Ethiopian Shade Coffee Is World's Most Bird Friendly

A new study found high biodiversity on traditional coffee farms.

Ethiopian coffee farmer Awol Abagojam and his son Isaac harvest their product near the village of Choche, much the same way their ancestors did a thousand years ago.

PHOTOGRAPH BY AMI VITALE, PANOS

Brian Clark Howard

National Geographic

Shady coffee plantations in Ethiopia, where coffee has been grown for at least a thousand years, hold relatively more forest bird species than any other coffee farms in the world, new research shows.

The research suggests that traditional cultivation practices there support local forest bird biodiversity better than any other coffee farms in the world.

In Ethiopia, coffee is traditionally grown on plantations shaded by native trees. These farms boasted more than 2.5 times as many bird species as adjacent mountain forest, according to a study slated for publication February 11 in the journal Biological Conservation.

"That was a surprise," says study co-author Cagan H. Sekercioglu, a biologist at the University of Utah and a National Geographic Society grant recipient. Further, "all 19 understory bird species we sampled in the forest were present in the coffee farms too, and that just doesn't happen elsewhere."

Other studies have shown that shade coffee farms provide better bird habitat than full-sun plantations, but the effect may be more prominent in Ethiopia because farmers there tend to use native trees instead of the exotic species popular elsewhere.

Coffee cherries, the fruit that contains the coffee beans, are seen up close on the plant in Ethiopia.

PHOTOGRAPH BY AMI VITALE, PANOS

Why It Matters

The new study may be the first of bird biodiversity on Ethiopian coffee farms, because the country is relatively remote and poor. Ethiopian coffee farmers face pressure—as in many countries—to convert more coffee production to full-sun plantations.

Growing coffee in the sun can reduce the risk of fungal disease, cuts labor, and can yield more coffee beans, but at the costs of lower-quality coffee that fetches less per pound and degraded habitat for wildlife, says Sekercioglu.

The Big Picture

Scientists found all but one of nine species of migratory birds on the coffee farms, but not in adjacent forest. Sekercioglu suspects that the open structure of the farms was more inviting to the birds than the denser natural forest because it more closely resembles the habitat they are used to in the north.

Still, Sekercioglu cautions that "coffee farms cannot simply replace forest for habitat." Although all forest understory bird species were also represented on the farms, their number of individuals was about 80 percent lower. (See how coffee changed America.)

Birds such as the blue-breasted bee-eater can be found on Ethiopia's shade coffee farms.

PHOTOGRAPH BY CAGAN SEKERCIOGLU, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CREATIVE

What's Next

The team would like to measure how birds in the canopy above the coffee farms are faring, since they only measured birds caught in the understory, or the first ten feet above the ground. The scientists also want to study long-term the breeding success and population changes of birds in forest versus shade coffee.

Sekercioglu also suggests that the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Centeror the Rainforest Alliance, which certify bird-friendly coffee from other countries, should consider extending their programs to Ethiopia. Certification allows farmers to recoup a price premium, which can help deter the impulse to convert farms to full sun or otherwise develop their land.

Correction: An earlier version of this story suggested the Ethiopian farms had the highest bird biodiversity anywhere, but it has been updated to clarify that the farms have the highest relative bird biodiversity.

=>nationalgeographic

OPDO’s Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa Questioned by OMN Journalists on Records of Human Rights in Oromia and TPLF’s Refusal to Make Afan Oromo Federal Language

(Gadaa)OPDO’s Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa came to Minnesota (also known as ‘Little Oromia’ for having the largest population of Oromos in North America) on an official trip sanctioned by Tigrean/TPLF officials from Mekelle (who know control the power at the Arat Kilo Palace in Finfinne) on January 30, 2015.

Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa’s trip was filled with controversies. At his unannounced arrival at the airport, he was received by members of the Ogadeni Community in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Tigrean/TPLF Embassy at Washington-DC worked hard to keep Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa’s arrival at the Minneapolis airport secret in order to avoid a huge protest rally by members of the Oromo Community – whose sons, daughters, fathers, mothers … were imprisoned, disappeared or even killed by the orders of the Tigrean/TPLF regime.

