a city with a struggling population of 228,000, the money soon runs out. A £3,750 grant to set up the farming project was spent straight away and now the women use their earnings to buy new buckets or tools.
Selmawit says: 'It's good. It is all good – but we need more help and money just to keep going.'
Source: Metro UK
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Special report: Generation HIV dying for £6 a pill (Metro UK)
Somali Militia Puts Troops Near Ethiopia
Monday November 27, 2006 12:46 AM
By MOHAMED OLAD HASSAN
Associated Press Writer
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) - The Islamic militia that controls much of southern Somalia dispatched thousands of troops Sunday to within nine miles of the border with Ethiopia, heightening fears that fighting would break out between the two sides.
A local reporter also said the Islamists were recruiting people for a holy war against Ethiopia, a largely Christian nation that is concerned about the emergence of a neighboring Islamic state and supports Somalia's fragile government.
``All our troops in the region are now ready at the front lines to face their enemy,'' said Mohamed Mohamud Agaweine, the military commander for the Council of Islamic Courts in central Somalia. He said thousands of Islamic fighters were in the region around the town of Abud-waq, but did not give an exact figure.
The Islamic council has been steadily gaining ground since seizing the capital of Mogadishu in June, while Somalia's two-year-old interim government has failed to assert control anywhere except the town of Baidoa.
Experts have warned Somalia has become a proxy battleground for Somalia's neighbors, Eritrea and Ethiopia. A confidential U.N. report obtained last month by The Associated Press said there were 6,000 to 8,000 Ethiopian troops in Somalia or near the border. The report also said 2,000 troops from Eritrea were inside Somalia supporting the Islamic movement.
Ethiopia has acknowledged sending military advisers to help the Somalian government, but Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has repeatedly denied sending troops, despite widespread witness accounts.
Ahemd Isse Gutaale, a reporter for local radio station HornAfrik, said the Islamists were using loudspeakers Sunday to call for people to join the holy war against Ethiopia.
``They were enrolling new volunteers and asked people to stand for the defense of their country,'' Gutaale said.
On Saturday, Meles said he expected legislators to back a resolution giving him authority to use military force against Somali extremists if they attack Ethiopia. He also said Ethiopia would not seek approval from the U.N. Security Council or any other body to defend itself militarily, saying it was Ethiopia's ``sovereign right.''
Somalia has been without an effective central government since warlords toppled dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991 and then turned on each other, carving much of the country into armed camps ruled by violence and clan law.
A government was established two years ago with the support of the U.N. to serve as a transitional body to help Somalia emerge from anarchy. But the leadership, which includes some warlords linked to the violence of the past, wields no real power outside Baidoa.
The United States has accused the Islamic council of sheltering suspects in the 1998 al-Qaida bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which the group denies.
Also Sunday, a Somali reporter was arrested in Baidoa, said Mowlid Hagi Abdi of the Somali Broadcasting Corp. It was not clear why the reporter was arrested. The government's information minister did not immediately answer his phone.
Several journalists have been arrested recently for reporting about Ethiopian troops in the country, but they have been released after a few days.
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Ethiopia says seeks no permission to defend itself
We are ready for war, Ethiopia warns Somalia's Islamists
Including Speech in Ethiopian Parilament
Special Section: Somalia
Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi addresses the media during a news conference in Addis Ababa November 25, 2006. Ethiopia said on Saturday it did not need the blessing of major ally, the United States, or any country to defend itself from any threat from neighbouring Somalia where Islamists have launched a holy war. REUTERS/Stringer (ETHIOPIA)
Deriba Merga and Belaynesh Fekadu win in 2006 TOYOTA Great Ethiopian Run
IAAF
Merga completes domestic road hat-trick, Fekadu surprises at Great Ethiopian Run
Sunday 26 November 2006
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia - Ethiopian 20km champion Deriba Merga completed a domestic road-running hat-trick as he won the men’s race in the 2006 TOYOTA Great Ethiopian Run on Sunday (26) morning.
In the women’s race, little-known runner Belaynesh Fekadu took a surprise victory over defending champion Genet Getaneh as both winners smashed the course record.
2006 TOYOTA Great Ethiopian Run Official Results
MEN -
1. Deriba Merga (Defense) 28:18.61
2. Tadesse Tola (Prisons) 28:21.89
3. Eshetu Wondimu (Aysha) 28:34.57
4. Tilahun Regassa (Entoto Terara) 28:34.77
5. Kidane Gemechu (Ethiopian Youth) 28:39.89
6. Wegayehu Girma (Aysha) 28:44.45
7. Gadissa Gurmu (Geta Zeru) 28:46.29
8. Tola Bane (Muger Cement) 28:47.48
9. Henry Sugut (Kenya) 28:47.50
10. Demesew Tsega (St. George) 28:49.13
WOMEN -
1. Belaynesh Fekadu (Omedla) 33:02.25
2. Lineth Chepkurui (Kenya) 33:07.68
3. Genet Getaneh (Prisons) 33:13.19
4. Aheza Kiros (EEPCO) 33:24.57
5. Bezunesh Bekele (Ethiopian Banks) 33:26.09
6. Emebet Eta’a (Defense) 33:32.24
7. Dire Tune (Prisons) 33:41.07
8. Ayelech Worku (Omedla) 33:46.70
9. Teyiba Erkesso (Prisons) 33:48.85
10. Makeda Haroun (Prisons) 34:04.04
Related Link
Urael on Great Ethiopian Run 2006
Runners compete in the Great Ethiopian Run at the start of the race in the centre of Addis Ababa November 26, 2006. REUTERS/Stringer (ETHIOPIA)
The start of the 2006 Great Ethiopian Run in Addis Ababa
(Jiro Mochizuki)
Charity success for Ethiopia trip
CYCLIST Eleanor Phelan has completed a gruelling 350km ride across Ethiopia, raising £2,000 for maternity services in the African country.
Miss Phelan, 25, of Chandlers Road, Marshalswick, joined 14 other cyclists for the week-long trip over the mountainous west of the country.
She said: "The ride was absolutely fantastic.
"The scenery was breathtaking; mountain after mountain with luscious green fertile valleys.
"We got a very positive, if not somewhat bemused, response from the locals we came across.
Ethiopia has long been a byword for starvation and poverty – but now the problems for what used to be a Middle Ages superpower have been exacerbated by a devastating Aids epidemic. As World Aids Day approaches, Metro Chief Reporter AIDAN RADNEDGE begins a week of special reports by talking to two mothers with devastatingly different stories to tell.
Lydia Hailu and Tsion Bereket have plenty in common.
Separated by just 18 months in age, the two toddlers smile and scarper around the room with the same enthusiasm, oblivious to the grinding poverty of their daily lives.
Both have been abandoned by their fathers and both have HIV-positive mothers.
Starbucks CEO to travel to Ethiopia
Ethiopian coffee trademark dispute may leave Starbucks with nasty taste
Madeleine Acey, Enterprise Editor, Times Online
Academic warns American chain that customers will go elsewhere if it places profit before ethics
Source:The Times
Starbucks was accused yesterday of “playing Russian roulette” with its brand as a row over prices for Ethiopian coffee farmers intensified.
As an Oxford academic lambasted the American coffee shops chain, Jim Donald, Starbucks’ chief executive, was preparing to visit Ethiopia tomorrow for talks with Meles Zenawi, its Prime Minister, The Times has learnt.
Douglas Holt, the L’Oréal Professor of Marketing at Oxford University’s Saïd Business School, accused Starbucks of hypocrisy and abuse of power and said that the company was in danger of damaging its name among its educated middle-class customers by opposing Addis Ababa’s attempts to trademark Ethiopia’s coffee varieties in the United States.
The international coffee chain had worked hard to cultivate a progressive image, selling fair trade and “ethical” products and promoting sustainable development among the poorest coffee-growers, he said.
“In their rash attempt to shut down Ethiopia’s applications, [Starbucks] have placed the Starbucks brand in significant peril. Starbucks customers will be shocked by the disconnect between their current perceptions of Starbucks’ ethics and the company’s actions against Ethiopia,” he said.
He claimed that Starbucks’ stance was likely to hit profits much harder than any price rises brought about by trademarking.
Oxfam said last month that the Ethiopian growers selling to Starbucks earned between 75 cents and $1.60 a pound on beans that Starbucks sold at up to $26 (£13.40) a pound. The aid organisation issued a strongly worded statement accusing Starbucks of actively blocking Ethiopia’s trademark bid.
Starbucks, in turn, denied this and issued a statement demanding that Oxfam stop its attack. Oxfam took out full-page advertisements on the issue in The New York Times and two Seattle-based newspapers.
Starbucks said that trademarks were not the best way to help growers and suggested a regional certification alternative that it said was used in many countries to brand premium food and wine. It made no sense, the company said, for trademarks to be geographically based, as in the Ethiopian application for three regional names. Starbucks added that it consistently paid premium bean prices and that between 2002 and 2006 it had quadrupled its Ethiopian coffee purchases.
“We support the recognition of the source of our coffees and have a deep appreciation for the farmers that grow them,” the company said. “We are committed to working collaboratively and continuing dialogue with key stakeholders to find a solution that benefits Ethiopian coffee farmers. We have had recent conversations with Oxfam about planning logistics for a stakeholder summit.
“Our investment in social development projects and providing access to affordable loans . . . has been recognised for its leadership within the industry,” it said.
Getachew Mengistie, the director-general of the Ethiopian Intellectual Property Office, said that Addis Ababa had studied the merits of both trademarks and certification and found that trademarks would strengthen the position of farmers, enabling them to get a reasonable return for their product.
Professor Holt said: “With a certification mark, Starbucks and other Western coffee marketers would still have full control over Ethiopian coffee brands.” Trademarks would require licences for companies wanting to use the names — giving the coffee producers a commercial asset that they could control.
Starbucks declined to confirm or deny Mr Donald’s visit. Oxfam said that it had invited supporters to fax Mr Donald in protest and that more than 70,000 people had done so.
“Speciality coffees in other regions of the world can get up to 45 per cent of the retail price, compared with the 5 to 10 per cent Ethiopians are currently receiving,” Oxfam said. “We’re meeting with Starbucks again next week and are hoping there can be progress.” Ethiopia’s growers could earn $88 million (£45 million) more per year with trademarks, it said.
Starbucks declined to respond directly to Professor Holt’s comments.
Brian Smith, research fellow at Cranfield University and author of Guarding the Brand, questioned Professor Holt’s assertions. He said that Western consumers had limited sympathy with subsistence farmers in Africa and although they might be prepared to pay 5p more for a fair trade latte, they might not walk an extra 50 yards to another coffee shop to avoid Starbucks and its policy on trademarks.
“I don’t see this doing Starbucks significant long-lasting harm . . . Starbucks will handle this in an intelligent manner, offering an alternative,” he said.
Crucial brew
$11.2bn
Ethiopia’s GDP
$7.8bn
Starbucks’ annual revenues
12,400
Number of Starbucks coffee shops worldwide
15 million
Number of Ethiopians reliant on the coffee trade
54%
Percentage of Ethiopia’s GDP that is coffee
90%
Percentage of Ethiopia’s exports that are coffee
80%
Perecentage of Ethiopians living on $2 or less a day
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Related articles on the dispute between Ethiopia and Starbucks
Ethiopia says seeks no permission to defend itself
Sat Nov 25, 2006 5:00 PM GMT
By Tsegaye Tadesse
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - Ethiopia said on Saturday it did not need the blessing of major ally, the United States, or any country to defend itself from any threat from neighbouring Somalia where Islamists have launched a holy war.
Prime Minister Meles Zenawi pledged to explore all means to peacefully resolve the bitter standoff between his country, which backs the interim government in Somalia, and the Islamists, who control much of southern Somalia.
The Islamists have declared jihad against Ethiopia, accusing it of sending troops into Somalia to prop up the government.
"It is our country that is being attacked. Naturally, we do not seek any light, green, red or yellow from anyone to protect ourselves," Meles told a news conference.
"If, and when, we are convinced that all options of resolving the invasion through peaceful means are exhausted, only then we may act to respond in kind," he said, adding the Islamists had trained, armed and smuggled hundreds of Ethiopian rebels into the country.
