By: Dr. Megalommatis Muhammad
Shamsaddin (Pictured Below)
Worse than the Soviet archetypes, the African Gulag is identified with the vast cemetery of peoples – ‘Ethiopia’; false state from name to education, and from A to Z, ‘Ethiopia’ is a monstrous Neo-Nazi fabrication of the racist Amhara and Tigray Abyssinian elites who have subjugated and, due to Western tolerance and/or indifference, tyrannized for more than a century numerous nations.
The criminal, racist and inhuman intention of the Amhara and Tigray Abyssinians is to either exterminate great numbers of these nations’ populations or to enforce by all tyrannical means their assimilation, which is precisely what can be called the Worst Genocide in the History of the Mankind.
As this proves to be an impossible task, due to the heroic resistance of the Ogadenis, the paranoid dictator Zenawi and his criminal and barbaric elite introduce new methods and new – absolutely appalling and inhuman – concepts of Genocide.
Genocide through Dehydration and Starvation
Extermination through intentional dehydration and deliberate starvation is what the Neo-Nazi Amhara and Tigray currently attempt to perform against the Ogadenis, who have never accepted their annexation by Abyssinia that took the form of colonial transfer effectuated between 1948 and 1955, according to the shameful decision of the departing English colonials.
For this reason, the Ogadeni Diaspora in Europe mobilized their forces in order to raise awareness among Europeans as regards to the African Gulag - Ogaden. The gathering in front of the European Council, Brussels, on March 28th, 2008, was a successful mobilization that helped the Europeans understand that the days of the Cemetery of Peoples – ‘Ethiopia’ are numbered. The manifestation terminated when representatives of the Ogadeni Diaspora handed over to Mr. Louis Michel, the European Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, a Petition.
It is a moral obligation for all the peoples of Europe to help the Ogadenis achieve freedom, independence and human respectability. We cannot afford to help the Albanian Kossovars and at the same time disregard the Ogadenis.
The EU authorities should study the Petition handed over to Mr. Louis Michel, by the Ogaden Communities in Europe. We publish here this valuable document integrally, and we will expand further on with respect to the Neo-Nazi atrocities recently performed by the criminal Abyssinian thugs in tyrannized Ogaden.
Under the title ‘A New Gulag in the Ogaden’, the Petition sheds light on the most recent atrocities that have been perpetrated in Ogaden; every European should feel guilty for having in a way allowed these criminal acts take place. The Petition text starts as follows in the next paragraph.
A petition handed over by the Ogaden Communities in Europe to Mr. Louis Michel, the European Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, during the demonstration of the Somali Ogaden Diaspora in front of the European Council, Brussels, on March 28th 2008.
A New Gulag in the Ogaden
Mr. Commissioner,
Two years ago Ethiopia embarked on a campaign to terrorise and intimidate the Ogaden people in order to force them to leave areas it earmarked for oil exploration. As the Ogaden environment is very fragile and the livelihood of the people depends on Livestock, this policy of forced dislocation without their interest in mind caused lots of hardship and forced the Ogaden people to react against this blatant aggression and unethical exploitation of their lands without the consent or interest by a government they considered a colonial occupier of their territory. As this suppression intensified, the Ogaden National Liberation Front which fights for the Emancipation of the Ogaden people took matters into their own hands and removed a Chinese exploration team and a military garrison guarding them at Obole in the Ogaden.
This act gave the Ethiopian regime the justification it needed to start genocide of the Ogaden people. On June 9, 2007, the Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles, held a news conference and publicly declared war on the Ogaden people by saying:
“We have launched a political and military operation to try to contain the activities of the Ogaden National Liberation Front [ONLF] in the region…As for the military plans, over the past few days they have started to be implemented”.
The Ethiopian army and security forces translated the declaration into systematic campaign of genocide by the Ethiopian army. The Ethiopian ‘National Defense forces’ (ENDF) initiated an unprecedented reign of terror the scale of which was never seen before. It hanged hundreds of civilians, including young girls and the elderly. The ENDF burned villages, nomadic huts and food reserves. In addition, the army used rape as a weapon by defiling women and young girls, often in front of their family members in order to exact maximum humiliation and demoralization. The unrestrained soldiers did not even spare the livestock, killing hundreds of camels and confiscating thousands of sheep. Understanding the vulnerability of the people to draught and scarcity of water during the dry season, the army destroyed water reservoirs build by the civilians and prevented people from getting water at the few water holes that are available the whole year, unless the people traded the water for young men to fight the liberation front.