Just a little more than six months ago, more than a hundred nonviolent (peaceful) Oromo protesters were gunned down by the Tigrean elite killing squad called Agazi for opposing the Tigrean Master Plan for Addis Ababa – a Master Plan that is designed to displace Oromo farmers around Addis Ababa (Finfinne) and give the land to Tigrean and other Habesha investors (new/neo-Neftegna’s).
No one – not a single person – has been brought to justice to answer the killings of more than a hundred peaceful Oromo youth, elders – students, mothers and fathers. As a Speaker of the Federal House of Representatives, OPDO’s Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa could have used his power to set up a federal committee to investigate the mass killings of more than a hundred Oromo students and other civilians. However, Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa has never done that, instead, he was sent by the Tigrean/TPLF regime to tarnish the image of the peaceful protesters as “violent robbers.” What’s more, after having slaughtered more than a hundred Oromos, TPLF has not stopped the Tigrean’s Addis Ababa Master Plan of displacing Oromo farmers in order to give out the land to Tigrean and other Habesha investors (new/neo-Neftegna’s). OPDO continues to say nothing to stop the Tigrean’s evil agenda of physical and cultural genocide against Oromos in Central Oromia, especially, around the Finfinne areas.

Mr. Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa, the following videos were recorded live as TPLF’s Tigrean elite killing squad – the Agazi – was slaughtering Oromos in Ambo on April 30, 2014, and the other two were from Mendi and Madda-Walaabuu University shootings. The civilians slaughtered by the Tigrean elite killing squad – the Agazi – were not “violent robbers” – they were students and other civilians. Justice will be delivered by the Oromo people soon over these mass slaughtering of innocent civilians. Where will OPDO stand at that crucial time – with the TPLF’s Tigrean elite killing squad – the Agazi – again, or with the Oromo people? When will OPDO stop TPLF’s “5-Year Growth and Transformation Plan (GTP)” that continues to evict Oromo farmers to give the land to Tigrean and other Habesha investors (new/neo-Neftegna’s) under the disguise of “poverty eradication and development”? Conscious OPDO members must ask themselves these questions before it’s too late and play their historic role of crushing the aggression of Habeshas/neo-Neftegnas in Oromia.

OMN Journalists Question OPDO’s Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa on Records of Human Rights in Oromia and TPLF’s Refusal to Make Afan Oromo Federal Language

OMN Journalists Question OPDO’s Abbaa-Duulaa Gammadaa on Records of Human Rights in Oromia and TPLF’s Refusal to Make Afan Oromo Federal Language

Ethiopia: Crackdown on Dissent Intensifies

Human Rights Situation Dire Ahead of May 2015 Elections

(Nairobi) – The Ethiopian government during 2014 intensified its campaign of arrests, prosecutions, and unlawful force to silence criticism, Human Rights Watch said today in its World Report 2015. The government responded to peaceful protests with harassment, threats, and arbitrary detention, and used draconian laws to further repress journalists, opposition activists, and critics.

“The Ethiopian government fell back on tried and true measures to muzzle any perceived dissent in 2014,” said Leslie Lefkow, deputy Africa director. “Journalists and dissenters suffered most, snuffing out any hope that the government would widen political space ahead of the May 2015 elections.”

In the 656-page world report, its 25th edition, Human Rights Watch reviews human rights practices in more than 90 countries. In his introductory essay, Executive Director Kenneth Roth urges governments to recognize that human rights offer an effective moral guide in turbulent times, and that violating rights can spark or aggravate serious security challenges. The short-term gains of undermining core values of freedom and non-discrimination are rarely worth the long-term price.

Ethiopia’s dismal rights record faced little criticism from donor countries in 2014. Throughout the year, state security forces harassed and detained leaders and supporters of Ethiopian opposition parties. Security personnel responded to protests in Oromia in April and May with excessive force, resulting in the deaths of at least several dozen people, and the arrests of hundreds more. The authorities regularly blocked the Semawayi (Blue) Party’s attempts to hold protests.