Meles said he had explained Ethiopia's position on Somalia to Western powers, who have scrambled to respond to the Somali crisis since Islamists seized Mogadishu in June in a direct challenge to the Addis Ababa-backed interim government.
"Both Brussels and Washington appear to believe that any military response on our part might be counter-productive, saying that dialogue is the best way forward," Meles said.
"We too agree that dialogue is the best way, nevertheless as the direct victims of the aggression, we feel we might be forced at some stage to respond with force."
Senior Islamist Sheikh Sharif Ahmed has accused Washington of giving Ethiopia the go-ahead to fight his movement.
Meles was speaking two days after appearing in parliament to urge lawmakers to back plans to fight the Somali Islamists, although he has refrained from declaring war on them.
Ethiopia insists it has only sent a few hundred military trainers across the border, but a U.N.-commissioned report says it has deployed thousands of soldiers and weapons into Somalia.
In Mogadishu, senior Islamists flanked by parliamentary speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan, on a visit to the capital, condemned Meles' parliamentary address as "naked aggression".
The group also issued a 10-point communique on Saturday which called for the Islamists and the interim government to resume talks in Sudan's capital Khartoum next month.
Talks between the two sides collapsed in October, with the Islamists saying they would not negotiate unless Ethiopian troops withdrew from Somalia.
But deputy defence minister, Salad Ali Gele, offered little hope on Saturday, saying the Islamists should give up their demands before the government rejoined the negotiating table.
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Related Links
We are ready for war, Ethiopia warns Somalia's Islamists
Including Speech in Ethiopian Parilament
Special Section: Somalia
Tanzania stun Ethiopia in Cecafa
Anteneh Zewdie
BBC Sport, Addis Ababa
Tanzania came from behind to beat defending champions Ethiopia 2-1 in the opening game of the Cecafa Cup in Addis Ababa on Saturday.
The home side opened the scoring in the 24th minute through Biniam Assefa, who converted a cross from midfielder Ashenafi Girma.
The Tanzanians, who have been impressive in the Nations Cup qualifiers, turned up the heat on Ethiopia but spurned a couple of good scoring chances.
With only five minutes before the break, midfielder Amir Mafta silenced the home crowd from with a free kick from the edge of the box.
The Taifa Stars took control of the game and teenager Bantu Admin got the winner on the hour mark.
The home side pushed forward for the equaliser but Samuel Degfe and Solomon Kebede were denied by Tanzania keeper Juma Kaseja.
Meanwhile, Djibouti will play Malawi on Sunday while Burundi take on Zambia.
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Ethiopia chase third Cecafa Cup
Girma Wake – a vision for Ethiopian
By Günter Endres
Airline Business
As a veteran of 30 years on and off with Ethiopian Airlines, chief executive Girma Wake has seen his airline pass through many phases and several major transformations.
Today the emphasis is very much on upgrading the infrastructure that supports the Addis Ababa-based carrier as it grows strongly. Passenger growth for instance has been higher than anticipated, leading the airline to its Vision 2010 programme put together with the help of SH&E and Ernst & Young. “Today, we are a $600 million airline and we want to reach $1 billion by 2010,” he says. “We carry today 1.7 million passenger and want to increase this to 3 million. Our jet equipment now numbers 19 aircraft, and we want to have 30 by 2010.”
Of the 10 Boeing 787s on order it has to help achieve this rise, seven will be delivered by that time, says Girma, who already has his sights on more. “We are likely to order five more 787s or Airbus A350s,” he says. The first 787 arrives in September 2008.
Ethiopian Airlines also plans to increase staffing levels from 4,700 to 5,500, and destinations from 46 to 60. The airline flies to 28 cities in Africa, which is its most important market, but Girma says that it is strongest between Africa and the Middle East and Asia, facilitating growing traffic between the two continents.
Network development will increasingly emphasise non-stop, or at the most, one-stop services, as well as frequency increases. “We have also created a team to focus on our service strategy,” Girma says. “This team is talking to customers and will determine what we need to do with regard to ground service, in-flight service, aircraft seating and so on. The study will be completed in December.”
He has his eyes on possible investments in other airlines in Africa, revealing that the airline had planned to take a stake in newly established Ghana International Airlines, but pulled out because of legal complications. Ethiopian has been invited by other airlines, but Girma declines to name these suitors, saying only that “if we can see a good hub, we will invest”.
Asked if he sees the Yamoussoukro Decision to liberalise the aviation market on the entire continent as feasible, Girma is more upbeat than most other African airline leaders. “Although we complain [about its slow implementation] there has been a lot of progress. It will be implemented across Africa, but it will take time. There is no choice. It will need the more developed airlines and countries to take the lead, to show the weaker countries that there is nothing to fear, and they will follow. I believe it is good for Africa.”
On the infrastructure side, Ethiopian is building of a new terminal to handle a growing cargo business, which accounts for $94 million of its revenues. “Air freight is the catalyst for economic development,” he says, adding that it is critical, especially for land-locked countries in Africa. He is planning to lease a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 or MD-11 to add to the two converted Boeing 757-200 freighters.
A new hangar to boost third-party maintenance capacity has also been completed, while a major overhaul of training facilities will enable the airline to reduce the amount of expensive time spent training on actual aircraft. The training centre not only serves Ethiopian Airlines but also many other African carriers, says Girma.
Ethiopia chase third Cecafa Cup
BBC News
Ethiopia will chase a record-equalling third successive East and Central African Senior Challenge Cup when they host the 11-nation tournament that kicks off in Addis Ababa on Saturday.
Ethiopia's recent success in the annual regional event has hinted of a revival for one of the early stalwarts of African football, although the return to the event of Malawi and Zambia will temper their optimism.
The two southern African countries were past members of the Confederation of East and Central African Football Association, which is organising the tournament in Ethiopia, but have since migrated to the regional equivalent in southern Africa.
Malawi and Zambia have been invited to compete to boost the competitiveness of this year's tournament which is missing five-times winners Kenya, who are suspended from international competition by Fifa.
Kenya are the only other nation to win the title three times in a row, a feat they achieved from 1981 to 1983.
Eritrea are also absent because of their long-standing border conflict with neighbours Ethiopia, but the tournament does offer the likes of Djibouti and Somalia rare forays into the arena of international football.
Ethiopia open the tournament with a match against Tanzania's mainland team on Saturday.
Tanzania's national side is split into players who represent the mainland and those from the island of Zanzibar, which is not recognised as an independent football entity by Fifa.
The East and Central African Senior Challenge Cup is Africa's oldest cup competition, first played in Kenya in 1926 as the Gossage Cup.
The Cecafa tournament has been renamed the Al Amoudi Senior Challenge Cup, after its sponsor Hussein Al Amoudi.
An Ethiopian millionaire, Al Amoudi is offering US $1.5 million, over two years, to cover prize money and tournament costs.
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Washington Update
Nov 24 2006
On Sunday, Nov. 19, Dr. Taye Woldesmiat, president of the Ethiopian Teachers Association and Ato Kifle Mulat, president of the Ethiopian Free Press Association addressed a Town Hall meeting in Washington, D.C.
They provided updates on the situation in Ethiopia and discussed future plans for restoring democracy and improving the human rights situation.
Dr. Taye Woldesmiat emphasized the need for all Ethiopians to work together to use peaceful means to bring about democratic change. He called for a halt to unnecessary fighting among those who are united in their pursuit of democracy. He called for an immediate focus on the release of political prisoners, journalists, and leaders of civic society. He warned that the structure of Ethiopian society is unraveling as the educational system disintegrates, children drop out of school and there are no economic opportunities. Students will continue to play a key role in efforts to bring democracy to Ethiopia, he said. Dr. Taye also stressed the important role that women must play.
Ato Kilfle described the important role the free press played during and after the elections to inform the Ethiopian public. He added, however, that the Ethiopian press has paid a heavy price. Most independent-minded journalists are suffering in jail, although they are guilty of nothing other than reporting the truth. His hands were chained together in remembrance of the Ethiopian journalists who are in jail, as well as those who have been killed. He expressed strong disappointment with the lack of interest in the international community, and the failure of governments and organizations in free countries to intervene to help Ethiopian journalist. Those suffering in Ethiopian jails include Sirkalem Fasil, a journalists who was pregnant when she was arrested and who delivered her baby in prison.
The large number of Ethiopians who attended the meeting applauded Dr. Taye and Ato Kilfle. They also loudly and clearly requested that they work hard to organize a conference bringing together all Ethiopian political and civic organizations to craft unified positions. There was strong agreement among audience members representing a variety of political groups, as well as by Dr. Taye and Ato Kilfle, that democratic change can only be achieved if civic organizations are involved in the effort.
Following a very active question and answer session, Dr. Taye proposed the following basic elements for future action:
Civil society must play an active, constructive role in transforming Ethiopian society from dictatorship to democracy.
All of the political parties must work together.
Ethiopian intellectuals must work for the common good of Ethiopia society; they should network among themselves.
A civil society support committee should be organized.
There should be strong links between those working for democracy inside Ethiopia and those in the rest of the world.
Ethnic and religious conflict must be avoided.
Orqanized by Addis Dimitse radio, ENC/EAC and other civic groups
Mesfin Mekonen
Three fatally shot in Oakland at Thanksgiving family gathering
The victims' family has established a memorial fund at Bank of America. The "Mehari Family Fund" account number is 056-094-2210. Source: CBS 5
Killed wereLocal TV News from The Bay Area
Updated Video News
CBS5 TV 11/24
Brother's death may have led to fatal feud
- Jim Herron Zamora, Chronicle Staff Writer
Saturday, November 25, 2006
Read Original Story from San Francisco Chronicle
Two brothers arrested for allegedly killing three in-law relatives in North Oakland on Thanksgiving apparently blamed their sister-in-law for a third brother's unexplained death, police and relatives said Friday.
All the victims and the alleged killers, who were arrested after the shootings in a Temescal district apartment, were immigrants from the East African nation of Eritrea. Hundreds of Eritreans, including women wearing traditional scarves, gathered Friday to mourn the dead family members and honor the survivors in a meeting room of the Keller Plaza apartment complex at 5321 Telegraph Ave.
"This is the worst nightmare for Eritreans," said Yikaalo Gebreselassie of Alameda, who said he was a friend of the victims. "We've never had this kind of experience before, and now we have three people dead."
The two brothers, Asmeron Tewolde Gebreselassie, 43, and Tewodros Tewolde Gebreselassie, 39, were arrested in their apartment in the same complex late Thursday after admitting their roles in the slayings, police said.
Asmeron Gebreselassie, a taxi driver, allegedly told investigators he was the gunman. Police said Tewodros Gebreselassie, an engineer, had admitted to an unspecified role in planning the attack at the third-floor apartment of their sister-in-law's mother.
Tewodros Gebreselassie was a guest at the family's Thanksgiving gathering and let his brother in before the shooting started, police and friends said. Both men are jailed without bail on suspicion of three murders. They are expected to appear in court Monday or Tuesday.
They are suspected of killing Winta T. Mehari, 28, of Berkeley, her brother Yonas Mehari, 17, who lived at the apartment, and their mother, Regbe Bahrenegasi, 50.
Several other members of the family fled when the gunman walked in during the Thanksgiving gathering and opened fire about 3:10 p.m. One suffered a broken back when he jumped from the apartment, authorities said. Another, a 22-year-old brother of Winta and Yonas Mehari, was shot in the foot when he tried to disarm the killer.
Winta Mehari was married to Abraham G. Tewolde, 42, the brother of the two arrested men, police and family members said. Tewolde, who ran an auto repair shop on Broadway in Oakland, died in March of undetermined causes, meaning an autopsy failed to reveal a specific cause of death, according to the Alameda County coroner's office.
Mehari's family believed his death was the result of a heart attack, friends said Friday. However, his brothers were skeptical and "believed that (Winta Mehari) either had something to do with the death or was not forthcoming about what happened," police Officer Roland Holmgren said.
Tewolde's death was not the subject of a criminal investigation, police and coroner's officials said.
