Millennial challenge: Making international journalists and their editors accountable to stakeholders around the globe!

Global Strategic Enterprises, Inc for Peace and Prosperity- www.globalbelai4u.blogspot.com; www.SolomonicCrown.org


Dear Patriotic Global Citiznes and Friends of Ethiopia:

Re: Smearing Ethiopian Image by Jeffery Gettleman- the man deported for spying! fabricating "Starve out the population strategy story, this is almost genocide accusation!

How can we make the Gettlmans and Donald Paynes of this world accountable?

The attached article by Herald Tribune International and New York Times Author of a series of negative articles on the Ogaden, who was deported from Ethiopia for journalist or tourist unbecoming is a similar saga of the late AP reporter Anthony Michelle, et al. and it needs to be dealt with seriously with facts as soon as possible. He is more or less claiming a genocide or strategy to starve out the population story. This is serious business and needs to be investigated immediately.

I wonder, "when did .. modern jounalism turned into a series of " ...so and so, he said, she said", .... propaganda become news?" and get printed by the Gettleman- Spy! who seems to be bent on to be the new front man for modern fascists of 21st century trying to humiliate and desicrate the image, person and interest of the Ethiopian people. His activities are relentless and he seems to be the spokesperson and propaganda chief of the Altihad-Alqaeda Network in the Horn.

This is a serious national and international security issue that needs our immediate attention! Facts should be our guide and not terrorist sympathiser propaganda. The Chinese Globalizaiton agenda should be matched with competition but not with surrogate terror of any kind! if that is the hidden agenda.

This man was caught red handed moving between borders and making propoganda news that assists the Altihad-Alqaeda terrorists, who have track record of repeated carnage starting in 1977 when they managed to terrorize the whole eastern corridor upto Nazareth. Their leader was recently defeated in Somalia and now is in apparent safeheaven for terrorists in Asmara with the madmen of the Horn.

When did a Jewish man become friends with the Alqaeda Network by going against facts and fabricating stories. This type of media insurrection is the prelude to fascist take over of our mind and consiousness and need to be challenged as early as possible.

Read carefully, almost all his source is questionable. There is no reliable evidence that can be verified by a third party to his fabrications. How does a Gettleman, what ever Gettle means think that he can gettle his way through against our national interest and the people of Ogaden and behave as if he knows best for the people of Ogaden than their own Ogadeni leaders.

Imagine there is no mention of 24 April 2007 terror and massacre by the Altihad-Alaqeda network of Chinese and Ethiopian citizens.

Imagine if Ethiopian Journalists and papers begin publishing rather negative and dishonoring stories and fabrications against the the memeories of the 9/11 victims of the Alqaeda victims in New York, Pen and the Pentagon.

This "getttle of a man" is making the same level of desicration of the memory of those unsuspecting victims massacred by these terrorists. Who will speak up or demand accountability for our people in this critical time of need? Can we be silent observers to this type of incredulous stories? Can silence become aquiescence to potential criminal activities? Has this ever happened in history? The post 9/11 intelligence and journalistic fiaso is still around us with serious consequences. We need to demand accountability such that all the alegaton should be independently verifed or else these damaging stories should be withdrawn or amended with facts.

Yes, freedom of expressio is important but it should be based on verifiable facts and should not be abused by potential terorirsts as it happened during the WWII, the Cold War and now during the War on Terror.

When does it become game to massacre Ethiopians and Chinesse and sacred to murder New Yorker? I beive .."A human life is sacred wherever they live and whenever the terror takes place." Imagine, pulishing such story in the Intenational Tribune, UPI and AP that is circulated all over the world without challenge or any sort of perspective? There appears to be no context and background with appropriate level of balance with serious and fair accounting, substantiated with facts on the ground, for readers to appreciate why the current security situation is in crisis in the region.

This is irresponsible journalism that plays in to the hands of current and future terrorists. This is no way to treat alllies against terror, where many are sacrificing their lives and honor to protect the region from the expanding terror. It is not fair to our families in Ogaden that are making the supreme sacrifice with their lives and honor to preserve their families and their well earned freedom and self administration to be hijacked by the Altihad-Alqaeda sympathisers.


If there is any truth to the alleged story to sleeper cell activists, the Gettlemans of this world are creating it and the Homeland Security and International court of justice should take a serious look in such unfolding stories and people who create opportunties for misrepresentation of facts and acuse a whole nation of conduct unbecoming of civilized communities.

May be HR2003, should incude transparency and accountabilty for all including western journalists who misrepresent events that undermines the nationla security of US and Ethiopian allies and bring the Gettlemen of this world to congress for hearing.


