Rare Somalia talks make slow start, U.N. hopeful

By Omar Hassan
11/05/08

DJIBOUTI, May 11 (Reuters) – Rare peace talks between Somalia’s interim government and opposition exiles have made a slow start in Djibouti, but a senior U.N. official said he was encouraged both sides had turned up.

“I am more than hopeful, the Somalis who I met today are committed to peace and reconciliation and they are ready to do it for the sake of Somalia,” the U.N. envoy to Somalia, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, told reporters in Djibouti late on Saturday.

Delegates from the government and exiles based in Eritrea have yet to meet face-to-face, but Ould-Abdallah and Arab League officials shuttled between the two sides.

“We are going to work with them on how to advance commitment to peace and security, commitment to respect Somali sovereignty, integrity and independence,” Ould-Abdallah said.

More than 35 people have been killed and dozens injured in a fresh surge of violence in Somalia since Thursday, casting further doubt on the prospects for the negotiations.

Militants behind near-daily ambushes and roadside bombs targeting government troops and their Ethiopian allies are the remnants of an Islamist movement that was ousted by the government and its Ethiopian allies at the start of last year.

The leaders of that group, and other critics of President Abdullahi Yusuf, have since moved to Ethiopia’s arch-foe Eritrea and formed the Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia.

They had repeatedly refused to meet government officials until Ethiopian troops left Somali soil. But last month they dropped that demand and agreed to send delegates to Djibouti. (Writing by Daniel Wallis; Editing by Charles Dick) (For full Reuters Africa coverage and to have your say on the top issues, visit: africa.reuters.com/)

First posted on ethio media 14/01/07

16 years have elapsed but we will never stop asking this

question, and there wouldn’t be a better time than now when

Sebhat Nega has made it clear who is in power.

 

In short, Sebhat Nega, the architect of Meles Zenawi’s ascent to power in pre- and post-1991, has confirmed what genuine Ethiopians have been testifying all along: Ethiopia is in the hands of a masked mercenary group housed in the misnomer TPLF. The ABC of the struggle of the Ethiopian people should be to recognize power in Ethiopia is in the hands of an enemy, namely “TPLF,” a group that has nothing to do with Tigrai other than use the northern region as a spring board to attack and hold the rest of Ethiopia hostage.

The guilty verdict Meles Zenawi imposed on the Ethiopian leaders in Kaliti Prison is being presented to the internatioanl community as the work of an independent judiciary by none other than Bereket Simon, the second-in-command Eritrean who personally oversaw the June and November 2005 killings of innocent civilians. Bereket also referred to the protesting youth as “hooligans who tried to rob banks,” although banks in Addis reported to an inquiry commission later that there was no single law-breaking incident during the protests.

Sebhat Nega’s “we are more Eritrean than Eritrean themselves” is a last wake-up call for Ethiopian opposition support groups and civic associations to map out a common strategy that will lead to dislodge the Eritrean Woyanes from power. With the effective opposition environment, it wouldn’t be too hard for the rank-and-file of TPLF/EPRDF to abandon the top-notch Eritrean camp and intensify the movement for freedom.

No opposition should waste time by entertaining the idea of reconciliation with the Eritrean Woyanes in power. For a group that was born and raised through violence knows no reconciliation. Nor should we place our trust in the so-called “mediators” who have never uttered a single word of

condemnation when the Eritrean Woyanes were brutally murdering innocent Ethiopian citizens. Sebhat Nega’s two-and-a-half-hour confession should help us come out of the stage of denial, and admit that we are being ruled by those who fought against our country, our history, our honor, our survival. Above all, sixteen years of despicable rule should make us say: “Enough is enough.”

Absolute power corrupts absolutely, so they say. Sebhat was too corrupted by an absolute power he thought he was in power in Eritrea, and vowed to defend Eritrea from his perceived Ethiopian attack by any means possible. The guys who fought and turned Ethiopia into a landlocked nation, the guys who fought on the Eritrean side against Ethiopia during the 1998-2000 War, have neither the legal nor the moral right to rule Ethiopia even for a day. They have to go.

To achieve this, once again, Ethiopian opposition parties and civic groups should come up with a common program and mobilize the huge Ethiopian Diaspora resources even, among other things, into launching a viable radio service to Ethiopia.

For that matter, at a time when very small nations have several radio and TV stations, Ethiopia, a country of over 70 million and the second most populous nation in Africa, has no single radio or TV station of its own. In addition, the Eritrean Woyanes are using Ethiopian money to block even US-based Websites and blogs from being accessed in Ethiopia.
In other words, Ethiopia is the only big country that is in an information limbo. This crime is being committed by design by those who have virtually held the nation hostage.

The case of Kinijit leaders and the journalists who have been convicted of crimes that carry death or life term sentences cannot be seen in isolation from the struggle of freeing Ethiopia from the hands of its enemies. It is time to stand up and be counted as an Ethiopian seeking freedom and honor for a deserving people.