Tewodros Gebreselassie showed up at the Telegraph Avenue apartment about an hour before the killings, police said. Family members were not expecting him, but he stayed nonetheless and socialized, investigators said.
At some point he let in his brother, who opened fire with a handgun, police said. The brothers then took their 2-year-old nephew -- Winta Mehari's son -- and fled to their apartment, where they later surrendered to a police SWAT team after a brief standoff. The boy was unharmed.
The gunfire and standoff led to an evacuation of more than 200 residents in the Keller Plaza complex, which extends along Telegraph from 52nd to 54th streets.
According to residents, most people who live in Keller Plaza are of Eritrean or Ethiopian descent. Bahrenegasi was active in the Eritrean Orthodox Church in Oakland and was popular among the city's 3,000-member immigrant community.
Bahrenegasi and her children came from Asmara, the capital of Eritrea, and many of the well-wishers Friday were from the same city. Some who came to the apartment complex said they did not know the family well but wanted to show support and respect.
North Oakland is the hub of Eritrean culture in Northern California. There are four restaurants or cafes owned by Eritreans within three blocks of Keller Plaza. Another 10 or so Eritrean-owned businesses are scattered along Telegraph and Shattuck avenues between downtown Oakland and south Berkeley.
About 10,000 to 12,000 Eritreans live in the Bay Area, the second-most-popular U.S. destination for that nation's immigrants behind Washington, D.C. The growth of the East Bay community prompted Eritrea to open a consulate in the Tribune Tower in downtown Oakland.
Thousands of immigrants from the nation of 4.5 million came to the United States as refugees during and just after their country's 30-year war of independence with neighboring Ethiopia.
"We all came here seeking a better life," said Habte Kifle, a family friend from El Sobrante who immigrated in 1984 and later graduated from UC Berkeley. "We are a very quiet people. We don't seek attention. This is very hard for us. We've never had a tragedy like this in our community here."
UPDATE: Prior death could be motive in triple slaying
By Harry Harris, Staff writer
Article Last Updated:11/24/2006 11:46:59 AM PST
OAKLAND — Avenging a perceived dishonor is what police believe led to the shooting deaths of a woman, her mother and teenage brother Thursday afternoon in a North Oakland apartment.
Police said Friday the two suspects arrested thought the family they targeted had something to do with their brother's still unexplained death in March and after months of brooding and verbal threats finally took their revenge.
"This is all about two things: truthfulness and honor in (the suspects') eyes," said homicide Sgt. James Morris.
"They felt the family had something to do with their brother's death and they had to do something," said Morris, who is investigating the case with Sgt. Lou Cruz.
Killed were Winta T. Mehari, 28, her brother, Yonas Mehari, 17, and their mother, Regba Baharengasi, 50, who all lived in the apartment in the 5300 block of Telegraph Avenue where the shooting happened about 3 p.m. Thursday.
One investigator said of the crime scene, "It was like hell was brought there."
A 22-year brother of the victims — who police described as a hero for disarming the main suspect — was shot in the foot and another brother, 20, suffered a broken back when he leaped from the third-floor apartment to avoid being shot.
The suspected gunman was identified as Asmeron Tewolde Gebreselassie, 43, a taxi driver who was arrested along with his brother, Tewodros Tewolde Gebreselassie, 39, an unemployed engineer who police said helped plan the attack.
Morris said Asmeron Tewolde Gebreselassie admitted the shooting to police hostage negotiator Sgt. Dave Faeth and later to him and Cruz.
Tewodros Tewolde Gebreselassie admitted to being in the apartment when the shooting happened and to a "limited involvement," Morris said.
Morris said the suspects had been upset with Winta Mehari and other members of her family ever since their brother, Abraham G. Tewolde, 42, a mechanic, died March 1 in Berkeley. At first, it was thought he died from a heart attack, but the coroner's office still has it classified as an unexplained death, adding to the brothers' concerns, police said.
Morris said the brothers had been brooding about the death ever since and although there had been no prior physical violence, they had made some verbal threats.
On Thursday the Mehari family was having its traditional Thanksgiving meal where more than a half dozen people were present. Morris said before their brother's death, the two suspects had often attended the meal but were not expected to show up Thursday.
But Tewodros Tewolde Gebreselassie showed up unexpectedly and after an hour of socializing, made a phone call, Morris said.
Within minutes, Asmeron Tewelde Gebreselassie showed up with pistols in both hands and began shooting at people inside the apartment as soon as he entered, Morris said.
When the shooting started his younger brother grabbed their deceased brother's 2-year-old son by Winta Mehari and fled, Morris said.
The three people killed apparently died right away. As others inside the apartment tried to flee, the victims' 22-year-old brother began fighting with the gunman, causing him to drop a gun and escape, Morris said.
Responding police were directed by witnesses to another apartment in the complex where the suspects' family lived, saying they had fled there.
Faeth and other negotiators were brought to the scene as well as police SWAT officers.
Morris said Faeth not only got admissions from Asmeron Tewolde Gebreselassie, he was also "instrumental in getting them to surrender."
Six of their relatives and the abducted 2-year-old were also brought out of the apartment, police said.
The two suspects were each booked on three counts of suspicion of murder
Source: InsideBayArea
----------------
The gunman then fled, prompting a SWAT team to close down surrounding blocks and conduct an apartment-by-apartment sweep.
Asmero Tewolda surrendered to police several hours later, after barricading himself in the complex, police said. His brother, whose name was not released, also was taken into custody, although his alleged role in the incident was unclear."Right now we are looking at both of them as suspects," said police spokesman Officer Roland Holmgren.
Authorities believe the shooting stemmed from an ongoing family dispute, said Lt. Kenny Whitman. Several handguns were recovered at the scene, he said.
Tewolda and the other man questioned by police are brothers who believed their sister-in-law, one of the women killed, was responsible for the death of her husband - their brother - eight months ago, according to Gebrehiwot Tesfandrias, a family friend.
The woman, believed to be in her 20s, was shot along with her mother and her brother, Tesfandrias said.
The man who jumped out the window was taken to Highland Hospital, where he was listed in stable condition, police said. The names of the victims were not immediately released.
Three fatally shot during Oakland Thanksgiving dinner
Fourth person injured in three-story jump to escape gunfire
By Kristin Bender, Staff Writer
Inside Bay Area
Article Last Updated:11/23/2006 09:45:06 PM PST
OAKLAND _ Three people were killed today and another was seriously injured after jumping from a third-story window to escape a gunman who stormed a North Oakland apartment in the middle of a holiday dinner to settle an ongoing family dispute.
Photo: Family members mourn three victims who were shot iniside the Keller Plaza apartments in Oakland on Thursday. (Ray Chavez - Staff)
Police did not release the names of the two women and one man who were gunned down shortly after 3 p.m. in an apartment in the Keller Plaza apartment complex at 5301 Telegraph Ave.
A fourth victim, who reportedly jumped from the apartment's third-story window in an attempt to escape gunfire, was transported to Highland Hospital with unknown injuries, police said.
Police arrested Asmero Tewolda and his brother, whose name was not released, after police hostage negotiators made contact with him and he surrendered without incident.
His brother was also taken into custody, but it was not clear late Thursday if he would be held in connection with the shootings.
``Right now we are looking at both of them as suspects,'' said Officer Roland Holmgren, police spokesman.
Holmgren said snipers, SWAT team officers and the homicide unit all assisted with the investigation and the arrests Thursday.
Tewolda is believed to be related to the victims. The fight that sparked the gunfire was reportedly related to a custody battle over a small child, sources said. The child was not injured.
Shortly after the shooting, several Eritrean women wearing headscarves and believed to be family or friends of the victims emerged from the building wailing ``Somebody died! Somebody died!'' in a foreign language.
A man, his striped T-shirt splattered with blood, dropped to his knees in prayer in the middle of the street.
The apartment building faces a portion of 53rd Street and part of Telegraph Avenue. Police closed Telegraph between 52nd and 55th streets and the 500 block of 53rd Street for several hours while the suspects were still at large.
Dozens of black-and-white police cars, firetrucks and the American Red Cross were on scene for hours. Witnesses and those who either live in the apartment complex or were visiting when the gunplay began, stood on nearby sidewalks wrapped in white blankets, crying and talking among themselves. All refused to comment.
Police said the shooting started in a two-bedroom apartment, where at least 11 people were gathered for a Thanksgiving meal. With three people dead, everyone inside fled to another nearby apartment in the same complex. The gunman followed and stayed there until he surrendered.
When the 911 call came in at 3:10 p.m., police dispatchers could hear gunshots and screaming in the background, police said. The triple homicide brings Oakland's homicide total for the year to 138. Last year there were 94 homicides.
Staff writer Harry Harris contributed to this report.Enjoy ...
We are ready for war, Ethiopia warns Somalia's Islamists
Jonathan Clayton, Africa Correspondent
The Times, London UK
The Horn of Africa, one of the world’s most volatile regions, edged closer to war today after Meles Zenawi, the Ethiopian Prime Minister, said that his country had completed preparations to take on a powerful Islamic alliance in neighboring Somalia.
Mr Zenawi told the Ethiopian parliament that the Islamists presented a "clear and present danger" to Ethiopia, whose main regional foe — Eritrea — was arming them. He said that attempts to settle the crisis through dialogue and negotiation had proved fruitless.
"When any country faces that type of danger it has the full right to defend itself against this threat ... To exercise this right we have been preparing for this kind of response because it is our responsibility," Mr Zenawi declared.
Opposition MPs criticised his statement as amounting to "a declaration of war". The Islamists, who now control most of Somalia, later met in emergency session in the capital, Mogadishu, and vowed to defend the country against a "reckless and war-thirsty" Ethiopia.
However, at the same time the Supreme Islamic Council of Somalia, a coalition of 11 Islamic organisations that wrested power earlier this year from local warlords, invited Washington to send an official delegation to Mogadishu for talks.
Council spokesman Abdurahim Muddey said: "We are inviting the United States to send a delegation to see what is happening in Somalia... The US delegation will be received by our foreign relations chief, Ibrahim Hassan Addow, who is himself an American citizen."
The United States has accused the Islamists of links to al-Qaeda and encouraged Ethiopia to send 5,000 troops to support a rump government based in the border town of Baidoa.
Related Link
Opinion: Old nightmare, new danger
Stanley A. Weiss
International Herald Tribune
A UN report also recently accused 11 countries of fuelling the conflict in Somalia by supplying arms to either side. It said that the influx of weaponry risked igniting a new regional war in the Horn of Africa like the 1976-78 Ogaden War in which America and the then Soviet Union backed opposing sides.
Aidan Hartley, a regional analyst and author, told The Times: "We are now looking at a potent mix of nationalism and Islam. Many of the Islamists are also nationalists who have never forgotten the humiliation of losing the Ogaden."
Several regional experts have disputed the report, which also claimed Somali fighters fought alongside Hezbollah against Israel in last summer’s Lebanon conflict with Israel. They said that only a handful of the Islamists were extremists and that the American approach risked strengthening, rather than weakening, their position.
In echoes of allegations against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq prior to its invasion, the UN report also alleged that Iran sought to purchase uranium from the Supreme Islamic Council of Somalia in exchange for weapons. It named 11 countries that have violated the country’s arms embargo, including Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran, Libya and Egypt.
The Islamists’ supreme leader, Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, has been designated a "terrorist" by the US, which earlier this month warned that Somali extremists may be plotting suicide attacks in Kenya and Ethiopia.
Intelligence sources say Washington has indicated to Ethiopia that it would not oppose a military operation to remove the Islamists, but regional experts say such an action would ignite the entire region.
Eritrea and Ethiopia fought a devastating border war in 1998-2000 and have several unresolved border disputes. It is feared both would soon be directly embroiled in any fresh conflict.
Washington previously ran a covert operation to support Somali warlords fighting the Islamists for control of Mogadishu that collapsed in June when the city fell. The warlords carved up Somalia in 1991 after the Cold War dictator, Mohamed Siad Barre, was overthrown and since then has known nothing but anarchy.
Today, European Union sources in Brussels, citing the danger of an all-out war in the Horn of Africa, distanced themselves from the US policy of refusing to engage in dialogue with the Islamists.
