Memorandum on Human Rights Priorities for the European Union-Africa Summit

March 31, 2014

Introduction

The European Union (EU)-Africa summit provides an important opportunity to highlight crucial human rights developments in both Africa and Europe. Progress is being made on many human rights issues in an array of countries, but daunting challenges remain. The summit agenda includes both democracy and governance and peace and security, two broad topics that include a range of human rights concerns.

Human Rights Watch is concerned by some of the negative trends, particularly in Africa regarding the respect for human rights defenders and violations of the rights to freedom of association, expression, and peaceful assembly, and in the EU in relation to the rights of migrant and asylum seekers, and discrimination and intolerance towards migrants and minorities.

This memorandum summarizes key thematic concerns, provides links to specific country information where relevant, and urges African and European member states to implement recommendations that would help address ongoing human rights violations that threaten the lives and well-being of citizens across the continent, as well as the sustainable development of numerous countries.

Using Bloodshed to perpetuate their Rule- a Standing Policy of Ethiopia’s Rulers

OLF Statement on the violent clash going on in southern Oromia

Since the violent formation of the Ethiopian empire three generations ago, Oromia and Oromo have been in constant conflict, instability, poverty and ignorance. The violence is applied either directly by the regime or through agents instigating conflict between neighbouring peoples or even tribes. Oromia and Oromo, who happen to be the main base of this empire, have borne the brunt of this violence.

Oromo suffered shocking extermination and mutilation, including severing of males’ limbs and females’ breasts, for resisting the imperial conquest. They were disfranchised of their land and dehumanized by reducing them to serfs and distrusting them, along with their dispossessed lands, to serve the victor militia forming the “neft’egna” (arms-bearer’s) system. Conflict was instigated with all the neighbours projecting Oromo as threats so that they would never think of resisting any more. Thus Oromo has to pay sacrifice in lives and property simply because of the possibility of being a threat in the future.

Is this the most farcical use of taxpayers’ money ever: Ethiopian gets legal aid from UK – to sue us for giving aid to… Ethiopia

• The farmer claims aid is funding a despotic one-party state in his country
• Alleges regime is forcing thousands from their land using murder and rape
• Prime Minister David Cameron says donations are a mark of compassion
• If farmer is successful, Ministers might have to review overseas donations

By IAN BIRRELL

Gift: Prime Minister David Cameron claims the donations are a mark of Britain’s compassion

March 29, 2014, UK (Daily Mail) — An Ethiopian farmer has been given legal aid in the UK to sue Britain – because he claims millions of pounds sent by the UK to his country is supporting a brutal regime that has ruined his life.
He says UK taxpayers’ money –  £1.3 billion over the five years of the coalition Government – is funding a despotic one-party state in his country that is forcing thousands of villagers such as him from their land using murder, torture and rape.
The landmark case is highly embarrassing for the Government, which has poured vast amounts of extra cash into foreign aid despite belt-tightening austerity measures at home.

Prime Minister David Cameron claims the donations are a mark of Britain’s compassion.
But the farmer – whose case is  set to cost tens of thousands of pounds – argues that huge sums handed to Ethiopia are breaching the Department for International Development’s (DFID) own human rights rules.
He accuses the Government of devastating the lives of some of the world’s poorest people rather than fulfilling promises to help them. The case comes amid growing global concern over Western aid propping up corrupt and repressive regimes.
If the farmer is successful, Ministers might have to review major donations to other nations accused of atrocities, such as Pakistan and Rwanda – and it could open up Britain to compensation claims from around the world.

Ogaden To Dadaab In Search of Peace

By Graham Peebles 

Counter Currents | March 29, 2014

Meeting the victims
It was dark when I arrived at Wilson Airport, Nairobi for the 7am United Nations charter flight to Dadaab. I was in Kenya to meet refugees from the Ogaden region of Ethiopia and record their stories. Accounts of false imprisonment, murder, rape, torture at the hands of the ERPRDF government: stories, which would prove deeply distressing.