Media remain under a government stranglehold, with many journalists having to choose between self-censorship, harassment and arrest, and exile. In 2014, dozens of journalists fled the country following threats. In July, the government charged seven bloggers known as Zone 9 and three journalists under the abusive Anti-Terrorism Proclamation. In August, the owners of six private publications were charged under the criminal code following threats against their publications. The government blocks websites and blogs and regularly monitors and records telephone calls.

The authorities have been displacing indigenous populations without appropriate consultation or compensation in the lower Omo Valley to make way for the development of sugar plantations. Villagers and activists who have questioned the development plans face arrest and harassment.

The government showed no willingness to amend the Anti-Terrorism Law or the Charities and Societies Proclamation, despite increasing condemnation of these laws for violating basic rights. Authorities more rigorously enforced the Charities and Societies Proclamation, which bars organizations from working on human rights, good governance, conflict resolution, and advocacy on the rights of women, children, and people with disabilities if the organizations receive more than 10 percent of their funds from foreign sources.
“The government’s crackdown on free expression in 2014 is a bad sign for elections in 2015,” Lefkow said.

=>hrw

Leaked Report Says World Bank Violated Its Own Rules In Ethiopia

                    ICIJ  |  By Sasha Chavkin

 This article was reported by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, a Washington DC-based global network of 185 reporters in 65 countries who collaborate on transnational investigations.

Internal watchdog finds link between World Bank financing and Ethiopian government's mass resettlement of indigenous group

The World Bank repeatedly violated its own rules while funding a development initiative in Ethiopia that has been dogged by complaints that it sponsored forced evictions of thousands of indigenous people, according to a leaked report by a watchdog panel at the bank.

The report, which was obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, examines a health and education initiative that was buoyed by nearly $2 billion in World Bank funding over the last decade. Members of the indigenous Anuak people in Ethiopia’s Gambella province charged that Ethiopian authorities used some of the bank’s money to support a massive forced relocation program and that soldiers beat, raped and killed Anuak who refused to abandon their homes. The bank continued funding the health and education initiative for years after the allegations emerged.

The report by the World Bank’s internal Inspection Panel found that there was an “operational link” between the World Bank-funded program and the Ethiopian government’s relocation push, which was known as “villagization.” By failing to acknowledge this link and take action to protect affected communities, the bank violated its own policies on project appraisal, risk assessment, financial analysis and protection of indigenous peoples, the panel’s report concludes.

“The bank has enabled the forcible transfer of tens of thousands of indigenous people from their ancestral lands,” said David Pred, director of Inclusive Development International, a nonprofit that filed the complaint on behalf of 26 Anuak refugees.
Anuak children in Gorom Refugee Camp in South Sudan. Many Anuak fled Ethiopia during a government relocation campaign called "villagization". Photo credit: Andreea Campeanu/ICIJ.

The bank declined to answer ICIJ’s questions about the report.
“As is standard procedure, World Bank staff cannot comment on the results of the Inspection Panel’s investigation until the Executive Board of the World Bank Group has had the opportunity to review the Panel’s report over the coming weeks,” Phil Hay, the bank’s spokesman for Africa, said in a written response.

In previous responses to the complaint, bank management said there was no evidence of widespread abuses or evictions and that the Anuak “have not been, nor will they be, directly and adversely affected by a failure of the Bank to implement its policies and procedures.”

Because the panel’s report has not yet been published, some of the language may be revised before a final version is released, but its basic conclusions are not expected to change.

The report stops short of finding the bank responsible for the most serious abuses. The panel did not attempt to verify the widely reported allegations of forced evictions and human rights violations, finding that the question was beyond the scope of its investigation. The bank did not violate its policy on forced resettlement, the report says, because the relocations were conducted by the Ethiopian government and were not a “necessary” part of the health and education program.

Since 2006, the World Bank and other foreign donors have bankrolled the Promoting Basic Services program, which provides grants to local and regional governments for services such as health, education and clean water. The PBS program was designed to avoid funneling aid dollars directly to Ethiopia’s federal government, which had violently cracked down on its opposition after disputed 2005 elections.

