We have come to note that dictatorial and ruthless regimes have often claimed and volunteered to keep international peace. Once allowed, they use their participation in international peace-keeping missions as a legitimizing factor for their own despicable rule. A regime that is the primary source of abuse of natural human rights, a regime that often perpetuates and instigates hate among its own diverse population to divide and rule, is not qualified to keep peace anywhere even if it expresses such interest. It is grand hypocrisy of the Ethiopian government to volunteer for peace keeping in Darfur, and this hypocrisy prompted us to write this editorial.
Many human rights organizations rank the Ethiopian regime among the worst in the world. The Tigrean minority regime of Meles Zenawi has no positive political, diplomatic, or military role to play in resolving the conflict in Darfur. And yet, it has invited itself to join the peace keeping team of the United Nations (UN) to be stationed in Darfur. The Ethiopian regime has blood of innocent civilians in its own country; it can not be trusted in a neighboring country. It dilutes the honorable mission of the UN, and it will use its very presence to justify its own brutal rule, to collect foreign currency and cover up its own bloody venture into Somalia without the mandate of the African Union (AU) and the UN. In fact, UN arms monitors report that “Ethiopian military forces resorted to using white phosphorus bombs indiscriminately”, even on civilian population in Mogadishu. The regime has also delayed all efforts to demarcate the border with Eritrea, disregarding the Boundary Commission's decision repeatedly and for several years. The Ethiopian regime is the cause for tensions and mass killings in the Horn of Africa.
It is an insult for AU or UN to allow the army of a brutal regime into a peace keeping force in Darfur. It would amount to endorsing the killings and tortures of hundreds of thousands of civilians.
In conclusion, the Ethiopian regime, representing a minority Tigrean ethnic group is notoriously known for terrorizing the peoples of Ethiopia and neighboring countries including cross-border raids into Kenya, Somalia, and the Sudan. This regime survives by concocting conflict among peoples. The presence of the army of this regime among UN and AU peace delegates is unacceptable to those who dream of Africa free from dictatorship and blatant exploitation. The UN and the AU must close their doors to the Ethiopian army if they want to maintain their credibility and shield the goodness of their mission.
This is the position of OLF.
Victory to the Oromo people!
August 25, 2007
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