Oromo Human Rights Activist Jawar Mohammed Speaks Out Against the Recent Oromophobic Assault on Oromos in Bahir-Dar

From Ob. Jawar Mohammed’s Facebook Note:

The ugly verbal and physical attacks on Team Oromia at the Bahir Dar Games should not be surprising to anyone who has been following Ahmara politics in the last few years. Anti-Oromo propaganda, fueled by electronic and print media, has become the pillar of Amhara political discourse. Oromophobia is now a household affair. It’s funny to see individuals and media entities, who have been brainwashing Amhara youth into worshiping the savagery of Menelik, now trying to denounce those who followed his footsteps by venting their hatred towards and unleashing violence on Oromo. You cannot preach “Heil Hitler!” all year along, and pretend to care about victims of Anti-Semitic violence committed by Neo-Nazis.

Journalists, media under attack from hackers: Google researchers

March 28, 2014, Singapore (NDTV):  Twenty-one of the world’s top-25 news organisations have been the target of likely state-sponsored hacking attacks, according to research by two Google security engineers.
While many internet users face attacks via email designed to steal personal data, journalists were “massively over-represented” among such targets, said Shane Huntley, a security software engineer at Google.
The attacks were launched by hackers either working for or in support of a government, and were specifically targeting journalists, Huntley and co-author Morgan Marquis-Boire said in interviews. Their paper was presented at a Black Hat hackers conference in Singapore on Friday.
“If you’re a journalist or a journalistic organisation we will see state-sponsored targeting and we see it happening regardless of region, we see it from all over the world both from where the targets are and where the targets are from,” Huntley told Reuters.

Xalayaa Banaa Waldaya Qorannoolee Oromoo (OSA)f: Seenaan Oromoo Qubsuma Har’aa Keessatti Bardhibbee 16ffaa irraa Eegala moo San Dura?

Yahyaa Jamaal)

Xalayaa banaa kana afaanuma keenyaan OSAf akkan barreessu waan na dirqetu jira. Hayyonni seenaa dhalootaan Oromoos tahee Oromoo irraa ala tahan,waa’ee seenaa Oromoo Bardhibbee 16ffaa, (gariin Oromo migration jedhu, gariinis Oromo expansion jedhu, ani garuu Return of the Oromo jechuun filadha) irratti falmii hunde-jabeessa yoo geggeessan dilas hin dhagahu, hin dubbisu. Rakkoo kana wanni maddisiise maal akka tahe ifaa dha. Oromoon akka Oromootti seenaa mataa ofii barreeffamaan galmeeffatee ol kaa’uu hanqachuun isa guddaa dha. Oromoon waan argaa-dhageettiidhaan (afoolaan) hangafoota isaa irraa dhagahu dhala dhala isaatti dabarsaa dhufe malee, sirna barreeffamaa mataa isaa qabaatee ittiin hin galmeeffanne. Oromoon sirna barreeffama mataa isaa dhabeef garuu qaroomina dur-durii (ancient civilization) hin qabu jechuu miti. Qaroomina sirna barreeffama mataa keenyaa dhabneef qofa mataan waan gad nu cabuuf hin qabu. Qaroomina laalcha polotikaa, aadaa, amanatii, safuu, urjii dhahaa fi kan kana fakkaataniin saboota ollaa keenyaa kamuu keessaa hangafummaan laalamuu dandeenya. Hundumtuu hafee, warra Gadaan bulu tahuun keenya qofti mootii qaroomtotaa nu godhuu danda’a.

Why Restricting Foreign Funding of NGOs Is Wrongheaded

March 27, 2014 (Huffington Post) — There is a new weapon of choice for governments that want to undermine bits of civil society that irritate them: restricting funding from foreign sources. By making it more difficult for human rights organizations or public watchdogs to access money from abroad, these governments hope to curb dissent and reduce accountability. These measures not only go against established international conventions and commitments, but what governments do not seem to realize is that the measures will not work.