By 2010, federal and provincial authorities had embarked on an effort to relocate nearly 2 million poor people in four provinces from isolated rural homes to village sites selected by the government. In these new villages, authorities promised to provide the relocated communities with health care, education and other basic services they had lacked.

The government relocated 37,883 households in Gambella, roughly 60 percent of all households in the province, according to Ethiopian government statistics cited by the Inspection Panel. The Ethiopian government has said that all resettlements were voluntary.

Many members of the Anuak, a mostly Christian indigenous group in Gambella, have said they didn’t want to move. Anuak and their advocates say that they were pushed off their fertile lands by soldiers and policemen, and that much of the abandoned land was then leased by the government to investors. The evictions were “accompanied by widespread human rights violations, including forced displacement, arbitrary arrest and detention, beatings, rape, and other sexual violence,” according to a 2012 report by Human Rights Watch.

The Human Rights Watch report and Anuak refugees’ complaint to the Inspection Panel contended that the bank’s money was being used by local and regional authorities to support forced relocations. For example, they say, money from the PBS initiative was used to pay the salaries of government officials who helped carry out the evictions.

The bank continued to fund the PBS program throughout the villagization campaign. The bank approved new funding for PBS in 2011 and 2012, and its support for the program continues today. Since the nationwide health and education initiative launched, Ethiopia has reported strides in reducing child mortality and increasing primary school enrollment.

The villagization campaign ended in 2013, and is believed to have resettled substantially fewer than the nearly 2 million people anticipated by the government.

The Ethiopia case is one of several recent World Bank-financed projects that have drawn fire from activist groups for allegedly funding human rights violations. These projects include a loan to a palm oil producer in Honduras whose security guards have been accused by human rights advocates of killing dozens of peasants involved in a land rights dispute with the company, and a conservation program by the Kenyan government that members of the Sengwer people say was used as tool for pushing them out of their ancestral forests.

In the Ethiopia case, the Inspection Panel decided that the most severe allegations of forced evictions and violence were beyond its mandate, in part because bank rules limited its investigation to only the most recent funding installment of the PBS program.

During its investigation, the Inspection Panel asked Eisei Kurimoto, a professor at Osaka University in Japan and an expert on the Anuak people, to travel to Gambella and help review the Anuak’s complaint.

Kurimoto told ICIJ that Anuak he spoke with told him Ethiopian authorities used the threat of violence to force them to move.

Ethiopian officials who carried out the villagization program “always went with armed policemen and soldiers,” Kurimoto said. “It is very clear that the regional government thought that people would not move happily or willingly. So they had to show their power and the possibility of using force.”

Inclusive Development International’s Pred said it is now up to World Bank president Jim Yong Kim to decide whether “justice will be served” for the Anuak. “Justice starts with the acceptance of responsibility for one’s faults – which the Inspection Panel found in abundance – and ends with the provision of meaningful redress,” he said.                                   

=>huffingtonpost

ETHIOPIA: “ETHIOPIAN EXODUS” FLOODS YEMEN

Photo: Ethiopian refugees of the Tigray ethnic group crossing into Eritrea

Sam B.

The Regional Mixed Migration Secretariat (RMMS) is again reporting a dramatic increase in Ethiopians fleeing their country from hunger, poverty and deplorable human rights abuses to Yemen. The RMMS core Steering Committee and founding agencies are UNHCR, IOM, DRC, Intersos and the Yemen Mixed Migration Task Force.

The Economist (the magazine) writes:

“Several thousand Ethiopians sleep rough in Bossaso’s dirt, like animals. They are sustained by Muslim alms: a free meal each day, paid for by Bossaso traders. Some of the Ethiopians arrive in town feral with hunger. They have to be beaten back with cudgels when the meal is served. The hope of all of them is to be illegally trafficked across the sea to Yemen. They slip out of town in the moonlight, cramming into metal skiffs that are death traps. Many drown in the crossing: the boat sinks or they are tossed overboard by traffickers when Yemeni patrols approach. Some of the men interviewed in Bossaso for this story have since drowned in this way. Refugee agencies say only a few of those who survive will find jobs in Saudi Arabia. The rest will drift, disappear or die young.”

