Annan blames Ethiopia...

Hello Folks:

It is tragic that it has to take famine to wake the world/UN up to the fact 
that Ethiopia is ruled by thugs.  The world had been  silent when ethnic 
cleansing and systematic deportation of Eritreans and Ethiopians of 
Eritrean 
discent was taking place.  And now the world has to feed starving 
Ethiopians, so the thugs can continue to squander precious resources and 
buy 
sophisticated weapons for their senseless war against Eritrea.  Isn't  this 
is obscene and tragic?  Are they once again going to get away with this 
because the world chooses to be indifferent and not hold them accountable 
for their crimes against humanity?

Alexy
====================================================
Agence France Presse
April 9, 2000, Sunday 4:09 AM, Eastern Time
SECTION: International news
LENGTH: 329 words
HEADLINE: Kofi Annan criticises Ethiopian government for delayed aid

DATELINE: LONDON, April 9

BODY:
   UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan defended the international community 
from 
charges that it has failed to supply sufficient aid to famine victims in 
Ethiopia, suggesting in an interview with the Sunday Times that Addis Ababa 
may be partly to blame for delays in food relief.

"There has been an adequate response by the world. We have had food 
supplies 
there," Annan said, adding: "They have not been distributed properly," said 
Annan.

"It is a tough terrain and Ethiopia is a huge country, but the government 
could have done a better job of distribution."

Around eight million people in Ethiopia are estimated to be facing 
starvation after three years of drought which has dried out most wells and 
killed much of the region's livestock.

Ethiopian authorities have claimed that a delayed international response to 
the famine has depleted emergency food stocks and prevented the rapid 
distribution of aid.

According to UNICEF, around 900,000 tonnes of emergency food supplies are 
urgently needed.

But Annan maintained that a swift response to the famine had been impeded 
by 
a sporadic border war between Ethiopia and Eritrea that has caused 
thousands 
of deaths since May 1998 and closed many access routes to afflicted areas, 
particularly in the parched south-east of Ethiopia.

"The World Food Programme wants to use the Eritrean port of Massawa for 
supplies, but it is closed by war," he said.

Annan went on to make a stinging attack on Africa's political leaders, 
accusing them of avarice, megalomania and failure to work towards better 
living conditions in their countries.

"The quality of the leaders, the misery they have brought to their people 
and my inability to work with them to turn the situation around are very 
depressing," he declared.

"Unless we find a way of getting them to focus on resolving conflicts and 
turn to key issues of economic and social development, the efforts that we 
are all making will be for naught."

======================================================

The Indian Ocean Newsletter April 8, 2000
SECTION: POLITICS & POWER; ETHIOPIA; N. 899
LENGTH: 309 words

HEADLINE: Military preparations continue

BODY:


Apart from the purchase of four SU-25 fighters from Shturmovik Sukhovo 
which 
the Russian firm revealed on April 3, the Ethiopian
army has equipped itself with 90 Ural military vehicles purchased in 
Russia. 
The jet fighters are two SU-25T equipped for anti-tank
operations and two SU-UB training aircraft. The Urals have been 
reconditioned in a military workshop in Addis Ababa and sent to the
front at Bure. The army has also taken delivery of brand-new MI-24 
helicopters bought from Russia and now stationed at Debre Zeit
air force base, and training course on these aircraft are being given to 
Ethiopian pilots on the old Addis airport. Last week, a Russian
pilot, his Ethiopian student pilot and a senior Ethiopian mechanic were 
reported killed when the helicopter they were in crashed near
Addis Ababa. Similar training has been carried out at Bahr Dar and Mekele, 
in northern Ethiopia, with about a dozen Russian pilots
billetted at the Ghion hotel in Bahr Dar. Military training has also 
resumed 
on the front, particularly at Barra camp, near Sheraro, where
young officer cadets are going through a three-month refresher course. 
Although these military preparations are going on, the food
supply being taken to the Ethiopian front lines is not dry rations but 
flour, teff and sorghum, suggesting a defensive and stationary
choice.

I.O.N. - Cases of desertion are not rare on both sides of the front. A 
group 
of Ethiopian Amhara soldiers which deserted recently at
Bure put up an unusual reason by claiming that they were members of the 
pro-government ANDM (ex-EPDM) movement headed
Tamrat Layne (the ex-prime minister just sentenced to eighteen years prison 
for alleged corruption). They said they had been victims
of ethnic discriminations by Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF, the 
hard -core of EPRDF ruling in Addis Ababa).
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com