There has been a plethora of funding restrictions recently — so much so that the UN’s Special Rapporteur on freedoms of assembly and association devoted his report to the subject last year. Colleagues at the International Center for Not-for-profit Law have documented more than 20 attempts to restrict foreign funding in the last two years.

April 15: Oromo National Memorial Day

March 27, 2014 (Advocacy for Oromia) - April 15th is the Oromo Martyrs’ Day, also known as Guyyaa Gootota Oromoo. This commemorative day was first started by the OromoLiberation Front (OLF) after the executions of its prominent leaders on a diplomatic mission en routed to Somalia on April 15, 1980. Since then, this day has been observed as the Oromo Martyrs’ Day by Oromo nationals around the world to honor those who have sacrificed their lives to free Oromia, and to renew a commitment to the cause for which they had died.

Why April 15th?

Mid 1978-1979 is remembered as the period when the survival of the Oromo national liberation struggle, led by the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), was under a severe threat of extinction. It was feared that OLA units in Arsi, Bale and Hararghe would disintegrate, and their channel of connection and supplies would be cut off by the Dergue army that just recuperated from the Ethio-Somali war. Upon defeating the Siad Barre army, the Dergue turned its face on OLA. The OLA, in the fronts of Arsi, Bale and Hararghe, fought steadfastly and scored victory over the Dergue army and regrouped once again on January 1st 1980. In the wake of their military victory, OLF intensified its political struggle inside the country and abroad. The initial political victory included the persuasion of the Siad Barre government to allow the opening of OLF office in Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1980, to serve as a center of consultation and deliberation between OLF political and military leaders.

PRESS RELEASE: Ogaden Youth & Student Union (OYSU)-San Diego and The Walk to End Genocide

The following is a statement from the Ogaden Youth & Student Union (OYSU).

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San Diego, CA – The 3rd annual Walk to End Genocide was held in San Diego on March 23rd 2014. This event which had hundreds of attendees, was a success as the participants walked and chanted in order to make their voices heard about the genocides occurring all over the world. OYSU San Diego, under the leadership of their President, Mohamed Noor Mohamoud, participated in this walk, along with the members from the Ogaden community in San Diego.

Ethiopia: Arrests and Detentions of Oromo Students in Southern Oromia

HRLHA Urgent Action

March 26, 2014

Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa (HRLHA) would like to express its deep concern over the safety and fates of Shakiso High School Oromo Students who became victims of discriminate mass arrest and detention in Shakiso Town of Guji Zone in southern Oromia. Around two hundred ethnic Oromo Students have been sent to a jail in the nearby Adola Town, and some have received varying degrees of injuries both from bullets that were shot by the security forces during the interference and by beatings.

Ethiopia: Telecom Surveillance Chills Rights

Foreign Technology Used to Spy on Opposition inside Country, Abroad

Afaan Oromo tiin PDF

March 25, 2014, Berlin (Human Rights Watch) – The Ethiopian government is using foreign technology to bolster its widespread telecom surveillance of opposition activists and journalists both in Ethiopia and abroad, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

Ethiopia uses foreign kit to spy on opponents – HRW

March 25, 2014 (BBC News) — Ethiopia’s government is using imported technology to spy on the phones and computers of its perceived opponents, a Human Rights Watch report says.

The New York-based rights group accuses the government of trying to silence dissent, using software and kit sold by European and Chinese firms.

The report says the firms may be guilty of colluding in oppression.

An Ethiopian government spokesman, quoted by AFP, dismissed the report as a part of a smear campaign.

“There is nothing new to respond to,” Ethiopian Information Minister Redwan Hussein told the agency.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) says its report is based on more than 100 interviews with victims of abuses and former intelligence officials, conducted between September 2012 and February this year.

Ethiopia Government Regularly Records Phone Calls – Human Rights Watch

March 22, 2014, NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — A rights group says that Ethiopia’s government regularly listens to and records the phone calls of opposition activists and journalists using equipment provided by foreign technology companies.