RMMS calls this phenomenon the “Ethiopian Exodus”. Between September and November 2014 alone RMMS says over 26,000 Ethiopians have crossed the Red Sea to Yemen alone, on their way to Saudi Arabia. Many drowning in the attempt.

In November RMMS reported:

“An estimated 9,420 Ethiopians made their way to Yemen in November 2014, 19% higher than arrivals in October 2014, and 366% higher than the number of Ethiopians that arrived in November 2013.”

And in September it stated:

“An estimated 9,443 Ethiopians made their way to Yemen in September 2014, 15% higher than arrivals in August 2014, and 149% more than the number of Ethiopians that arrived in September 2013.”

RMMS estimated “82,680 migrants/refugees arrived in Yemen between January and November” 2014 and that “approximately 85% of the migrants” were those of “Ethiopian origin, while the rest were Somali”. RMMS further underscored that Ethiopian and Somalis are “maintaining the approximate arrival ratio between the two groups that has existed for the last 3 years.”

In fact starting in 2008 Ethiopian migrants arrivals to Yemen have overtaken Somalis, by large margin. The following graphic is compiled by UNHCR shows the breakdown between Somali and Ethiopian migrants in Yemen.

=>madote

URGENT: Statement released by Western Australian Oromo Community

(Oromedia, 21 January 2015)The Western Australian Oromo Community says any individual or/and group of individuals who may take part in  meeting with the Ethiopian government do not represent the Oromo Community in Western Australia.

This is in reference to telephone conversation and written request made by Ethiopian Embassy in Canberra, Australia to meet with Oromo diaspora by high level of delegate from Oromia Regional State led by Vice President. Thank you for your invitation.

As Oromo Community in Western Australia, we held a series of meeting and discussion about your request and made the following official statement to your request. We would like to inform you that we are not only unable to participate in any formal or informal discussion or dialog with the current Ethiopian Government body or it’s representative, but also we strongly and firmly oppose such gathering in its any form.

We the Oromo community in Western Australia demands that the current Ethiopian regime immediate cessation of hostility against Oromo people. We demand that Government stops its lip service campaign in the election year; release all political prisoners without any precondition, respect the basic human right of freedom of speech, peaceful assembly, and expression.

We also demand that the Government stop displacing Oromo people from its ancestral lands. We speak loud and clear that the Government cease the power immediately and allow opposition political parties to operate in the country freely. We also demand that the Government respect its article 39 constitution and allow the nation and nationalities in the empire of self-determination including cessation or union at will. Then only we believe that the door of dialog and discussion with this Government be open.

According to the press release “the current Ethiopia Government is the regime that dehumanized the Oromo public: marginalized the Oromo people politically, economically, and socially.”
Here is the press release from Oromo Community of Western Australia. Official Statemen_OCWA
The email letter sent to the Oromo community from Ethiopian Embassy Canberra indicated that “high level delegation of the Oromia Regional State led by the Vice President will visit Perth after January 23, 2015 (the specific date will be notified later) to meet with Oromo Diaspora in your city and the surroundings.”

The purposes of the meeting are:

1. To brief on the objective situation (political, economy and social development) of the region,
2. To brief on the Diaspora Housing Development Program and
3. To brief on the upcoming Oromia International Diaspora Day

The venue will be in one of the big hotels in Perth, the cost of which will be covered by us. Therefore, as Chairman of your association, we seek your assistance to inform the leadership and members to attend the forthcoming meeting in Perth. The Diaspora Minister Counselor will call you on Saturday, 17 January 2015, for detailed discussion.
Here is a letter sent from Ethiopian Embassy Canberra: Ambassador’s Letter

1. Ethiopian Embassy letter to Dr. Nuru Said, Chairman of Oromia Community

2. Response to the letter by Oromo Community in W. Astralia

=>ayyaantuu

Widespread Repression State Terrorism in Ogaden, Ethiopia

by GRAHAM PEEBLES

Ethiopia is being hailed as a shining example of African economic growth. Principle donors and devotees of the International Monetary Fund/World Bank development model (an imposed ideological vision which measures all things in terms of a nations GDP) see the country as an island of potential prosperity and stability within a region of failed states and violent conflict. “Economic performance in recent years has been strong, with economic growth averaging in double-digits since 2004,”states the IMF country report. The economic model (a hybrid of western capitalism and Chinese control) adopted by the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) government is a centralised system that denies democracy – consultation and participation in “development plans” is unheard of – ignores and violates human rights.