"They have done what no one else has done for 15 years: brought a measure of stability to the country... We need a more balanced approach," said a senior European Commission official with responsibility for the region.
The Islamists deny any connection to terrorism, but the transitional Somali government accuses them of staging an unsuccessful suicide car bomb attempt to kill the President in the administration’s seat of Baidoa in September.
One faction is also believed to have assassinated an Italian nun in September and a Scandinavian television reporter last June.
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P.M. Meles Zenawi Speech in Parliament Nov 23 2006
Part I
Half of Africa's 1.16 million neonatal deaths occur in Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Uganda, the report said. Ethiopia ranks 3rd in the number of newborn deaths with 119,500 newborn death.
| Country | Ranking for number of newborn death | Number of newborn deaths | Ranking for number of maternal deaths | Number of Maternal Deaths |
| Nigeria | 1 | 255,500 | 1 | 42,600 |
| DR Congo | 2 | 130,900 | 2 | 27,600 |
| Ethiopia | 3 | 119,500 | 3 | 26,000 |
| Tanzania | 4 | 44,900 | 8 | 8,100 |
| Uganda | 5 | 44,500 | 6 | 12,400 |
Africa most dangerous place for newborns -- report
JOHANNESBURG, Nov 22 (Reuters) - Each year more than one million babies in sub-Saharan Africa die before they are a month old because of a lack of essential health care, a U.N. report said on Wednesday.
"Sub-Saharan Africa remains the most dangerous region in the world for a baby to be born -- with 1.16 million babies dying each year in the first 28 days of life," said the report published, in Johannesburg and Geneva.
The document, drafted by nine agencies including the World Health Organisation, said six countries in the region had made progress in improving care, reducing neonatal deaths by about 30 percent in the past decade.
"Whilst the survival of the African child has shown almost no improvement since the 1980s, the fact that during 2006 several large African countries have reported a dramatic reduction in the risk of child deaths gives us new hope," said co-editor Joy Lawn.
Up to half a million African babies die on the day they are born, with Liberia having the world's highest neonatal mortality rate at 66 deaths per 1,000 births, compared with fewer than two deaths for 1,000 births in Japan.
Half of Africa's 1.16 million neonatal deaths occur in Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Uganda, the report said.
Burkina Faso, Eritrea, Madagascar, Malawi, Tanzania and Uganda had made significant progress in reducing infant deaths over the last 10 years, thanks to increased government spending on basic health care.
The report said opportunities to save the lives of newborns within existing programmes were often missed, with only one-tenth of women in Africa attending antenatal care receiving preventive treatment for malaria.
Only one percent of mothers with HIV had treatment to avoid transmitting the virus to their babies during childbirth.
"Up to 800,000 babies a year could be saved if 90 percent of women and babies received feasible, low-cost health interventions," the report said, adding this would cost about $1 billion per year.
The United Nations said in October that more than 18 million children in Africa would be orphaned by HIV/AIDS by the end of the decade if more was not done to combat the pandemic among the continent's overwhelmingly young population.
Excerpts from the UN Report
To meet MDG 4, sub-Saharan Africa will need to achieve an annual average reduction in under-five mortality of at least 8 percent per year for the next decade. Four high burden countries with stagnant U5MR in the 1990s –
Tanzania, Malawi, and Ethiopia – have reported 25 to 30 percent reductions in U5MR over the past few years based on data from Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) released in the past year (Figure I.3). These statistics equate to annual reductions of over five percent and suggest that major decreases in child mortality can be achieved.
More than half of African babies who die do so at home.
In some countries, such as Ethiopia, as few as five percent
die in hospital.
Early marriage in Ethiopia
In the Amhara region of Ethiopia, half of all girls are married before the age of 15. Many are betrothed even earlier and sent to live with their future husband’s family by the age of nine or ten. Early marriage is one of many harmful practices that are particularly prevalent in rural areas, along with female genital mutilation, abduction, and unattended births. The effects of early marriage are devastating. Girls who marry at such a young age suffer major disadvantages physically, emotionally, economically, and socially. Involvement with community and church leaders, empowering girls through school clubs and legal enforcement such as annulment of early marriages can lead to change.
Only 42 percent of pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa give birth with a skilled attendant present.Coverage is lower in the poorest countries: in Ethiopia, for example, only five percent of births are assisted by a skilled attendant.
According to DHS data in Ethiopia, 90 percent of mothers did not receive any PNC [Routine Postnatal Care] within the first six weeks. Of the few who did have a PNC contact, more than half gave birth in a health facility, where crowds and
the practice of early discharge often hinder mothers from receiving proper PNC.
In 2000, nearly 147,000 babies in Ethiopia died in their first 28 days of life. At that time, tetanus was the cause of an estimated 14,000 to 20,000 newborn deaths each year.Tetanus is still a major problem in Ethiopia.
A number of countries in Africa – Tanzania, Malawi, and Ethiopia – have recently shown dramatic reductions in under-five mortality rate (U5MR) according to new DHS data. There are also countries making steady progress in reducing U5MR, NMR as well as maternal mortality, such as Eritrea.
Source:
WHO
Ethiopia ranks 100th in World Economic Forum's Gender Gap Index out of 115 countries
The report measures the size of the gender gap in four critical areas of inequality between men and women.
1) Economic participation and opportunity – outcomes on salaries, participation levels and access to high-skilled employment
2) Educational attainment – outcomes on access to basic and higher level education
3) Political empowerment – outcomes on representation in decision-making structures
4) Health and survival – outcomes on life expectancy and sex ratio
Political Empowerment for Women in Ethiopia
Ethiopia ranks 28th in the number of women in parliament where 22% of MPs are women. In Ministerial positions, Ethiopia ranks 92 with just 6% of the positions held by women.
Education Attainment for Ethiopian women
The literacy rate for women in Ethiopia is 34% while for men it is 49%. Enrollment in primary education for women is 44%, 22% in secondary education and just 1% in tertiary education.
The Nordic countries, Sweden (1), Norway (2), Finland (3) and Iceland (4), top the latest Gender Gap Index released today by the World Economic Forum. Germany (5) completes the top five countries with the smallest "gender gap". The Philippines (6) is distinctive as the only Asian country in the top 10
Top 10 in Gender Gap Index
1 Sweden
2 Norway
3 Finland
4 Iceland
5 Germany
6 Philippines
7 N. Zealand
8 Denmark
9 UK
10 Ireland
Bottom 10 in Gender Gap Index
105 Turkey
106 Mauritania
107 Morocco
108 Iran
109 Egypt
110 Benin
111 Nepal
112 Pakistan
113 Chad
114 Saudi Arabia
115 Yemen
Here is the country profile for Ethiopia from World Economic Forum
World falls short on gender equality
By David Clarke
LONDON (Reuters) - No country in the world has achieved equality of the sexes in the key areas of education, health, employment and politics, according to a new ranking of 115 nations published on Tuesday.
Sweden has gone farthest in eliminating inequality between men and women, followed by Norway, Finland and Iceland. The Philippines is the only Asian country in the top 10 and the United States comes in at 22. Yemen ranks bottom.
The ranking, called the Gender Gap Index, covers 90 percent of the world's population and was compiled by researchers from Harvard University, the London Business School and the World Economic Forum.
"For the first time the gut instincts that many of us have are backed up by statistics," said Cherie Booth, the wife of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, and a human rights lawyer.
"There's no way the gender gap between men and women has been eliminated," she said at the launch of the index.
The index measures gaps between men and women in four areas: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival and political empowerment.
By quantifying differences between the sexes in access to resources or opportunities, rather than measuring absolute levels, the researchers sought to strip out the impact of economic development.
For economic participation, for example, the researchers measured the proportion of men and women in work, pay gaps and the ratio of women to men among legislators, senior officials and managers.
The study shows the gender gap for health and survival is very narrow across the world. Based on a score of 1 meaning full equality and 0 a complete lack of equality, the range for all 115 countries is just 0.9796 to 0.9227.
But when it comes to political empowerment -- the ratio of women to men in parliament, ministerial positions, and heads of state over the past 50 years -- the best performer is Sweden with a score of 0.5501 but Saudi Arabia is last with zero.
The Nordic countries benefitted from a higher proportion of women in political office than many and this is the measure that hits the American ranking, despite its good scores elsewhere.
"Women have been empowered to participate in the labour force, but not in politics," said Ricardo Hausmann from Harvard University, one the authors of the report.
The Philippines scored well across the board and is one of only five countries to have closed the gender gap for both health and education. The others are Dominican Republic, France, Honduras and Lesotho.
France, however, only comes 70th in the ranking. It falls down on both the economic participation and political empowerment rankings. South Africa is the best performer in Africa coming in at 18.
Source: Reuters
Ethiopia: An EU THAT RECEIVED BAPTISM OF THE HIGHEST ORDER
By Aie Zi Guo, November 2006
Nov 21, 2006 — As always I fail to understand the type of language that sinks into the mind of diplomats. Against this suspicion please allow me to be straight forward. Writing course language has not been my inner self. However, appeasing the European Union (EU) is being hypocritical, hence my deliberate choice to write this harsh note. Nevertheless bound by the curtsey of civilization, I apologize in advance.
Fifty years ago and following the Auschwitz massacre, your community made a collective promise to defend democracy, human right and the rule of law in our planet. It is this community that decided to protect humanity from tyranny. It is this community that formulated international conventions and bill of rights. It is this community that colonized Africans, exploited Africa’s resources and tried to introduce western democracy. Cognizant that the community would be bound by its faith and principles, Africans believed that the EU will stand behind their quest for freedom. As good disciples many worked tirelessly to advance the cause of freedom and solicited the community’s multifaceted support. In the process thousand sacrificed their lives and millions were exposed to torture and abuse by antidemocratic forces. Even sinister African Dictators echoed the political jargons of EU and other western powers to make incalculable misery to their people through torture, genocide and ethnic and religious conflicts. In the end neither democracy nor development was achieved. Africa’s effort to bring democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights has been an abysmal failure.
In many ways EU has contributed to the failure and to the shameful state in which Africa is in now. The causes of the failure, among others, emanates from the double standard policies pursued by EU and its member states. For example this community remained a sleeping giant while genocide, miscarriage of justice, abuse of power and torture took place at the doorsteps of its embassies. It is EU in tandem with the like minded leaders from North America that nourished tyrants with the means to ascend and cling to power. Aid and loan money has been channeled to dictators through bogus financial institutions of the IMF, WB, and UN. EU monies ‘be it budgetary or humanitarian support’ is used to buy guns and not butters to suppress democracy and abuse human rights.
What is even surprising is that EU in Brussels watched the madness of dictators with utter indifference and diplomatic jargons of restrain and containment. It is this community that shakes hands and toss diplomatic champagne with African dictators on the virtue of containment. It is this community that permitted African dictators to sit shoulder to shoulder with its diplomats and parliamentarians at EU sponsored conferences to discuss issues of human rights, sustainable development, terrorism, peace and stability. EU diplomacy seemed devoid of a moral benchmark when attending receptions and tossed friendship champagnes with tyrants. Is it not this type of negligence and double standard policy that emboldened the minds of dictators? Yes, it is this community that gave dictators a moral and physical comfort to continue the act of tyranny. For innocent Africans it is inconceivable to see a progressive institution ‘EU’ contributing to the proliferation of new breeds of dictators like Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia, Mouseveni of Uganda and Issayas of Eritrea. It is also difficult to see how EU support the creation of banana states that are breeding grounds of terrorism. No doubt this double standard policy of the international community has given dictators a free ride to castrate democracy, and abuse human rights. Now the ghost of dictators does not only haunt the children of Africa but also has become a scarecrow for your children in Europe. So long as this community follows a diplomacy that appeases dictators, its enemies will continue to proliferate in numbers. A new addition to this is the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in Somalia.