Human Rights Watch said in a report Friday that the foreign equipment aids the Ethiopian government’s surveillance of perceived political opponents inside and outside the country.

The group’s Arvind Ganesan said Ethiopia is using its government-controlled telecom system to silence dissenters. The group says that recorded phone calls with family and friends are often played during abusive interrogations.

Kibba Afriikaa Keessatti Hiriirro Mormii Guddaan Hawaasa Oromoo fi Ogaadeniin Gaggeefame

Bitootessa 21, 2014

Gaafa Bitootessa 18,2014 ummanni Oromoo fi Ogaadeen kibba Afriikaa jiraatan walgahii mootummoonni Afriikaa 54 guyyaa hundeeffama Pan-African Prliament kabajachuuf torbaan lamaaf Afirikaa kibbaa magaalaa Johannesburg bakka Midrand  jedhamutti yeroo gaggeefatan hawaasi Oromoo fi Ogaadeen tokkummaan ta’uun miidhaa mootummaan Wayyaanee fi abbaa irree EPRDF uumattoota Ithiopia irraan gahaa jiru balaaleffachuun sagalee mormii jabaa dhageessisuun gabaafame.

In Accepting Ethiopia, Transparency Group “Sacrifices Credibility”

WASHINGTON, Mar 21 2014 (IPS) - A major international initiative aimed at promoting transparency in the extractives industry is coming under harsh criticism for accepting an application from Ethiopia, despite significant ongoing legal restrictions on the country’s civil society.

The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), a standards programme based in Oslo, had declined a previous application for candidature from Ethiopia, in 2010. The previous year, the Ethiopian government had passed a law widely seen as repressive, and the EITI board stipulated that the country’s application would be deferred until that law was struck down.

Ethiopian peoples are dramatized by regimes and ruled by one ethnic group 5% of total populations

Reported by Kumilachew Gebremeskel Ambo | March 20, 2014

It was 6^th Mar2014 on Thursday the program was prepared and co-ordinated by Frontline Club Oslo. The club has great contribution in preparing stage for different issues like debate, seminars and others which is critical and International conflicts among different countries. It is a great step for countries like Ethiopia to have this   opportunities to explain the current and worst situations by Ethiopian Regime to the rest of the world.It was agreat presentations and debate by guest speakers invited Mr. Obang Metho and Mr. Abdullah Hussen. Those great persons of the time to show the Current Ethiopian situations. The program was began by one of founder of Frontline club Mr.Truls Lie( Chairman).

The Guardian (UK): PTW Baxter obituary

Hector Blackhurst | The Guardian (UK)

My friend, the social anthropologist PTW (Paul) Baxter, who has died aged 89, made a significant contribution to western understanding of the Oromo peoples of northern Kenya and Ethiopia and championed their culture, which was frequently denigrated by colonial and local elites.

ETHIOPIA: SILENCE, PAIN, LIES AND ABDUCTIONS

By Muktar M. Omer

Template denials

March 17, 2014 (WardheerNews) – The Ethiopian Government, through its foreign ministry,  responded to Martin Plaut’s article“Silence and Pain: Ethiopia’s human rights record in the Ogaden” with the usual feigned shock and template denial that has long characterized the regime’s political personality. It is the established behavior of aggressive and autocratic regimes to discount well-founded reports of human right violations as propaganda constructs of the ‘enemy’. The response from the Foreign Ministry was thus nothing more than a well memorized and rehearsed Ethiopian way of disregarding documented depravities committed by the regime. As usual, the tenor of the regime’s reaction is blame apportionment, not done on the basis of reasoned assessment of the evidences presented, but prompted by the urge to bear out its political prejudice and cover-up.