Remember the Ruwanda Genocide took place with gross media mis-representation of one grout against the other, and the Second World War was won on the back of Counter-informations by institutions such as the current international BBC new. The BBC is now famous across the world, but its inception was as war counter-propaganda service.

It appears in the current world of globalization, the media campaign is the first tool of disinvestment and shifting of markets. It is becoming apparent, that this is a new campaign against the long term interest of Ethiopians being waged by few Jeswsih sounding authors from New York, perhaps with strategic and global business interests, etc. and we need to be vigilant and demand for transparency and accountability. Surely we should use the same universal lingo in the HR2003 Paynes and Co are using.

We should demand for an investigation of both the story on the ground and the allegation this gettleman is making. If there is evidence to his story, there should be accountability from the local and State governments. If there is no truth to his fabrications, then he and his surrogate counter-intelligence or spy agencies should be made to account.

The most important issue is to ensure that our people are protected from man-made and natural disasters. The area is suffering from both accounts.

We need to investigate news via reliable means of accountability from every one. It is sad that some congressmen and inernational editors of well recognized journals are becoming sloppy and are fabricating news just to hit their deadlines.

Remember the story of the War on Terror when no journalist or political leader questionned the fabrications about the Niger Uranium enrichment shipments and now this story about the Intentional starvation of Ogaden by their own people need to be investigated and where ever the facts lead, all concerned including journalists should be made accountable.

I suggest there should be an International Court of Joournalist Justice to make those masquerading under the auspecies of journalism and are in effect spreading disinformation to create unnecessary considitons for even larger catastrophy.

I sugest all readers to question for the truth and not accept every thing written by these types of jounalists that attach themselves to big Newspapers and fabricate stories. At the same token, we need to investigate officials both non profit and governmental organizations to support their stories with evidence that can be presented in the court of justice and most of all decent human intelligence.

Let us take the warning, that when fascist Italia tried to invade Ethiopia, it first started the slavery and then the missionary story to civilized what they termed was not Roman Catholic Territory. We discoved by their action and eventual outcome, they were the true barbarians and many were hanged upside down like Mussoloni by their own people.

With regards and seeking for an intelligent and alternative perspective. You can see below how the Gettlemen of New York Times work hand in hand with the terrorists. The Gettlemen write a rather disturbing story and the terrorist quote it as fact and then publish their propaganda news. We have been here before, some one is intentionally coordinating this and who could it be? Imagine the Red Cross participating in such dangerous activities. The attached article by the Ogaden Administration is worth reviewing.

Please review previous response to the Washington Post editorial, for further information at www.globalbelai4u.blogspot.com



Belai Habte-Jesus, MD, MPH

Global Strategic Enterprises, Inc for Peace and Prosperity
www.globalbelai4u.blogspot.com
Globalbelai@yahoo.com
C: 703.933.8737; F: 703.531.0545
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http://mobile.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L23422492.htm

Ethiopia rebels warn catastrophe looming in Ogaden

23 Jul 2007


NAIROBI, July 23 (Reuters) - Ogaden rebels warned of a looming "man-made famine" in Ethiopia's remote area bordering Somalia and called on Monday for a U.N. investigation into accusations the government was blocking food aid to the region.

On Sunday, a New York Times report quoted Western diplomats and relief officials as saying Ethiopia's government was blockading emergency food aid and choking off trade to Ogaden.

The Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), which is seeking more autonomy for its homeland but which Addis Ababa says it is a terrorist group bankrolled by Eritrea, called for a U.N. fact-finding mission.

"The ONLF wishes to affirm to the international community that if there is no immediate intervention in the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in Ogaden, there will be a man-made famine created by the current regime of Meles Zenawi," the ONLF said in a statement.

Ethiopian government officials were not immediately available to comment.

On Monday, the ONLF said Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's administration was engaged in a systematic and deliberate campaign of violence against its people.

"These war crimes include diverting humanitarian assistance for use by the regime's armed forces ... deliberate burning of villages, arbitrary arrests, extrajudicial killings, torture, a blockade on food aid as well as other commercial goods and other forms of collective punishment," the ONLF said in a statement.

"The United Nations bears a particular responsibility to investigate war crimes in Ogaden given recent reports that its humanitarian assistance is deliberately being diverted to armed forces and militias responsible for these war crimes," it said.

The ONLF itself has been accused of carrying out atrocities, including an April raid on a Chinese-run oil field in which 74 people were killed and seven Chinese workers taken hostage.

They were later freed but in the wake of the attack, Meles announced a crackdown on the rebels.

It is difficult to get independent information out of the desolate region, which is ethnically Somali.

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Source: BBC

Tuesday, 24 July 2007

2. Ethiopia deadline for Red Cross

The people living in Ogaden are mostly nomadic
The Red Cross has been given seven days to leave the Ogaden region bordering Somalia by the Ethiopian government.

