Sanctioned War Crimes: Serbs in Bosn & Ethiopians in Somalia
Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 5:40 pm
The Associated Press
Published: May 6, 2008
NAIROBI, Kenya:
A leading human rights group on Tuesday accused Ethiopian troops in Somalia of killing civilians and committing atrocities, including slitting people's throats, gouging out eyes and gang-raping women.
In a new report, Amnesty International detailed chilling witness accounts of indiscriminate killings in the Horn of Africa country and called on the international community to stop the bloodshed.
The rights group said it obtained scores of reports of killings by Ethiopian troops that Somalis have described as "slaughtering like goats." In one case, "a young child's throat was slit by Ethiopian soldiers in front of the child's mother," the report says.
Amnesty said some 6,000 civilians were reported killed and more than 600,000 were forced to flee their homes in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, last year.
"The people of Somalia are being killed, raped, tortured. Looting is widespread and entire neighborhoods are being destroyed," Michelle Kagari, Amnesty's deputy director for Africa, said in a statement from Nairobi that accompanied the report.
The report quotes testimony from some 75 witnesses as well as scores of workers from non-governmental organizations. People are identified only by their first names to protect them from retaliation.
In one testimony, Haboon, 56, said her neighbor's 17-year-old daughter was raped by Ethiopian troops. The girl's brothers tried to defend their sister, but the soldiers beat them and gouged their eyes out with a bayonet, Haboon was quoted as telling Amnesty.
In a another chapter on violations by Ethiopian forces, the report quoted several interviews conducted by Amnesty staff in Somalia.
In Mogadishu's Holwadag neighbourhood, 15-year-old Barni recounted how she found her father with his throat cut when she came back from school and found the rest of her family gone following an operation by Ethiopian forces.
Ceeblaa, a 63-year-old woman from the capital's Wardhigley district told AI she saw three men from her neighbourhood being rounded up by Ethiopian troops.
"The next morning, she saw the bodies of the three men on the street," the report said.
"One was strangled with electrical wire. The second had his throat cut. The third had been chained ankle to wrist, and his testicles had been smashed."
The rights group had recently accused Ethiopian forces of killing at least 21 people inside a Mogadishu mosque on April 19, seven of whom had their throats slit.
Last month, Amnesty said Ethiopian troops killed 21 people in Mogadishu's Al Hidaaya Mosque -- seven of the victims had their throats cut. Ethiopia dismissed the report as lies, saying its soldiers had never been involved in such incidents.
"The testimony we received strongly suggests that war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity have been committed by all parties to the conflict in Somalia and no one is being held accountable," Kagari said.
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-upda ... a-20080506
Published: May 6, 2008
NAIROBI, Kenya:
A leading human rights group on Tuesday accused Ethiopian troops in Somalia of killing civilians and committing atrocities, including slitting people's throats, gouging out eyes and gang-raping women.
In a new report, Amnesty International detailed chilling witness accounts of indiscriminate killings in the Horn of Africa country and called on the international community to stop the bloodshed.
The rights group said it obtained scores of reports of killings by Ethiopian troops that Somalis have described as "slaughtering like goats." In one case, "a young child's throat was slit by Ethiopian soldiers in front of the child's mother," the report says.
Amnesty said some 6,000 civilians were reported killed and more than 600,000 were forced to flee their homes in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, last year.
"The people of Somalia are being killed, raped, tortured. Looting is widespread and entire neighborhoods are being destroyed," Michelle Kagari, Amnesty's deputy director for Africa, said in a statement from Nairobi that accompanied the report.
The report quotes testimony from some 75 witnesses as well as scores of workers from non-governmental organizations. People are identified only by their first names to protect them from retaliation.
In one testimony, Haboon, 56, said her neighbor's 17-year-old daughter was raped by Ethiopian troops. The girl's brothers tried to defend their sister, but the soldiers beat them and gouged their eyes out with a bayonet, Haboon was quoted as telling Amnesty.
In a another chapter on violations by Ethiopian forces, the report quoted several interviews conducted by Amnesty staff in Somalia.
In Mogadishu's Holwadag neighbourhood, 15-year-old Barni recounted how she found her father with his throat cut when she came back from school and found the rest of her family gone following an operation by Ethiopian forces.
Ceeblaa, a 63-year-old woman from the capital's Wardhigley district told AI she saw three men from her neighbourhood being rounded up by Ethiopian troops.
"The next morning, she saw the bodies of the three men on the street," the report said.
"One was strangled with electrical wire. The second had his throat cut. The third had been chained ankle to wrist, and his testicles had been smashed."
The rights group had recently accused Ethiopian forces of killing at least 21 people inside a Mogadishu mosque on April 19, seven of whom had their throats slit.
Last month, Amnesty said Ethiopian troops killed 21 people in Mogadishu's Al Hidaaya Mosque -- seven of the victims had their throats cut. Ethiopia dismissed the report as lies, saying its soldiers had never been involved in such incidents.
"The testimony we received strongly suggests that war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity have been committed by all parties to the conflict in Somalia and no one is being held accountable," Kagari said.
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-upda ... a-20080506
maybe the ICU is trying to defame TFG/Ethiopia 
so somalis join your cuzzins and dont think from your arab heads.