This is a regime whose character has the potential to confuse even Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, formerReagan foreign policy advisor, who made a distinction between “authoritarian” and “totalitarian” regimes. In her essay “Dictatorship and Double Standards,” she describes authoritarian dictators as “pragmatic rulers who care about their power and wealth and are indifferent toward ideological issues, even if they pay lip service to some big cause”; while, in contrast, totalitarian leaders are “selfless fanatics who believe in their ideology and are ready to put everything at stake for their ideals”.

Oromo Demonsteretion on March 14, 2014 in Hamar, Norway

Ethiopia: Transparency Group Should Reject Membership

Repression of Civil Society Contravenes Organization’s Rules

March 14, 2014, New York (HRW) – A major global initiative to encourage governments to better manage natural resource revenues should reject Ethiopia’s bid for membership due to its harsh restrictions on civil society,Human Rights Watch said today.

The governing board of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) is expected to make a decision about Ethiopia’s candidacy at its next meeting, on March 18 and 19, 2014, in Oslo. EITI was founded in 2003 to strengthen governance by increasing transparency over revenues from the oil, gas, and mining industries. Its members include countries, companies, and civil society representatives.

No Oromo has constitutional or legal protection from the cruelty of the TPLF/EPRDF regime

By Roba Pawelos | March 13, 2014

Roba Pawelos

A country is not about its leaders but of its people. It goes without saying that the people are the symbolic mirror of their nation. That is exactly why foreigners particularly the development partners assess and evaluate a nation through its people. In other words, happy people are citizen of not only a peaceful and happy nation but one which accepts the principles of democracy, rule of law and human and people’s right. On the contrast, heartbroken, timid and unhappy people are subjects of dictatorial, callous and brutal regimes. Such people are robbed of their humanity and identity through systematic harassment, intimidation, unlawful detention, extra judicial killing and disappearance by the leaders who transformed themselves into creators of human life or lords. The largest Oromo nation in Ethiopia through the 22 years of TPLF/EPRDF repressive leadership has turned into a nation sobbing in the dark. One does not need to be a rocket scientist to figure this out. All it takes is a closer look at any Oromo in the face. The story is the same on all the faces: fear, uncertainty, and an unquenchable thirst for freedom. The disturbing melody of the sobs, in the dark echo the rhythmic, desire to break free from TPLF dictatorial shackles.

ETHIOPIA: Aid and Ethics Clash

March 13, 2014 (Tesfa News) — Ethiopia is among the most foreign aid dependent country. Topping the worldwide list of countries receiving aid from the US, UK, and the World Bank, the nation has been receiving $3.5 billion on average from international donors in recent years, which represents 50 to 60 percent of its national budget. – Oakland Institute

By Africa Confidential,

Britain and the US are accused of complicity in human rights abuses, highlighting difficult choices about democracy and development.

Two of Ethiopia’s leading foreign donors are again accused of complicity in human rights abuses. It highlights the debate on whether development should come before democracy.

The most recent claims accuse donors not only ofdoing business with an authoritarian regime but of intentionally covering up its abuses.

Stop Sending Aid to Dictators

By William Easterly

March 13, 2014 (Time) — Too much of America’s foreign aid funds what I call authoritarian development. That’s when the international community–experts from the U.N. and other bodies–swoop into third-world countries and offer purelytechnical assistance to dictatorships like Uganda or Ethiopia on how to solve poverty.

Unfortunately, dictators’ sole motivation is to stay in power. So the development experts may get some roads built, but they are not maintained. Experts may sink boreholes for clean water, but the wells break down. Individuals do not have the political rights to protest disastrous public services, so they never improve. Meanwhile, dictators are left with cash and services to prop themselves up–while punishing their enemies.

Oromo Voice Radio broadcast, March 12, 2014

Very alarming, sad and well orchestrated situation is going on in Oromia to shrink the map and reduce its population. The TPLF regime is doing its best to make ethnic minorities rise up against Oromo from South Somali, from West Benishangul and Gumuz, from East Harari (Adare) and Somali and from North Amhara and Afar. Do we just keep quite and keep talking as usual?