The ICRC has been carrying out water and sanitation projects there.

An army crackdown in the area after a series of rebel attacks has restricted the movement of essential goods.

The rebel group, the Ogaden National Liberation Movement, accuses the government of blockading the region, and producing a "man-made famine".

On Monday, the New York Times carried an article saying that Ethiopian troops were preventing emergency aid reaching the mainly Somali speaking region.

But aid agencies have been reluctant to complain publicly about the lack of access, fearing that it might compromise their work in the future.

The regional president of Ethiopia's Somali region, Abdullai Hassan, told the BBC that the ICRC had been given seven days to leave the area.

He accused the organisation of collaborating with the enemy and of spreading baseless accusations against the regional government on its website.

Ethiopia's eastern Ogaden region shares a long and porous border with Somalia, and most of its people are of the Somali ethnic group.

The ONLF has fought for the secession of the Ogaden region since the early 1990s.

In April, rebels attacked a Chinese-run oil field killing nine Chinese and 65 Ethiopians.




******************************************************

The Meles regime to block food to rebel region in
Ethiopia

21st, 2007 jul

The International Herald Tribune

By Jeffrey Gettleman

NAIROBI — The government of Meles Zenawi in Ethiopia
is blockading emergency food aid and choking off trade
to large swaths of a remote region in the eastern part
of the country that is home to a rebel force, putting
hundreds of thousands of people at risk of starvation,
Western diplomats and humanitarian officials say.

The Ethiopian [Woyanne] military and its proxy
militias have also been siphoning off millions of
dollars in international food aid, and using a United
Nations polio eradication program to funnel money to
their fighters, according to relief officials, former
Ethiopian government administrators and a member of
the Ethiopian Parliament who defected to Germany last
month to protest the government's actions.

The blockade takes aim at the heart of the Ogaden
region, a vast desert on the Somali border where the
government is struggling against a growing rebellion
and where government soldiers have been accused by
human rights groups of widespread brutality.

Humanitarian officials say the ban on aid convoys and
commercial traffic, intended to squeeze the rebels and
dry up their bases of support, has sent food prices
skyrocketing and disrupted trade routes, preventing
the nomads who live there from selling their
livestock. Hundreds of thousands of people are now
sealed off in a desiccated, unforgiving landscape that
is difficult to survive in even in the best of times.

"Food cannot get in," said Mohammed Diab, the director
of the United Nations World Food Program in Ethiopia.

The Woyanne government says the blockade covers only
strategic locations, and is meant to prevent guns and
matériel from reaching the Ogaden National Liberation
Front, the rebel force that the government considers a
terrorist group. In April, the rebels killed more than
60 Ethiopian guards and Chinese workers at a
Chinese-run oil field in the Ogaden.

"This is not a government which punishes its people,"
said Nur Abdi Mohammed, a government spokesman.

But Western diplomats have been urging Woyanne
officials to lift the blockade, arguing that the many
people in the area are running out of time. "It's a
starve-out-the-population strategy," said one Western
humanitarian official, who did not want to be quoted
by name because he feared reprisals against aid
workers. "If something isn't done on the diplomatic
front soon, we're going to have a government-caused
famine on our hands."

The blockade, which involves soldiers and military
trucks cutting off the few roads into the central
Ogaden, comes as Congress is increasingly concerned
about Ethiopia's human rights record.

Ethiopia is a close American ally and a key partner in
America's counterterrorism efforts in the Horn of
Africa, a region that has become a breeding ground for
Islamic militants, many of whom have threatened to
wage a holy war against Woyanne.

The country receives nearly half a billion dollars in
American aid each year, but this week, a House
subcommittee passed a bill that would put strict
conditions on some of that aid and ban Ethiopian
officials linked to rights abuses from entering the
United States.

The House also recently passed an
amendment, sponsored by J. Randy Forbes, a Virginia
Republican, that stripped Ethiopia of $3 million in
assistance to "send a strong message that if they
don't wake up and pay attention, more money will be
cut," Forbes said.

Woyanne's pardon on Friday of 30 political prisoners
who had been sentenced to life in prison could ease
some criticism. But Senator Patrick Leahy, Democrat of
Vermont, is pushing ahead with measures to more
closely vet assistance to the Ethiopian military.
According to human rights groups and firsthand
accounts, government troops have gang raped women,
burned down huts and killed civilians.

American officials in Ethiopia said they were trying
to investigate the situation but that the Ogaden was
too dangerous right now for a fact-finding mission.
American officials said they had heard persistent
reports of burned villages and that the blockade was
putting the area on the cusp of a crisis.