A willing ally in the “war on terror,” Ethiopia is a strategically convenient base from which the US launches it’s deadly Reaper Drones over Yemen and Somalia, carrying out “targeted assassinations” against perceived threats to “national security” and the ‘American way of life’. In exchange perhaps, irresponsible benefactors – Britain, America and the European Union – turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the human rights abuses being perpetrated throughout the country by the highly repressive dictatorship enthroned in Addis Ababa.

Widespread repression

Whilst there are state-fuelled fires burning in various parts of the country: Oromo, Amhara, Gambella, and the Lower Omo Valley for example. Regions where Genocide Watch (GW) consider “Ethiopia to have already reached Stage 7 (of 8), genocide massacres,” arguably the worst atrocities are taking place within the Ogaden, where GW say the Ethiopian government has “initiated a genocidal campaign against the Ogaden Somali population.”

A harsh region subject to drought and famine where, according to human rights groups such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, as well as first hand accounts, innocent men, women and children are being murdered, raped, imprisoned and brutally tortured by government forces.

The region borders Somalia and is populated largely by ethnic Somalis, many of whom do not regard themselves as Ethiopian at all and see the Ethiopian military operating within the region as an occupying force. The Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) has been engaged in a struggle for independence for the last 22 years. They were elected to power in the 1992 regional elections; however, after they had the democratic gall to propose a referendum on self-determination, the central government under the leadership of the previous Prime-Minister – Meles Zenawi, sent in the military: leading members of the newly elected regional authority and their supporters were executed and arrested and the army installed to control the region. The ONLF, branded terrorists by a government that labels all dissenting individuals and groups with the “T” word, were driven into the bush from where they have been waging armed and diplomatic resistance ever since.

Since 2007, all international media and prying meddlesome humanitarian aid groups have been banned from the area, making it extremely difficult to collect up-to-date information on the situation. The main source of data comes from courageous refugees and defected military men who have found their way to Kenya or Yemen. Most fleeing the region end up in one of the five sites that comprise the sprawling UNHCR-run Dadaab refugee camp in North Eastern Kenya. Established in 1992 to accommodate 100,000 people for 10 years, it is often described as the largest refugee camp in the world and is now home to round 500,000, although manipulated Kenyan government figures are much lower.

Maryama’s story

Maryama arrived in Dadaab with her son and daughter in May 2014 after fleeing her homeland in Ethiopia. She had been the victim of terrible physical and sexual abuse at the hands of the Ethiopian military. Her shocking story echoes the experience of thousands of innocent women – many of whom are no more than children – throughout the affected parts of the Ogaden. I met Maryama in the UNHCR field office of the Dagahaley site in October 2014. She spoke to me of her life in the Ogaden and the violence she had suffered. We sat on the ground in the shade of a UN office building. She spoke with clarity and passion for over an hour, her two-year old son on her lap.

Like many people in the Ogaden, Maryama lived a simple life as a pastoralist. Tending her goats and camels, she moved from place to place with her family. She had never attended school, cannot read or write and knows little or nothing of her country’s politics. Some time in 2012, she was arrested when a large group of armed soldiers from the Ethiopian military descended on her family’s settlement in Dagahmadow in the district of Dagahbuur. “They came to us one day while we were tending to our affairs in our village and they accused us of being supporters of the ONLF as well as having relatives in the ONLF.” The soldiers “called all the village people together and started carrying out acts of persecution. They took anything of value, including property and livestock, by force and burnt down homes in the process. I had just given birth seven days earlier when they came into my home and they asked me why I am inside the house [a small semi-circular wooden structure made from branches and mud] by myself [she was bathing her son at the time]. They saw footsteps near my home, which they followed and concluded that it must have been left by the ONLF” [the prints were in fact made by the military]. “All of us were taken out of our homes and questioned about the ONLF, we all denied any involvement. Our homes were then burnt.”