Oromo Voice Radio broadcasts to Oromia on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Mondays at 7:00 PM Finfinnee time at 16 MB or 17850 kHz. Oromo Voice Radio is operated by Madda Walaabuu Media Foundation.

In today’s program OVR has:

Ethiopia—An Abusive Home for its People? Mr. Obang Metho Address Norwegian Civil Society

March 10, 2014

A review of the difficult conditions of life in Ethiopia leading to the large exodus of its people to other parts of the world and their hope for Ethiopia’s transformation.

I want to thank Frontline Club Oslo, New Frontiers, Norwegian activists, Solveig Syversen, who invited me, Marius von der Fehr, our moderator, and all of those people involved in organizing today’s event. It is an honor to be part of this public discussion on Ethiopia, entitled: In the Name of Democracy: Land Grabbing and Genocide in Ethiopia.

North Norway Oromo youths Demonstrate against the ongoing human rights violation By TPLF/EPRDF regime in Trondheim, Norway

Report by Getinet Dinkayehu

Oromo Youth in North Norway on March 1, 2014 protested against the ongoing human rights violations, inhuman killings, and the repression being done by the criminal Ethiopian Government and urges the TPLF/ERPDF to stop dictatorship with Impunity. It is terrifying and unjust that the continuing suffering of Oromo people through systematic human rights abuses by the Ethiopian Government is largely ignored by governments around the world. Yet the heinous crimes of the TPLF/EPRDF government rank high in the catalogue of human right abuses committed by African governments.  Over the past two decades, the TPLF-led Ethiopian government has imprisoned tens of thousands of Oromo political oppositions, several thousands of innocent Oromo have been deteriorating in prisons and secret camps, and many have been and are being cruelly tortured, killed, uprooted, raped and exiled. Others have been abducted in broad daylight, and made to disappear or murdered secretly.

Migration and Refugee Protection in the Horn of Africa

A Week with Ethiopian Immigrants in the Horn of Africa, Uganda

HRLHA is a non-profit, non-political and non-partisan human rights organization with a Special Consultative Status with the UN Economic and Social Council. It works on defending fundamental human rights including freedoms of thought, expression, movement and association. It attempts to challenge abuses of human rights of the people of various nations and nationalities in the Horn of Africa. It also works on raising the awareness of individuals about their own basic human rights and that of others. It encourages the observances as well as due processes of law. It promotes the growth and development of free and vigorous civil societies.

North Norway Oromos for Human Right

March 5, 2014 (Oromia Post) — The Trondheim Oromo Community, Trondheim OLF together with the Trondheim OromoAsylum seekers including other asylum seekers from all over Norway has showed up their togetherness by standing for Human Right.

It was around 11:00 when the gathering started in Trondheim, Norway. There was around 100 people who gathered at Trondheim torg, to say ”No” to torturing andhuman right violations by the Ethiopian Regime against peaceful Political opposition groups, journalists, Oromo political activists and other politically concerned people.

Letter: To all human beings who are human, By Journalist Wubushet Taye (Zeway Prison)

Journalist Woubshet Taye is incarcerated in Ethiopia over his works

March 2, 2014 (Premium Times): “Discussing these types of issues is forbidden,” said the warder rudely and added, “You are only allowed to discuss family matters”. You might suspect that these words were spoken by one of our beloved mother Ethiopia’s prison officers. However, they are actually taken from Maxim Gorky’s 1906 story Mother (page 102). The story was written 108 years ago – so very long ago! But it doesn’t seem so long to us – why? Because what we are living through now is even worse. And it is worrying how fast things are deteriorating.

Prison is now where everything leads. Every day we are told by the media that what is needed is “strong measures; measures to ensure it won’t happen again; measures to remove etc”. These words are not legal principles but are spoken in hate. These statements, which are only a fraction away from a declaration of systematic state terror, are especially damaging for those of us who are held in Ethiopia’s prisons.