Against this background no wonder if millions of Ethiopians continue being baffled by the hypocrisy of this august community. It is no surprise if many find it difficult to count the EU as guardians of democracy and human rights. Ethiopians continue to wonder how and when EU member states who expose the atrocities and human rights abuses of dictators through their annual human rights reports would take concrete steps to standup against tyranny. After the May 2005 election many Ethiopians believed that the leaders of the EU would listen to Anna Gomez. On the contrary the EU shocked millions of Ethiopians by inviting Meles Zenawi to Brussels to lecture this grandiose community on good governance on November 17, 2006. The invitation is testimony to EU’s deliberate negligence to human rights and democracy in Ethiopia. This is an insult to the millions of democracy loving Ethiopians that aught to be condemned and not condoned. There should be no diplomatic and moral generosity of complacence to dictators.
Amidst all these Ethiopian’s hope for change is kept alive by the principled stand of EU parliamentarians including Anna Gomes et el. No doubt this gives the enthusiasm to struggle against tyranny. Sooner or later freedom will come and Anna Gomes will celebrate the triumph of democracy with Ethiopians. Those who joked on democracy with double standard diplomacy will be humiliated like a disgraced dictator. Therefore, it is incumbent on the EU to act in accordance with its charter which is based on the universality and indivisibility of human rights and the responsibility for their protection and promotion, together with the promotion of pluralistic democracy and effective guarantees for the rule of law. It is time to listen to Anna Gomez’s recommendations to do some serious business of disaster prevention in Ethiopia.
In a final note we owe congratulations to the EU for receiving the best lecture of good governance from those who do not govern but rule by the rule of the gun. Ethiopians and the rest of Africans are sure that Meles and other African leaders have succeeded in convincing you with their new paradigm that "Democracy cannot be imposed from the outside”. This statement is a copycat slogan from the recently concluded Sino-African summit in Beijing. China has reassured African leaders that she will dance with any African leader as long as they do business with Asia’s rising tiger. Through their lectures, African dictators have made it clear that EU’s unprincipled rhetoric of democracy, human rights and rule of law has no place in Africa. It is also an indication that those dictators whom you tried to appease for over 50 years are having a super power that will help them in their own terms. Africa is gradually slipping out of the influence of your community. They believe that the international power and diplomatic alliance long held with Europe is starting to tilt to the Red East. Before this take root it is time to revisit your policy towards Ethiopia in particular and Africa in general. The time is now to choose either to be on the side of the people or be against the people of Ethiopia and the people of Africa in general.
Finally it is believed that Meles and other African leaders have given the community ‘wonderful’ lectures on governance. EU conference participants must have received baptism of the highest order from the holy water of dictatorship . Nevertheless, Ethiopians pray that your community frees itself from condescending behaviors, hypocrisy and double standard diplomatic whitewash. For God’s sake show your guardianship of democracy, human rights and rule of law today. Tomorrow is too late to everyone.
* The author is an economist who is interested on international affairs particularly on Ethiopia. He resides in Canada. He can be reached at aiezuguo@yahoo.com
Rare zoo lion cubs poisoned
By Amber Henshaw
BBC News, Addis Ababa
Rare Abyssinian lion cubs are being poisoned at a zoo in Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa, and their bodies are then sold on to be stuffed.
The zoo, founded by Ethiopia's former Emperor Haile Selassie, says they poison a number of cubs each year because they do not have the space or money to look after them.
"We can send them to the forest and to some governmental palaces but most of the time we send them to the taxidermists," said the Lion Zoo administrator Muhedin Abdulaziz.
He said the taxidermists pay about $175 (£90) for each cub and they are then sold for $400 (£210).
No-one at the zoo is happy about the situation and local conservationists are angry.
Sanctuary
One Ethiopian conservationist, who did not want to be named, said he had been offered 11 cubs last year.
"They told me I could take and keep them but I don't have land to keep them...and it was not easy to get land."
"They kill them by poison and automatically they are taken to the taxidermist's office" Muhedin Abdulaziz, Lion Zoo
"Finally I was told they gave them to the taxidermists and they were killed and poisoned."
Emperor Haile Selassie started the Lion Zoo 57 years ago.
It collected lions from across the country and was a symbol of his reign.
The Abyssinian Lion is distinguished by its small size and the male's black mane.
Eight pairs of lions live in the zoo, which is in the Siddist Kilo area of Addis Ababa. There are currently three cubs there.
Few lions remain in Ethiopia's game parks.
The conservationist said he would like to see sanctuaries set up around the country for the lion cubs.
"If we have a sanctuary, or maybe we can reintroduce them back into the wild, that can preserve natural resources," he said.
It is something that Mr Muhedin would also like to see.
Poison
He said they were asking their bosses to expand the zoo so they did not have to keep poisoning the cubs.
Photo: The taxidermists pay $190 for each lion cub
"For the time-being our immediate solution is to send them to the taxidermists but the final and best solution is to extend the zoo into a wider area."
Mr Muhedin said the wildlife office sends vets to kill the unwanted lions.
"They kill them by poison and automatically they are taken to the taxidermist's office.
Tadesse Haile from the Ethiopian Wildlife Department said he did not have any information about it and that he had never heard of cubs being poisoned.
Between 1,000 and 1,200 people visit the zoo each day. Meat to feed the lions costs about $4,000 (£2,100) a month.
The Lion Zoo is also home to baboons, monkeys, rabbits, Egyptian geese and goldfish.
Story from BBC NEWS:
Two rare Ethiopian lion cub's rest inside their enclosure at the Lion Zoo in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2006. The zoo is poisoning rare lion cubs and selling the corpses to be stuffed because it doesn't have enough money to care for the animals, which are the national symbol, the zoo's administrator said Wednesday. 'These animals are the pride of our country,' Muhedin Abdulaziz of the Lion Zoo told The Associated Press. 'But our only alternative right now is to send them to the taxidermist.' Ethiopia's lions, famous for their black manes, adorn statues and the local currency. Wildlife experts estimate that only 1,000 Ethiopian lions, which are smaller than other lions, remain in the wild. (AP Photo/Les Neuhaus)
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ETHIOPIA: Funeral associations - for the living as well as the dead.
By Sumba Snr and agencies
Nov 22, 2006, 01:21
ADDIS ABABA, - Support for Ethiopian families affected by the AIDS pandemic has come from an unexpected source - local funeral associations, known as edirs.
Photo: Community members make their contributions to their local edir
An edir is a traditional 'burial society' to which members make monthly contributions and receive a payment to help cover funeral expenses in return. Nearly every modern Ethiopian is thought to be a member of at least one edir, either a neighbourhood association, one based at work, or operating along age or gender lines.
"I used to hate the edirs - they had the money to help the sick but did nothing," said Senait Tefra, 16, sitting beside her bedridden, HIV-positive mother. "They'd stigmatise people like my mother and wait for them to die before they offered support, but now that's changing and I'm glad."
Senait's mother, Aster Astatka, looks far older than her 48 years, but thinks she would not be here at all if it wasn't for the help she got from her edir. "I couldn't even walk into the hospital on my own," she said. The edir has helped with money, home care and finding medical treatment, including the antiretroviral drugs that have given her a new lease of life.
Until recently, the burial societies were focused solely on providing for a member's funeral, and in much of Ethiopia that is still the case. However, a number of them, shocked by the mounting toll of AIDS on their membership, started looking at what they could do to tackle the problem.
Policymakers believe that reformed edirs could provide the civil society involvement so vital to combating HIV in Ethiopia, where an estimated 1.2 million people are living with the virus and up to 130,000 have died from AIDS-related illnesses.
"Ethiopia is a very top down society," said Addis Ababa University's Dr Alula Pankhurst, a social anthropologist who has researched the role and history of edirs. "So, if you take as your premise that something as devastating as HIV/AIDS has to be tackled at the grassroots level, then the edir is the only answer."
Donors and NGOs agree. The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the World Bank and Care International have all included the societies in their HIV policies. "Edirs are in each and every village - even where there are no other institutions, when they call, the people will come," said UNAIDS's Gulelat Amdie.
With records dating back to 1916, the 'Lukanda Tra', on the western fringe of Addis Ababa, the capital, is believed to have been the first, and is again at the forefront of reforms. "Our people were dying - the edirs were having to pay out and we were all taking time off work to go to funerals," recalled the edir's Major Kasahun Feleke, looking the men and women queuing up to make their payments. "AIDS was killing both the young and the old - we felt we had to do something."
The edir changed its constitution to allow members to draw a quarter of their 2,000 birr (US$238) funeral payout before death, and permit a small extra fee to be levied to pay for additional social support from Tesfa, an organisation providing help, particularly in the area of HIV, to 26 affiliated edirs.
Besides giving awareness-raising talks at monthly meetings, Tesfa - meaning 'hope' in the local Amharic language - coordinates home-based care volunteers and provides income-generation schemes for HIV patients. Kasahun, one of the original drivers behind the organisation, said they wanted the edirs "to be for the living as well as the dead".
Tesfa receives additional funding from relief agencies like Care International and Help Age International to support 240 people living with HIV, and has 65 volunteers who give up to three days of their week to providing homecare.
"The volunteers help with everything - from counselling to washing people's bodies, to buying food, to first aid," said programme head Arega Gebrehilwot. "If people need referrals, we make sure they get proper treatment at the hospital. We support the family and train them to help their relatives."
This proactive attitude, involving much of the local community directly in care, has helped break some of the stigma against HIV/AIDS in Ethiopian society. Aster Astatka remembers that when she first fell ill seven years ago, "most of the community would stare at me and say 'look at her', but now my friends come over and eat my meals."
The organisation encourages HIV-positive people who can work to do so. They have provided funds to 150 people to start businesses, giving them both an income and flexible working hours. "They are selling injera [a cereal-based staple food], local beer, or doing metalwork - anything entrepreneurial," said Tesfa's Arega. "Those who borrowed 300 birr [$38] successfully are now borrowing more."
Modernised, federated edirs may be emerging in the city, but in the countryside they are almost nonexistent, yet it is in the rural areas where the edir may be able to play the biggest role. In urban centres there are schools, hospitals, factories and the media; in many rural areas healthcare information is far more difficult to spread and services are more difficult to provide.
Aster Astatka says she wants to see her edir continue to reform. "One day I hope they can provide proper health insurance - it will be too late for me, but not for my children."
Pankhurst said the continued development of the edirs would largely depend on whether donors, NGOs and the government allowed them to find their own ways of coming together and trusting them with AIDS funding.
"I think they can, and I think they must," he said. "The edir is really the only organisation that knows the locality and knows how to help in a sensitive way."
Source: IRIN/Kenya Times
Ethiopia to launch fully automated Commodities Exchange
Tamrat G. Giorgis
Addis Fortune
Ethiopia’s first organized commodities market is to be housed in the left wing of the building in the picture, owned by Alsam Plc, a company whose major shares are held by Saber Argaw. The buildings, located on Smuts Street, near Mexico Square, were estimated to cost close to 50 million Br, according to sources. The ground and the first floors are already occupied by Dashen and United banks, while the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has recently leased the middle two floors, with a total size of 1,000sqm, for nearly one million Birr a year. Far from the traditional coffee market that has a resemblance of organization – barely modern with its one personal computer – the Ethiopian Commodities Exchange (ECEX) will have fully automated operation, putting a large electronic billboard indexing prices on a daily basis. Coffee, sesame, haricot beans from cash crops and teff, wheat and maize from traditional grains are the first commodities that will hit the electronic billboard, thereby helping the inefficient commodities market get “order, transparency and low cost”.
Studies estimate that Ethiopian farmers produce 10 million to 12 million quintals of grain a year, but only a third of it makes it to the market. Farmers across the country are deprived of reliable and timely information on what the market offers for their products, with 40pc of the grain believed to be rerouted through the capital from surplus to deficit areas. The ECEX is designed to address this issue after electronically connecting 10 warehouses in various parts of the country, the largest being in Addis Abeba. There will also be 20 remote virtual trading sites, and 200 rural market electronic information boards that will get the same data as in the capital. Reliable sources told Fortune, the project head, Eleni G. Medhin (PhD), deliberately picked this building for its proximity to Merkato’s Ehel Berenda, the largest grain market in the country. ECEX is scheduled to be launched in September 2007.
