April 16, 2007
• Bush says Zenawi is committed to human rights
GHIMBI, Ethiopia -- First, the police threw
Tesfaye into a dark cell. Then, each day for 17 days, it was the same
routine: Electric shocks on his legs and back, followed by beatings with
rubber truncheons. Four or five officers would then surround and kick him.
At last, a large bottle of water would be tied around his testicles. He'd
pass out.
Tesfaye's crime? Maybe it's that he refused to
join the ruling party of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi. He was accused of
organizing street protests in late 2005. Police suspect he's a member of a
rebel group called the Oromo Liberation Front. Tesfaye doesn't know for
sure because no court ever charged him with a crime.
"They took us turn by turn to a dark place, and they would shock us and
say, 'What do you think now? You won't change your ways now? Do you want
to be a member of our party now?' " Tesfaye recalled of his time in prison
early last year. He refused to give his last name for fear of being
rearrested.
Accounts like this are common in today's Ethiopia. Interviews with
dozens of people across the country, coupled with testimony given to
diplomats and human rights groups, paint a picture of a nation that jails
its citizens without reason or trial, and tortures many of them -- despite
government claims to the contrary.
Such cases are especially troubling because the U.S. government, a key
Ethiopian ally, has acknowledged interrogating terrorism suspects in
Ethiopian prisons, where some detainees were sent after being arrested in
connection with Ethiopia's invasion of Somalia in December. There have
been no reports that those jailed have been tortured. The invasion ousted
an Islamic movement accused of having ties to al Qaeda that threatened to
topple an interim Somali government struggling to control the country.
The Bush administration maintains that Meles' government, a leading
partner in its war on terror in East Africa, is committed to democratic
and human rights reform. The government was severely criticized for a 2005
crackdown that saw tens of thousands of opposition members jailed and
nearly 200 people killed following elections in which the opposition made
major gains.
People across Ethiopia recounted stories of a government backsliding on
human rights issues. They told of confinement for days in tiny, dark cells
with their hands bound 24 hours a day; electric shocks; beatings with
rubber clubs; police who held guns to prisoners' heads; mutilation or pain
inflicted on the genitals.
"If you think differently, that is enough to put you on the side of the
opposition," said 34-year-old Teferi, who recently was released from
prison after two months without being charged with a crime. "If you say,
'This is not right, this is right, it's good to rule peacefully,' if you
talk something fair, it's over for you because there is no fairness from
them."
Teferi said a police source told him that he was arrested because he
played too much pingpong -- and that police suspected he was recruiting
people to a rebel group while he played. He said he was imprisoned at a
police training camp called Sankele outside the city of Ambo, which the
International Committee of the Red Cross has been barred from visiting.
Ethiopian officials dismiss stories of torture as lies, and have taken
the further step of expelling everyone from foreign journalists to
representatives of human rights groups such as Amnesty International and
Human Rights Watch. Ethiopian reporters for the U.S.-financed Voice of
America must work in secret for fear of harassment.
Bereket Simon, a top adviser to Meles, said it's in the interests of
rights groups to lie about the situation, and he rejected the idea that
torture occurs in Ethiopia.
"No way. No way. No way. I think you know, these are prohibited by
laws, by Ethiopian laws -- torture, any human treatments," Bereket said.
"In fact, we have been improving on our prison standards. We've been
working hard to train the police forces, the interrogators."
U.S. officials say Washington's close alliance with the government in
Addis Ababa allows it to raise concerns about Ethiopia's record privately.
The State Department is requesting more than $500 million for Ethiopian
aid in fiscal 2008, almost all of it for HIV/AIDS relief. The United
States trains Ethiopian troops, and the two governments have shared
intelligence about Somalia.
U.S. Ambassador Donald Yamamoto said he wants to investigate claims of
abuse, but warned against making allegations about Ethiopia's actions
without proof.
"There's a lot of misinformation about Ethiopia -- I mean, it's
amazing," Yamamoto said. "The problem comes in trying to divide or
separate what is fact and what's fiction, and trying to keep an open mind
on every issue. ... There are problems, and we're free to admit that, and
the Ethiopians are open to admitting that as well."
Ethiopia's critics are skeptical of the government's promises to
improve its human rights record.
"Over the years, the more I see, the more I become convinced that not
only does the government tolerate it, but I think they direct this kind of
behavior," said Ethiopian-born Theodros Dagne, a senior aide to Rep.
Donald Payne, D-N.J., a leading critic of Ethiopian practices on human
rights.
European diplomats and employees of Western aid groups, speaking on
condition of anonymity, said they keep quiet about abuses because they
fear the government will freeze them out of aid work. About 2.8 million of
Ethiopia's 75 million people depend on foreign food aid.
Washington's steadfast support has led some Ethiopian opposition
leaders to assert that Meles' government has only been emboldened.
"We fully believe that the international community is not going to
democratize this place -- it's going to be the tough task of the
Ethiopians," said Beyene Petros, a lawmaker and leader of the United
Ethiopian Democratic Forces, a coalition of opposition groups. "Simply,
the U.S. State Department's or the U.S. government's position on Ethiopia
is that it's a friendly government, and how can you go and quarrel with
your friend because somebody told on him?"
---
Zoe Alsop contributed to this story, which was reported with
a grant from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.
---
Source: San
Francisco Chronicle, April 16, 2007
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