Villagers say that anyone who criticizes the
government risks getting killed. According to Ogaden
Online, a Canadian-based news service that has been
highly critical of the Woyanne government and covers
the region through a network of reporters and
contributors, some equipped with satellite phones,
four young men who were videotaped by The New York
Times at a community meeting in an Ogaden village in
May were later tortured and executed.

The claim could not be fully verified independently,
but their identities may have been discovered by
Woyanne soldiers who had arrested three journalists
for The Times in the Ogaden and confiscated their
notebooks, cameras and computers.

"The army is out of control," said Jemal Dirie Kalif,
the member of Parliament who defected.

The blockade has been in place since early June, and
thousands of people have already fled on foot and by
camel. Two weeks ago, Abdullahi Mohammed, a
17-year-old student, walked from his village deep in
the Ogaden to the nearest town with a bus station. He
carried with him a few pieces of bread. He said that
when he stopped to ask villagers in the Ogaden for
food, they asked him for some instead. "They had
nothing," he said.

Though good rains this year have fed the few crops in
the area and provided a little cushion, "The most
these people can last without facing serious problems
is one month, maybe two," said David Throp, country
director for Save the Children UK.

Even if relief trucks are allowed in to all the
critical areas, the food might not reach the people
who need it. According to humanitarian workers and
several former Woyanne officials, including Kalif,
food aid is embezzled in two stages. First, soldiers
skim sacks of grain, tins of vegetable oil and bricks
of high-energy biscuits from food warehouses to sell
at local markets.

"The cash is distributed among security officers and
regional officers," a former government administrator
from the Ogaden region said in a recent telephone
interview on condition of anonymity because he still
works with government officials.

Then the remaining food is hauled out to rural areas
where the soldiers divert part of it to local gunmen
and informers as a reward for helping them fight the
rebels. The former administrator said he also knew of
specific cases in which army officers stole food from
warehouses and gave it to the families of women whom
their soldiers had raped, as compensation.

Several Western humanitarian officials estimated that
20 to 30 percent of the donor countries' food aid to
the Ogaden — aid that last year was valued at more
than $70 million — routinely disappears this way. To
cover their tracks, the soldiers and the government
administrators who work with them tell the aid
agencies that the food has spoiled, or has been stolen
or hijacked by the rebels, humanitarian officials
said.

Relief workers in Ethiopia have known about these
problems for several years, a humanitarian official
said, and have tried to set up committees of local
elders to oversee distribution. But that did not work
either, and aid officials eventually concluded that as
long as the majority of the food was getting through,
they would not stop the shipments.

When informed about these allegations, Diab of the
World Food Program said, "This is the first I've heard
of them."

Mohammed, the government spokesman, denied that
Ethiopian troops were pilfering or mishandling foreign
aid. "We don't do that," he said.

As the food crisis looms, Western diplomats are also
concerned about a separate plan by the regional
government in the Ogaden to divert a share of its own
budget for development projects — like schools and
farming — to the Ethiopian military.

This seems to be part of the Woyanne government's
strategy to do whatever it takes to crush the rebels,
who have deep popular support and, according to the
government, are getting arms and training from
neighboring Eritrea, Woyanne's bitter enemy.

The people of the Ogaden are mostly Somalis and
ethnically distinct from the highland Ethiopians who
have ruled the country for centuries, and the long
battle over the region has been steadily escalating
this year. The country director of one Western aid
agency, who recently returned from a field visit
there, said he saw two villages that had been burned
to the ground and several schools that had been
converted into military bases, with foxholes.

Humanitarian officials say the military is building up
militias and setting the stage for clan-based
bloodshed. The rank and file of the Ogaden National
Liberation Front tend to be members of the Ogaden
clan, and so the government has turned to other clans
to form anti-rebel militias. In the past few weeks,
thousands of men have been armed.

"Those Ethiopians are smart," Kalif, 32, said. "They
know Somalis are more loyal to clans than anything
else." Tactics like these, he said, drove him to
defect June 20 while attending a conference in
Wiesbaden, Germany. He was affiliated with the
governing party, and had been representing an area in
the eastern Ogaden for the past seven years.

He described a scheme with a United Nations polio
program, which was corroborated by two former
administrators in the Woyanne government and a Western
humanitarian official, in which military commanders
gave prized jobs as vaccinators to militia fighters,
and in the end, much of the polio vaccine was never
distributed.

"Army commanders are using the polio money to pay
their people, who don't pass out the vaccines, so the
disease continues and the payments continue," said
Kalif. "It's the perfect system." United Nations
officials in Geneva said they did not know whether
that was happening, but that they would investigate.

When asked how he knew about the polio scheme, Kalif
said: "Everybody out there knows. They're just too
scared to talk."

"If I don't get asylum and they send me back to my
country, I'm dead," he added. "But I was sick of being
a parrot. I have no regrets."