Source: AddisFortune
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The Seattle Kinijit Support Chapter Resolution on the Current Leadership Crisis
Negotiated Settlement is the Way to go - Seattle
The Seattle Kinijit Support Chapter held its first extraordinary general assembly on November 4, 2006, to discuss and deliberate on the current controversy involving the leadership of the Diaspora Kinijit movement. Early on, members and supporters were briefed on what has transpired so far leading to the current crisis where the organization is now on the verge of splitting into two contending groups.
Almost all who addressed the gathering expressed their disbelief, anger and frustration on why such a situation was left to spin out of control when our jailed leaders and through them the Ethiopian people need our unity and coordinated efforts more than ever. The crisis did not only paralyze our overall activities for over six months now but has also serious repercussions which may not be remedied easily unless a conscious and responsible effort is undertaken by both sides. The only beneficiaries of the current morass and gridlock are the tyrant dictator, its agents and enemies of the Ethiopian people.
ERA embarks on 1.5 bln birr road project
By staff reporter
Capital Ethiopia
The Ethiopian Roads Authority (ERA) unveiled plans to commence four road projects worth 1.5 billion birr in Somalia and Gambella regional states as part of its ambitious five year plan.
The first road will be the 220 km Degahabur-Kebridahar road and will be followed by the 105km long Kebridahar-Shilabo and 165km Gode-Kebridahar road in the Somali Region. The project also includes a 120km Adura-Berbe-Akobo road in Gambella Region.
After acquiring heavy machinery worth 613 million birr, ERA plans to upgrade damaged gravel roads in Somalia regional state to asphalt.
At the beginning of the current fiscal year, ERA had announced that it is devising a new mechanism to attract foreign contractors to come and tackle some of over 140 road projects it has set to carry out in the coming five years.
Samson Wondimu, public relations head with the authority, told Capital that about half of the projects out of the 140 will be carried out by foreign contractors and the rest by local contractors.
“We are planning to contact some embassies here to brief them about our programs so that they can pass on the message to contractors in their respective countries,” Samson said. In addition, “we will also be doing some capacity building work for the local contractors.”
ERA estimates the cost of the projects at hand to reach 26 billion birr. The larger financier of the projects is the government of Ethiopia with the rest to be covered by international funding organizations.
When the government's five year plan is completed, the authority hopes to complete 106,106 km of road in the country. This would include 11,331 km at the federal level (under ERA) and 94,775 km of rural roads (under regional road authorities).
Out of the 43 billion birr allocated for the next five years, the government is expected to provide 72%, the World Bank 5.1 billion birr and donors such as the Road Fund, ADB, Japan and Germany are expected to cover the remainder.
About 31,467.8 million birr is allocated for the construction of federal roads in the next five years, while 6,809 million birr has been allocated for rural roads in various regions.
Ethiopia: Federal Police building inaugurated
By Groum Abate
Capital Ethiopia
The Ethiopian Federal Police Commission's new office complex built near Mexico Square was officially inaugurated in the presence of high government officials on Saturday.
The complex that cost the government 47 million birr was designed to be used as Federal Police Headquarters and to consolidate all administrative operations in one facility.
The building is designed by National Consultants and built by MIDROC Construction. The construction of the headquarters took over four years.
The tower's design includes a helipad on the tower's upper roof that enables to land helicopters, making it the first building in the country that lands a helicopter on its roof.
The complex includes a 10-story tower, an assembly hall with a 200 people capacity, a 400 person multipurpose hall and other ancillary buildings. The assembly hall is a separate building from the tower block but connected by a pedestrian bridge. National Consultant's design solution included a tri-arc tower the shape of which was purposely selected to complement the rotary at Mexico Square . The three elevations of the tower are clad with glazed curtain walls and protected against the east, west and south west sun glares by 'Bris Solei' sun breakers.
Eritrea opposes border demarcation on map
AFP
November 20, 2006
ASMARA -- Eritrea Monday opposed plans by an independent border panel to demarcate its contentious border with archrival Ethiopia on paper, saying that the move offers no solution to the simmering row.
Instead, Asmara said that steps should be taken against Ethiopia, which it has repeatedly blamed for blocking the implementation of the panel's 2002 ruling by calling for revisions.
"Eritrea's position is very clear: we have accepted the decision, we have respected all the provisions of the agreement," said Yemane Gebremeskel, the director of Eritrean President Issaias Afewerki's office.
"We can't accept a half-formula, and the idea of relegating its mandate to the parties is not consistent with the provisions with the [Algiers] agreement," he said, referring to a peace deal that ended the 1998-2000 war.
Last week, the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission announced a plan to demarcate the frontier on maps despite ongoing tensions, expressing frustration with hardline stances on both sides that have prevented the physical marking of the border.
The Horn of Africa neighbors were invited to attend the commission's Monday meeting in The Hague to give their views, after which a final decision would be made.
However, Eritrea declined to attend, sending a letter to the commission in which it dismissed the plans, saying that they broke rules laid down in the December 2000 peace deal signed in Algiers.
The rejection follows comments by Issaias last week that the border issue was "solved."
The border delineation will be recorded on 45 official maps if the panel decides to go ahead with its proposal.
The commission added that it was proceeding after being hit with "serious and continuing impediments" and an "absence of any indication by the parties of a likely change in their attitudes."
The move comes amid growing international concern at the failure fully to implement a 2000 peace deal that ended their bloody border war that claimed nearly 80,000 lives, and fears that they may be using Somalia as a proxy battleground.
That deal required both sides to accept as "final and binding" the ruling of the boundary commission, but when it announced its decision in 2002, Ethiopia rejected it, later saying that it accepted in principle but only with revisions.
The panel's decision awarded the flashpoint border town of Badme to Eritrea and Ethiopia says that the ruling must be altered since it will split families and villages between the two countries.
The result has been that the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) border remains undemarcated and a source of constant tension in the region with fears of a return to conflict.
Source: METIMES
Ethiopia says it will reject Eritrea border ruling
ADDIS ABABA, Nov 20 (Reuters) - Ethiopia said on Monday it would not recognise any demarcation of its contested border with rival Eritrea, telling an independent commission its plans would be illegal and "must be rejected".
The Horn of Africa neighbours fought a 1998-2000 war over a frontier area of dusty villages and scrubby plains, in which 70,000 people were killed. Although a 2000 agreement ended the conflict, the peace process soon ground to a halt after Ethiopia rejected the commission's border.
Earlier this month, the commission said it would demarcate the border on maps and leave the two countries to establish the physical boundary themselves. It said it had invited both sides' to a Nov. 20 meeting in The Hague to discuss procedure.
"Ethiopia calls upon the commission to withdraw its letter and to cancel the proposed meeting," Ethiopia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement, saying the commission could not "redefine its mandate at this point" without both sides' agreement.
"Ethiopia has informed the commission that its proposal, if implemented, would result in a decision void of any legal force or effect and therefore must be rejected," it said in a statement.
The ministry urged the commission to cancel its demarcation decision which it said was illegal and contrary to the Algiers Agreement, which ended the war between Ethiopia and Eritrea.
"Such an act would be a dramatic departure from the demarcation the commission was mandated to fulfil."
Under their peace deal, both sides agreed to accept an independent boundary commission's ruling mapping the 1,000-km (620-mile) border as "final and binding".
The peace process ground to a halt after Ethiopia demanded further following the commission's 2002 ruling that the border village of Badme belonged to Eritrea.
Source: Alertnet
Ethiopia expels three air force and army senior officers
11/20/2006
In recent months, several senior officers have defected to archrival Eritrea or joined rebel groups like the Oromo Liberation Front, which has been fighting for greater autonomy in southern Ethiopia.
Ethiopia said Monday it has expelled three senior officers from the air force and army, the latest upheaval in a military that has been beleaguered by defections in recent months.
Air force Maj. Gen. Almeshet Degfe and army Brig. Gens. Kumera Assefa and Asamenew Tsgie were banned from the military last week, said Dawit Assefa, a spokesman for the Ministry of Defense. He gave no further details. "Banned means the three officers have been expelled or kicked out,"
Assefa said.
In recent months, several senior officers have defected to arch rival Eritrea or joined rebel groups like the Oromo Liberation Front, which has been fighting for greater autonomy in southern Ethiopia.
In early August, an Ethiopian army officer of Oromo descent, Brig. Gen. Kemal Geltu, defected to Eritrea with more than 100 Ethiopian troops under his command. He said he was unhappy with the Ethiopian government's treatment of the Oromo, who make up a third of Ethiopia's 75 million people.
Eritrea gained independence from Ethiopia in 1993 after a 30-year guerrilla war, but their border was never settled. They fought a 2-year war that ended in December 2000 when both countries signed a peace deal, allowing an independent commission to determine their border.
Ethiopia refused to implement the international commission's 2002 ruling. Eritrea has accused the international community of shirking its responsibility to ensure the ruling is obeyed.
The border, while still not demarcated, has been mostly peaceful since the 2000 truce. Both countries have tens of thousands of troops dug in on each side of the 1,000 kilometer (621 mile) frontier. A 25-kilometer (15-mile) wide buffer zone that separates the two armies is patrolled by U.N. peacekeepers.
Source: Eitb24/ETV
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Terror's Playground
More than a decade after U.S. troops pulled out, Somalia has fallen to Islamic fundamentalists. Here's why it could become the world's next nightmare
By SAM DEALEY / MOGADISHU
On a dusty side street in Somalia's former capital, there's little that distinguishes Mohammed's stall from the others. A grenade rests against a box of ammunition next to a row of AK-47s, and still more rifles hang from nails beneath a patch of tin roofing.
Kanazawa’s “God must be crazy” principle
Betemariam Gebre, MD, MSc
Bmariamz@yahoo.com
Summary
This paper is written in criticism to the recent article by Satoshi Kanazawa entitled “Mind the gap… in intelligence: Re-examining the relationship between inequality and health.” Kanazawa ‘tried’ to show the effect of IQ on population health. He concluded that “individuals in wealthier and more egalitarian societies live longer and stay healthier, not because they are wealthier or more egalitarian but because they are more intelligent.” He also concluded, “Income inequality and economic development have no effect on life expectancy at birth, infant mortality and age-specific mortality net of average intelligence quotient (IQ) in 126 countries.”
I will first mention the controversies regarding intelligence so that a reader can have some background. Then I will criticize Kanazawa’s source of national IQ. This is the book authored by Richard Lynn and Tatu Vanhannen entitled “IQ and wealth of the nations” in the year 2002. This book has been extensively criticized by many imminent scholars in the field. Hence, I will give emphasis on a limited number of issues. It is reported in media quoting his research that Ethiopia has the lowest IQ. Is it true? Is it reliable? Who has the “lowest IQ”? Is it Ethiopia’s 63? Equatorial Guinea’s 59? Mississippi –USA 62.7?
Thirdly, I will discuss the defects and inexplicable issues of “Savanna principle” to explain intelligence in relation with health within the context of his findings. I strongly disagree with the idea that Africa is almost still the ancestral environment while understanding that it is a hypothesis. Within the framework of his conclusions, I believe that Kanazawa misunderstands ‘health’. Statistical analysis was not done to replicate the findings. This comment, therefore, should be taken as observational and descriptive. I hereby also give one piece of correction on a web document published in addisvoice.com in reaction to Kanazawa’s article. I kindly request the attention of the readers that Kanazawa wrote Savanna principle not Savanna theory. The two are totally different. Health, intelligence, Africa and Savanna principle is also discussed. The effect of intelligence on health is known. Its interaction with other factors is not clearly elucidated. Intelligence is affected by several factors and so is health.
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6 Ethiopians Are Killed in Somalia Ambush
By MOHAMED ALI, Associated Press Writer
Sun Nov 19, 6:28 PM ET
Islamic fighters ambushed an Ethiopian military convoy on Sunday, killing six soldiers and injuring 20 in the first known skirmish between the rival forces maneuvering for control in Somalia, witnesses said.
Two Ethiopian trucks were destroyed by land mines before Islamic fighters opened fire on the convoy of more than 80 vehicles, witnesses told The Associated Press. The convoy was headed for the town of Baidoa, 150 miles west of the capital Mogadishu, where the country's weak interim government is based.