Furthermore, Ethiopia blockaded all trade into and out of the Ogaden, specially the vital commercial links with Somalia. Ninety percent of Ogaden’s export and import goes through Somalia. The army burned all vehicles it found and shot the passengers. Moreover, it refused food aid and medical supplies from the international community to reach the people and forced ICRC and Doctors without Borders (MSF) to leave.
Mr. Commissioner,
Then the UN sent a fact-finding mission, which discovered gross Human Rights violations by the ENDF, corroborated previous discoveries by MSF and Human Rights watch. Then the UN and international donors’ missions in Ethiopia pressured the Ethiopian government to lift the blockade, allow food aid and trade and to investigate and stop the violations by its army. (See attached quotes from independent sources).
At first, Ethiopia stated that it was accepting the demands of the international community but it started to put hurdles in front of the UN and NGOs’ programs. It said that it accepted more than forty NGOs to start work in the Ogaden, but it confined their work to few towns and then it made them virtually under house arrest by refusing them all movements. The UN mission was also not spared. The Ethiopian regime allowed them to open only three offices in the Ogaden on condition that the UN staff be provided by the security forces. The UN succumbed to Ethiopian pressure and the Ethiopians nominated three colonels from the security to head the offices. It also forced the World Food program to use only military warehouses and army escorts.
Moreover, Ethiopia increased its embargo of trade to the Ogaden by sending a whole Division to the main trade routes with Somalia. On top of that the Ethiopian army of occupation convened a meeting of all the Somali clans along the Somali border, informed them to stop trading with the Ogaden, stop refuges leaving the Ogaden, bring them back to the Ethiopian army and form militias to control the border. Ethiopia promised these clans arms and food aid in return for cooperation and dire consequences for those who breach this injunction.
Additionally Ethiopia banned all independent journalists from the Ogaden except under guided tours. Few brave journalist tried to ignore this and were imprisoned and the expelled from Ethiopia.
Today Ethiopia is committing a systematic and thorough depopulation and genocide in the Ogaden by strengthening its blockade and also insuring that international aid is made ineffective by assuming the role the NGO and UN while diverting or blocking it reaching the victims of it made and nature famine. Upton now NGOs and aid agencies are not having adequate access to the Ogaden as recently stated by USAID in a hearing before the US Senate.
The latest victim of Ethiopian criminal act is the community of Wayla-lagu-xidh. On the 16th of March 2008, the Ethiopian army brought army water tankers and pumped the water from the last artificial Water reservoir (Barkad) in the village. The water reservoir was owned by a man called Dayib Abdi Omar. After filling their water tankers they pumped the rest of the water to the field nearby. The villagers including children and vulnerable elders were left waterless. The nearest water point to the area is about 20 miles in Nus -dariq where there is an Ethiopian army garrison under their control. This monstrous act committed at the height of the Jilal dry season where there is an active famine is intended to punish the villagers for refusing to bring militias to fight the ONLF. The Irony of this act is demonstrated by the fact that this same government declared a few weeks ago that it needed four million US dollars in order to alleviate the water shortage in the Ogaden rural communities due to the extended dry season.
The Ogaden is today an enwalled gulag where the Ethiopian regime is committing crimes against humanity and it seems that although the international community is aware of what is going on there; it is being at given a meager attention or ignored. The Ogaden is turning into a human grave and if the Ethiopian government is not forcefully thwarted in it program of depopulation of the Ogaden through direct genocide or neglect, one day the world will wake up to a tragedy that it cannot do anything about as happened in Rwanda.
Mr. Commissioner,
We the Ogaden communities in Europe request from the EU and member countries to directly intervene in the Ogaden and avert the catastrophe that is reaching an advanced stage in the Ogaden now by forcing the Ethiopian government to:
1. Lift the blockade of trade and aid in the Ogaden
2. Allow NGO’s and independent journalists to freely operate in the area
3. Allow the UN to investigate the Human rights abuses committed
4. Accept a peaceful and negotiated settlement of the conflict
Furthermore we kindly request the EU to provide urgent assistance to the Ogaden people directly and insure that it reaches the intended recipients in the rural areas.
Thank you very much in advance.
The Ogaden Somali Communities in Europe / Communautés Ogaden en Europe / Jaaliyadaha Ogaadeenya ee Yurub
Address: Case Postale 2064, 2000 Neuchatel, Switzerland
Email: comm...@net2000.ch
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