The solders moved from house-to-house questioning people about the footprints. A young mother, who had given birth the day before and was holding her child, was interrogated, she knew nothing and said so. An elderly woman went to her aid; she was caught by the throat and questioned about the footprints – she knew nothing. They shot her dead. Two men from the village arrived and were immediately questioned. One of the men answered, denying any connection with the ONLF; two soldiers tied his hands together, threw a rope around his neck and pulled on each end until he choked to death. Maryama was ordered to hold the strangled man upright and not allow him to fall to the side. When, exhausted after two hours, she let go of the body she was “arrested with six other girls (including my sister), one of the girls had given birth that day.” On the first night in captivity [in an abandoned village] “she was forced to her feet by two soldiers, one of them kicked her in the stomach – she fell on the floor, keeled over and died on the spot. They also shot my sister in front of us. I watched as she bled to death next to the other girl who had died from the beating.”

Maryama told how after witnessing these atrocities, soldiers put a plastic bag over her head and tied a rope around her throat until she lost consciousness. When she came to, she found herself outside in a deep pit; she was naked and in great pain; she found it difficult to move. Her son was nowhere to be seen. Eight other people were with her, five were dead – one was a cousin, two were neighbours. These people had gone missing 10 days previously; it was assumed they were in prison. She cried hysterically.

After 28 days in the pit, her son was brought to her and they were both taken to prison. She was held captive in Jail Ogaden, in the regional capital Jigjiga, for approximately two and a half years, during which time she was subjected to torture and extreme sexual abuse. There were, she told me, over 1,000 women in the prison. At this point it is perhaps worth stating the obvious: this woman had broken no law, had not been charged with any offence or been granted any of her constitutional or human rights.

Maryama, along with other female prisoners, was routinely tortured by military personnel; stripped naked, they were forced to crawl on their hands and knees across a ground of sharp stones. Their knees would collapse and bleed; if they stopped, they were verbally insulted and beaten with wooden sticks or the butt of a rifle. Another favoured method of torture was to strip the women and take them to the latrines where toilet waste was thrown over them. At the same time they were beaten with sticks, belts and hit with the butt of a rifle. They were not allowed to wash and were forced to sleep covered in this waste.

Maryama, who was around 18 years of age when she was first arrested, was repeatedly raped by groups of soldiers while in prison. They like the women to be young – 15 to 20 – and semi-conscious when raped so the girls cannot resist and the perpetrator cannot be identified; part strangulation with a rope or a blow to the head using the butt of a rifle renders the innocent victim unconscious. Soldiers are told to use the penis as a weapon and are “trained,” defected military men told me, to rape women and how to “break a virgin”; violent demonstrations on teenage girls are given by training officers. They are told to eat hot chillies before going out on patrol, so their semen will burn the women rape victims. A defected divisional commander in the Liyu Police, Dahir, related how during his five years in the force he had witnessed between 1200 and 1500 rapes in the Ogaden.

The creation of a climate of fear amongst the population is the aim of the government and the military; they employ a carefully planned, if crude, methodology to achieve their vile objective. False arrest and detention of men and women, arbitrary assassinations and torture, rape and the destruction of property and livestock make up the arsenal of control and intimidation employed by the EPRDF government.

Unbelievable

The Ethiopian regime maintains that nothing untoward is taking place within the Ogaden region. The military and Liyu police (a renegade paramilitary group), they tell us, are safeguarding civilians against the terrorist organization operating there, namely the ONLF. Soldiers in training are brainwashed to see the population of the region, men, women and children, as enemies of the State. Accounts like Maryama’s are pure fiction, government spokesmen say, and, sorry chaps, the region is unsafe for members of the international media or human rights groups and you cannot enter. And if you do, you will be arrested.

There is indeed terrorism raging throughout large parts of the Ogaden and elsewhere in the country; it is State Terrorism perpetrated by a brutal regime that is guilty of widespread criminality, much of which constitutes crimes against humanity.

Graham Peebles is director of the Create Trust. He can be reached at: graham@thecreatetrust.org



=>counterpunch