Ethiopia backs the transitional government, whose authority has been severely challenged by an Islamic movement that has taken over the capital and much of southern Somalia since June.
The attack occurred near the town of Bardaleh, 50 miles southwest of Baidoa. Six Ethiopian soldiers were killed and 20 were injured according to a Somali fighter traveling in the convoy who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution.
"There were two explosions and then a large exchange of gunfire," said one witness who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. Around 50 Islamic fighters were involved, the witness added.
Islamic courts spokesman Sheik Abdirahim Ali Mudey told the AP that four Ethiopian trucks were destroyed and some soldiers were killed, but denied that his group was responsible for the attack. He said it was "a popular uprising" by village residents opposed to Ethiopian troops inside Somalia.
Heightening tensions in Somalia have raised fears of an all-out war could engulf the wider region.
Experts have warned the country has become a proxy battleground for Somalia's neighbors, Eritrea and Ethiopia. A confidential U.N. report obtained last month by the AP said 6,000 to 8,000 Ethiopian troops are in or near Somalia's border with Ethiopia, backing the interim government. The report also said 2,000 troops from Eritrea are inside Somalia supporting the Islamic movement.
Somalia has not had an effective government since 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned on one another. The interim government was formed with the help of the United Nations two years ago, but it only controls Baidoa, the town where it is based.
Government officials confirmed a skirmish had taken place but said they had no details. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media .
Ethiopian officials were not immediately available for comment. Ethiopian officials acknowledge sending military advisers to help Somalia's government, but have denied deploying a large number of troops.
Somalia's Islamic movement, meanwhile, lifted a curfew Sunday imposed after demonstrations against a ban on the popular stimulant "qat," a leaf chewed across the Horn of Africa and the Middle East. The 9 p.m. to 4 a.m. curfew imposed Thursday was the first in Mogadishu since the collapse of the last effective national government 15 years ago.
Islamic leader urges 'Greater Somalia'
MOHAMED OLAD HASSSAN
Associated Press
MOGADISHU, Somalia - The leader of the Islamic group that controls much of southern Somalia has revived the idea of a "Greater Somalia" that would incorporate regions of Kenya and Ethiopia - a move that could further stoke tensions with the neighboring countries.
Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys, chairman of the Council of Islamic Courts, told Shabelle Radio in an interview late Friday that his group would work to unite ethnic Somali peoples, but he did not say how it proposed to achieve a "Greater Somalia."
This is the first time that Aweys has spoken about expanding the influence of the Islamic courts outside Somalia since his group seized control of the capital, Mogadishu, in June and then consolidated its control over most of southern Somalia.
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"We will leave no stone unturned to integrate our Somali brothers in Kenya and Ethiopia and restore their freedom to live with their ancestors in Somalia," he said.
After present-day Somalia was formed in 1960 from Italian and British colonies, the country's leaders began pushing for the unity of all Somali-speaking peoples. Somalis live in Djibouti, northeastern Kenya and eastern Ethiopia.
Somalia launched an invasion of Ethiopia in 1977, which was quickly repelled. Since then, Somali nationalists and Islamic fundamentalists have continued to advocate the idea of a "Greater Somalia," and a minor ethnic-Somali insurgency continues in eastern Ethiopia.
Somalia has not had an effective government since 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned on one another. A government was formed with the help of the United Nations two years ago, but it controls just one town.
Experts have warned that the country has become a proxy battleground for Somalia's neighbors, Eritrea and Ethiopia.
A confidential U.N. report obtained last month by The Associated Press said 6,000-8,000 Ethiopian troops are in or near Somalia's border with Ethiopia, backing the interim government. The report also said 2,000 troops from Eritrea are inside Somalia supporting the Islamic courts.
On Nov. 2, the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, issued a warning saying Somali extremists were threatening suicide attacks in Kenya and Ethiopia. Somalia's Islamic militia denied they planned any such attacks.
A U.N. panel charged with monitoring the 1992 arms embargo on Somalia said in a report obtained Wednesday by the AP that 10 countries, including Ethiopia and Eritrea, had provided weapons, money and training to armed groups in Somalia.
The four-member panel based their report on their own investigations, interviews and material supplied by embassies in Nairobi. Several of the countries have denied the allegations.
The U.S. ambassador to Kenya, Michael Ranneberger, said Saturday there was ample information that foreign countries were providing weapons to Somalia. He would not comment specifically on the U.N. report, although he said it was "generally known Eritrea is involved."
"We do have reliable information that arms are flowing into Somalia from a number of different sources," Ranneberger told The Associated Press in Kapenguria, Kenya.
Eritrea's information minister, Ali Abdu, said Saturday the allegations were "absurd."
---
Associated Press Writer Elizabeth A. Kennedy contributed to this report from Kapenguria, Kenya.
Sexy soul sisters shine in Shinjuku
mainichi
Stroll down the street in Shinjuku's sprawling adult entertainment zone, Kabukicho, and you're likely to be propositioned by a horde of aggressive black touts, who entice passers-by with offers of the area's many corporeal delights.
A more recent development appears to be the rapid emergence of black hostesses, who are making inroads on the Chinese and other Asians who had previously serviced customers.
"They're from Kenya, Nigeria, Cameroon, Ethiopia and other places," a source at one of the local clubs tells Asahi Geino (11/16). "There seem to be around 50 or 60 such girls working in Kabukicho."
Kerrie, a stunning 26-year-old from Ethiopia
Most of the hostesses work at a type of establishment referred to as an "international club," ostensibly inexpensive watering holes that operate similarly to Japan's native cabaret clubs. The posted signs indicate a price of 4,000 yen for 90 minutes of fun.
To ensure you get what you want, advises Asahi Geino, be sure and request "Afurika no ko" (an African gal) to the maitre d' upon entering.
In the reporter's case, this request resulted in an introduction to Kerrie, a stunning 26-year-old from Ethiopia who, he insisted, bore a striking resemblance to supermodel Naomi Campbell.
Kerrie's revealing costume with its plunging neckline displayed plenty of dusky skin and an impressively deep cleavage.
"Will you buy me a drink?" she urged our reporter, batting her long eyelashes furiously. Swallowing hard, the reporter nodded dumbly in agreement.
Kerrie polished off her glass of wine in minutes, and promptly cajoled the dumbstruck reporter for a refill. After she imbibed five in about an hour, at 3,000 yen a pop, his bill, with tax and service charges added, came to over 20,000 yen -- quite a bit more than the 4,000 yen promised on the sign posted outside. Not an outrageous rip-off by Shinjuku standards, true, but typically deceptive.
"They'll usually try to get a customer drunk while getting the hostesses to keep ordering drinks to inflate the tab," explains Taro Chikuzen, a writer familiar with the latest trends in crimes by foreigners in Japan, who adds that the previous July in Shinjuku a Nigerian club owner was arrested after padding a customer's bill to the tune of 230,000 yen.
"After the police and Immigration Bureau teamed up in a major sweep, the Chinese, who were getting too powerful, disappeared from the area," says Akira Hinago, a reporter who covers the Kabukicho scene. "But now the Africans have been moving in to fill the vacuum. And because their visa status is legal, it's harder for the cops to clamp down on them."
Get rid of one foreign hood, sighs Asahi Geino, and another one will just pop up in his place. As this game of leapfrog is likely to continue, all the usual caveats against Shinjuku swindlers continue to apply. (By Masuo Kamiyama, People's Pick contributor)
November 18, 2006
Ethiopians Protest U.S. Mutilation Case
Saturday November 18, 2006 6:31 PM
By LES NEUHAUS
Associated Press Writer
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) - About 2,000 people demonstrated on Saturday to demand the release of an Ethiopian immigrant sentenced to 10 years in prison in the United States for mutilating the genitals of his 2-year-old daughter.
Khalid Adem, 30, was convicted on Nov. 1 of aggravated battery and cruelty to children by a court outside Atlanta. It was believed to be the first such criminal case in the U.S.
The protesters marched peacefully around one of the squares in the Ethiopian capital, chanting ``Free Khalid.'' They were watched from a distance by dozens of policemen.
During the trial, prosecutors said Khalid used scissors to remove his daughter's clitoris in his family's Atlanta-area apartment in 2001. The girl's mother, Fortunate Adem, said she did not discover it until more than a year later.
Khalid's attorney Mark Hill suggested during the trial that the couple's daughter was coached to testify against her father by her mother, who won custody of the child after they divorced in 2003. The girl, now 7, had testified on videotape that her father ``cut me on my private part.''
``His trial was not fair ... how is it that Fortunate did not notice that her own daughter had been circumcised for almost two years? How is that possible? She only told the police when they got the divorce to hurt him - to get back at him,'' Adel Adem, Khalid's brother, told The Associated Press before the demonstration.
Federal law specifically bans the practice of genital mutilation, but many states do not have a law addressing it. Georgia lawmakers, with the support of the girl's mother, passed an anti-mutilation law last year. But Adem was not tried under that law since it did not exist when his daughter was cut.
During the trial, Adem testified he never circumcised his daughter or asked anyone else to do so. His attorney acknowledged that the girl had been cut, but implied that the family of the girl's mother, who emigrated from South Africa, may have been responsible.
He said he grew up in Ethiopia's capital and considered the practice more prevalent in rural areas.
Genital mutilation crosses ethnic and cultural lines and is not tied to a particular religion. Activists say it is intended to deny women sexual pleasure. In its most extreme form, the clitoris and parts of the labia are removed and the labia that remain are stitched together.
Knives, razors or even sharp stones are usually used. The tools are frequently not sterilized, and often, many girls are circumcised at the same ceremony, leading to infection.
It is unknown how many girls have died from the procedure, either during the cutting or from infections, or years later in childbirth. Nightmares, depression, shock and feelings of betrayal are common psychological side effects, according to a 2001 U.S. federal report.
Since 2001, the U.S. State Department estimates that up to 130 million women worldwide have undergone genital mutilation.
Ethiopians protest against U.S. circumcision jailing
Reuters
Saturday, November 18, 2006; 5:54 AM
ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - Hundreds of Ethiopians took to the streets of Addis Ababa on Saturday calling for a retrial of an Ethiopian jailed in the United States for circumcising his daughter.
In what was believed to be the first such case in the United States, a Georgia judge sentenced Khalid Adem to 10 years in prison this month for removing his two-year-old daughter's clitoris with scissors in 2001.
The jailing has fuelled a passionate debate across Africa, with some approving the punishment but others opposing it.
Carrying placards such as "Free Khalid Adem - He is innocent," about 300 people marched across the Ethiopian capital on Saturday demanding a retrial.
"The trial against my brother was partial, biased and based on insufficient provisions of information. The judge heard only three of 10 defense witnesses before he passed his guilty verdict," 25-year-old relative Adel Adem told Reuters.
"The fact that his little daughter is circumcised does not prove his guilt. There is no strong hard evidence against him. This was just a nasty divorce fight that ended up in Khalid being framed by his wife for something he did not commit."
During the trial, Khalid and the victim's mother, blamed each other for the circumcision.
Adel said his brother's supporters were calling for a new trial at a different venue in the United States.
An estimated 3 million girls and women are mutilated or cut each year on the African continent, the U.N.'s children's charity UNICEF says, in a custom viewed in many traditional cultures as a necessary rite of passage.
Circumcision is also used to control or reduce women's sexual desire to lessen the chance of promiscuity in marriage.
Opponents say it disfigures and sometimes kills, causes psychological harm, complicates childbirth in life and reduces sexual pleasure for women.
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Khalid Adem Found Guilty in Female Circumcision Trial
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African leaders warn EU not to lecture them on democracy
Source:
IHT/AP
African leaders told the European Union on Friday not to lecture them on democracy and said at the close of a development conference that any future partnership had to be one of equals.
Several leaders expressed concern over renewed demands by the 25-nation bloc at the three-day talks they do more to address human rights and corruption if they want more aid.
"Democracy cannot be imposed from the outside"
"Democracy cannot be imposed from the outside," said Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, who criticized the EU's longheld policy of making its aid conditional on economic and political reforms.
EU Development Commissioner Louis Michel, who hosted the conference, had made the topic of clean government and promoting democracy a key issue.
