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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Somali American Peace Council
Somali Diaspora Network
Somalis for Peace and Justice
Somali Diaspora Congress.
[email protected]
Fairfax, Virginia, USA, 22 April 2008: Over two hundred Somali-Americans gathered in front of the US State Department to express their outrage about the blatant war crimes and human rights violations committed at the hands of the Ethiopian forces in Somalia. They are equally outraged by the State Department’s misguided approach which is creating a wide spread anti-Americanism in the Horn of Africa. There is an utter lack of integrity and moral authority on the part of the U.S. State Department because it provided tactical support the invasion and the subsequent occupation of Somalia and has remained silent about the war crimes and human rights violations committed at the hands of the Ethiopian forces.
Human Rights Watch and United Nation confirm that, in the past 16 months, the Ethiopian troops repeatedly shelled civilian neighborhoods. In violations of the international laws governing conflict and occupation, the Ethiopian occupation forces ignored United Nation’s warning to cease the continued shelling and deployment of military forces to residential area.
In less than a year, over 800,000 civilians have been displaced from Mogadishu due to the random shelling, killing, and insecurity in the city as the Ethiopian forces and militias loyal to the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) callously prevented the delivery of food aid to the displaced civilians. This forced exodus has now resulted in a grave and rapidly deteriorating humanitarian disaster. Former warlord President Abdullahi Yusuf’s November 20, 2007 speech in Baidoa, Somalia demonstrated the President’s animosity towards the International aid agencies. He accused the aid organizations of helping fund the rebels by monetizing food aid and that the World food Program (WFP) executives in Nairobi were stealing the food aid.
This week, over 80 Somalis are dead, the leader of the nonviolent Sufi sect (i.e., Tabliq) and several of his colleagues were "slaughtered" in a mosque, and over 40 children and students of a Koranic school were abducted by the Ethiopian forces. The US State Department added insult to injury. Its spokesman’s response to such atrocities was "We are going to continue to work with the Transitional Federal Government, with the Ethiopians, with the AU and others who are interested in trying to help bring peace and stability to Somalia and improve the situation in that country and give the Somali people a better future." When did the killing of religious leaders in their house of worship become “trying to help bring peace and stability to Somalia …”? This is the epitome of Orwellian newspeak.
The United States and the United Nations must end their support for the blatant gross human rights violations in Somalia and demand accountability for these war crimes so that any peacekeeping force would be seen by the Somali public as neutral and beneficial to Somalia. The Ethiopian forces must withdraw without preconditions.
The United States and United Nations must take the lead in a multifaceted humanitarian assistance to avert the disaster in the making. Besides food and potable water, the availability of basic health services and sanitation facilities are very crucial. Lack of these facilities is causing a huge and preventable number of deaths to the population of children under five.
In order for a lasting peace to take hold in Somalia and restore the Somali State, a genuine and carefully prepared process of reconciliation and peace conference must take place. Such a conference must ensure the full participation of all stakeholders including the TFG, Islamic Courts, members of the Free Parliament, civil society organizations inside the country and those of the Somali communities abroad.