EU officials stressed that a "strategic partnership" between Europe and Africa had to be built on the premise that cooperation is linked to political and economic reforms.
Botswana's President Festus Mogae urged the EU not to keep pushing a one-size-fits-all aid plan for African nations, which he said would do more harm than good in trying to combat poverty.
He added that each country also had a different approach to what democracy and good governance meant in dealing with corruption, human rights and freedoms.
"Do encourage and inspire us to practice good governance, but, for goodness sake, do not use your wealth and power and our poverty to try to make us in your image," Mogae said.
"Every country has its own historical concept," added Rwandan President Paul Kagame, who also criticized the EU and other donors for "inconsistent" development approaches.
"The language of development is local ownership," he said.
The EU has long chastised African countries over widespread corruption and poor management of billions of euros (dollars) in aid the continent gets every year.
EU governments last year agreed to increase its annual aid to Africa from the present €17 billion (US$21.8 billion) to around €25 billion ($32 billion) by 2010. Within that, the EU plans a €3 billion (US$3.8 billion) incentive fund to spur reforms.
Benin's President Boni Yayi told the conference that poverty had worsened over recent years because of poor administration.
"We don't want corruption to be our main cause of poverty," Yayi said. He called on the EU to provide added financial funds to help set up proper administration and better government infrastructure to support efforts to build democratic societies.
"It is all very well to have democracy but if it doesn't feed people, it won't work," he said.
On Wednesday, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso called for both African and European nations to accept closer relations and to seal that commitment at a leaders' summit planned for Lisbon, Portugal next year.
The appeal comes after the EU saw China sign US$1.9 billion (euro1.6 billion) in trade and cooperation pacts with African nations during a special summit over a week ago. The EU fears that will weaken its historical influence there.
European Union Foreign Affairs and Security Chief Policy Javier Solana, right, shakes hands with Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, left, prior to their talks at the EU Council building in Brussels, Friday Nov 17 2006.
Human rights - Ethiopia, Bangladesh and Iran
European Parliament Press Release 16-11-2006
At the close of this week's plenary session in Strasbourg, Parliament as usual adopted three human rights resolutions: on the ongoing crisis in Ethiopia since the 2005 elections, the situation in Bangladesh ahead of the elections scheduled for early 2007 and the deterioration in human rights in Iran over the past year.
Ethiopian government slammed for actions since 2005 elections
In its resolution on Ethiopia, Parliament looks at the crisis following the 2005 elections and the serious human rights violations that have taken place in the country since then, including the reports of continuing arrests, harassment, arbitrary detention and intimidation of opposition politicians, civil society activists, students and others. In the circumstances, MEPs deplore the invitation to the Ethiopian prime minister to address the European Development Days being held this month in Brussels.
Call for publication of report on killing of 193 people
The resolution refers to the Ethiopian government-backed Commission of Inquiry set up in November 2005 to investigate the killing of 193 citizens following demonstrations in June and November 2005. However, it points out that members of the Commission of Inquiry have been pressured by the Ethiopian Government to alter the findings and three of them have left the country after refusing government orders to do so.
The European Parliament therefore "calls on the Ethiopian Government to publish unamended and in its entirety, and without any further delay, the final report of the Commission of Inquiry; calls for the relevant courts to be supplied with the report, and urges them to take due account of it so that fair trials can be conducted".
EU invitation to Ethiopian prime minister criticised
In a strong message from MEPs to a fellow EU institution, the resolution "deeply regrets the EU Commission's invitation to Prime Minister Meles Zenawi to address the European Development Days" (being held from 13 to 17 November 2006 in Brussels), "especially on governance issues, a decision which sends out the wrong signal with regard to EU policy on respect for human rights, democratic principles, the rule of law and good governance".
Lastly the resolution points out that Ethiopia is a signatory to the ACP-EU Cotonou Agreement, "which stipulates that respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms is an essential element of ACP-EU cooperation". It therefore "asks the Commission and Council to closely monitor the situation in Ethiopia, and considers that development cooperation programmes under the Cotonou Agreement should be contingent on respect for human rights and good governance".
Source: EU
European Parliament resolution on Ethiopia
The European Parliament,– having regard to its previous resolutions on the post-election crisis and serious human rights violations in Ethiopia, in particular that of 7 July 2005 on human rights in Ethiopia, that of 13 October 2005 on the situation in Ethiopia and that of 15 December 2005 on the situation in Ethiopia and the new border conflict,
– having regard to Rule 115(5) of its Rules of Procedure,
A. disturbed by the arrest and expulsion of two European Commission officials from Ethiopia on the alleged grounds that they tried to help Ms Yalemzewd Bekele, a lawyer and women's rights campaigner, working for the European Commission in Addis Ababa, to get out of the country,
B. whereas there are reports of continuing arrests, harassment, arbitrary detention, humiliation and intimidation of opposition politicians, civil society activists, students and other ordinary citizens,
C. whereas, following high-level EU intervention on her behalf, Ms Yalemzewd Bekele was released on 27 October 2006 after being held incommunicado for a few days,
D. whereas the Ethiopian Parliament established a government-backed Commission of Inquiry in late November 2005 with the task of investigating the June and November 2005 killings,
E. whereas members of the Commission of Inquiry have been pressured by the Ethiopian Government to alter the findings and threeof them, including the chairman and vice-chairman, have left the country after refusing government orders to alter the final report findings,
F. whereas these officials managed to leave the country with the final report, and whereas this document overwhelmingly condemns the government's handling of the crisis, which left 193 citizens dead following the demonstrations in June and November 2005,
G. whereas, following the mass arrests of government opponents, human rights activists and journalists during demonstrations in June and November 2005, 111 opposition party leaders, journalists and human rights defenders are still in custody and are facing trial on charges including 'outrage against the Constitution', 'inciting, organising or leading armed rebellion' and 'attempted genocide',
H. recalling that post-election political detainees include Hailu Shawel, President of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy, Professor Mesfin Woldemariam, former Chair of the Ethiopian Human Rights Council, Dr Yacob Hailemariam, former UN Special Envoy and former Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, Ms Birtukan Mideksa, former judge, Dr Birhanu Nega, Mayor-elect of Addis Ababa, Netsanet Demissie, Director of the Organisation for Social Justice in Ethiopia, and Daniel Bekele, of Action Aid Ethiopia,
I. concerned at the recent arrest of Wassihun Melese and Anteneh Getne, members of the Ethiopian Teachers' Association, and that these new arrests seem to be a response to ETA complaints about government interference in the association's activities and intimidation of its leaders,
J. whereas Prime Minister Meles Zenawi is one of the EU Commission's guests at the European Development Days, being held from 13 to 17 November 2006 in Brussels,
K. whereas Ethiopia is a signatory to the Partnership Agreement between the members of the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States, of the one part, and the European Community and its Member States, of the other part (Cotonou Agreement), Article 96 of which stipulates that respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms is an essential element of ACP-EU cooperation,
1. Welcomes the EU's efforts to secure the release of Ms Yalemzewd Bekele and regrets deeply the expulsion of Mr Bjorn Jonsson and Mr Enrico Sborgi, two EU officials, from Ethiopia;
2. Calls on the Ethiopian Government to publish unamended and in its entirety, and without any further delay, the final report of the Commission of Inquiry; calls for the relevant courts to be supplied with the report, and urges them to take due account of it so that fair trials can be conducted;
3. Calls on the Ethiopian authorities to refrain from acts of intimidation and harassment against national leaders, including court judges and members of the Teachers' Association, carrying out their professional obligations;
4. Calls on the Ethiopian Government to immediately and unconditionally release all political prisoners, whether journalists, trade union activists, human rights defenders or ordinary citizens, and to fulfil its obligations with respect to human rights, democratic principles and the rule of law;
5. Calls on the Ethiopian Government to disclose the total number of persons detained throughout the country, to allow visits by the International Committee of the Red Cross, and to allow all detainees access to their families, legal counsel and any medical care that their health situation may require;
6. Calls on the Ethiopian Government to respect the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the African Union Charter of Human and People's Rights, including the right to peaceful assembly and freedom of opinion, and to guarantee the independence of the judicial system;
7. Deeply regrets the EU Commission's invitation to Prime Minister Meles Zenawi to address the European Development Days, especially on governance issues, a decision which sends out the wrong signal with regard to EU policy on respect for human rights, democratic principles, the rule of law and good governance;
8. Asks the Commission and Council to closely monitor the situation in Ethiopia, and considers that development cooperation programmes under the Cotonou Agreement should be contingent on respect for human rights and good governance, as clearly defined in the essential-element clause;
9. Calls on the Commission and the Council to explore ways of organising an all-inclusive inter-Ethiopian dialogue with the participation of political parties, civil society organisations and all stakeholders in order to work out a lasting solution to the current political crisis;
10. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission, the Ethiopian Government, the United Nations Secretary-General and the African Union. Source: EU
Girl's Ethiopian flood horror
BBC News Children
A young girl has told Newsround about a massive flood which wiped out her village in Africa.
Maheder described how the flood killed nearly 500 people a few months ago. Ethiopia is usually a very dry country, so this flood was very rare.
More on
BBC Children
Annan Opens African Meeting on Darfur
By LES NEUHAUS
The Associated Press
Thursday, November 16, 2006; 9:43 AM
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia -- U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan convened a meeting of key African, Arab, European leaders in Ethiopia on Thursday to try to break the deadlock over worsening violence in Sudan's Darfur region.
Annan wants U.N. peacekeepers to replace a beleaguered African force in Darfur. Sudan has so far blocked a U.N. contingent, and Annan wants to win action on the killings there before he leaves office on Jan. 1.
The meeting drew senior officials from the African Union, the Arab League, the European Union, Sudan, the United States, China, Russia, Egypt, France and a half-dozen African countries.
In recent days, pro-government militia known as janjaweed have stepped up attacks on villages in Darfur, killing dozens of people, international observers said Wednesday. In one raid, janjaweed militiamen _ backed by government troops _ forced children into a thatched hut, then set it ablaze, killing parents who tried to rescue the children, rebels said.
Speaking on Wednesday in neighboring Kenya, Annan said the United Nations still wants to send its own troops. It has proposed replacing the 7,000-member African Union mission in Darfur with some 20,000 U.N. peacekeepers.
"We have not given up the idea of strengthening the force in Darfur," Annan said. "We need to continue our efforts to calm Darfur ... the border area between Chad and Sudan is very fragile and volatile."
After years of low-level clashes over water and land in the vast, arid Darfur region, rebels from ethnic African tribes took up arms against Sudan's Arab-dominated central government in 2003. Khartoum is accused of unleashing the janjaweed. The militiamen are accused of many of the atrocities in a conflict that has killed some 200,000 people and chased 2.5 million from their homes.
The conflict has destabilized a wide region that includes parts of neighboring Chad and the Central African Republic. The chaos has been exploited by rebels from Sudan, Chad and the Central African Republic, and ethnic violence mirroring attacks in Darfur has been seen in Chad in recent weeks.
The Sudanese army has denied any connection to janjaweed attacks, saying the claims were politically motivated.
Some in Darfur say the government has let loose janjaweed forces in Darfur recently to put down an umbrella coalition of rebels, the National Redemption Front, which has rejected a peace deal and clashed with government forces.
The African Union said at least 30 people were killed and 40 wounded in the janjaweed raid Saturday in the north Darfur town of Sirba and that attacks were also reported nearby.
Human Rights Watch has called for a major increase in the Darfur peacekeeping force to stop the growing number of attacks on civilians.
The New York-based advocacy group said it has documented renewed aerial bombing of civilians both in Darfur and inside neighboring Chad since late October.
"We're seeing a regional war against civilians, with armed groups on both sides of the border actively supported or tolerated by the Sudanese and Chadian governments," Peter Takirambudde, Africa director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. "The high-level meetings in Ethiopia must produce a clear plan for immediate deployment of international troops to protect civilians in Darfur and eastern Chad."
The aid agency Medecins Sans Frontiers reported that thousands of people have fled their homes and refugee camps in Darfur. The agency said it was also increasingly difficult to provide aid to the victims because of the violence.
