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Getting Ethiopia Dead Wrong

Danish journalist Rasmus Sonderriis has spent seven of the last nineteen years living in Ethiopia, beginning in 2004. He just published “Getting Ethiopia Dead Wrong ,” a free Substack e-book, in which he gets it dead right. This is his account of Western media and officialdom’s disgraceful and deeply damaging deceptions and distortions about the November 2020 to November 2022 Ethiopian civil war, which is now commonly known as the Tigray War. Cutting straight to the chase, he notes that the war began when the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) attacked the Northern Command base of the Ethiopian National Defense Force on November 3, 2020, and the government responded, as any government would, by sending in troops to reestablish its legitimate monopoly on the use of force.

Western Media Glorifies TPLF Mob Violence Against Eritrean Festivals

For 40 years, Eritrean Festivals have been held around the world to sustain the diaspora community’s connections to their homeland and to one another. But this year, a violent, well-coordinated international campaign of sabotage left festival goers badly injured and property damaged. Major Western media reported the pogrom-style attacks as “clashes,” “riots,” “fights” and “violence” in a way that implied these had broken out between two sides, masking the reality – that hooligans had attacked peaceful festival goers. They also implied that the violence was warranted because Eritrea is run by a “repressive” government on the wrong side of the new Cold War.

The US Is Determined To Drive A Wedge Between Ethiopia And Eritrea

Western officials and pundits never stop trying to drive a wedge between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Their screams that Eritrea must get out of Ethiopia have grown louder and louder every day since  Ethiopia and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) signed a peace agreement to end the two-year civil war. The US should get out of Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America, and outer space before it brings an end to life on earth, but of course that’s not on the table. Instead we hear that the Ethiopian peace agreement is likely to collapse if Eritrean troops don’t leave Ethiopia. Biden, Blinken, and rabid pro-TPLF Congressmen like Brad Sherman, D-CA, continue to threaten Ethiopia, but even more so Eritrea, with sanctions.

Ethiopia Nears Victory In Its Civil War, US Scrambles To Control The Outcome

The Ethiopian and Eritrean armies now seem close to winning a two-year war with the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF,) a US-backed clique that ruled Ethiopia brutally for 27 years, from 1991 to 2018. As I write this, on October 24, 2022, Ethiopian and Eritrean forces are in control of most major cities in Ethiopia’s Tigray Region. They are reported to have surrounded Mek’ele, the Tigrayan Region’s capital, but it’s not clear whether or not they are inside. On Saturday, October 22nd, huge crowds rallied for Ethiopian sovereignty in Addis Ababa and across the country, holding up signs that read “No More to a Proxy War,” “USA Respect Ethiopian Sovereignty,” and “No Intervention in the Name of Humanitarian Aid.” Establishment outlets including the Associated Press and Bloomberg News felt compelled to report the rallies.

An Inversion Of Truth: The TPLF And Its Commitment To Peace

Events in Ethiopia continue to rapidly develop. Ethiopian federal forces have taken control of a string of major towns and cities in Tigray Region in recent days, and they are now reported be on the outskirts of Mekelle, the regional capital. The city’s airport, located some kilometers from the heart of the capital, was taken over by federal forces on Tuesday evening following fierce fighting. Meanwhile, high-level delegations from both the Ethiopian government and the TPLF have reportedly flown to South Africa for much-anticipated peace talks. Like all conflicts, the one that has been raging in northern Ethiopia during the past two years has been fought both on the ground and along the information front. Within the latter battle, a recurring, ever-present element has been disinformation.

Ethiopian Diaspora Groups Prepare To Protest West’s Support For TLPF

Ethiopian diaspora across the Western world is condemning the US and the EU for “emboldening” the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) which resumed the war in the northern part of the country on August 24, ending the truce initiated by the federal government in March. “Deploring the International community, in particular the UN, United States and the EU Member states, for their continued sympathy” towards the TPLF, the Ethiopian Advocacy Organizations Worldwide (EAOW) passed a resolution on Friday, September 2. The EAOW, a consortium of 18 organizations representing Ethiopian nationals in the US, Canada, UK, South Africa, and 11 European countries, condemned the TPLF’s alleged systematic large-scale forced conscriptions – including of child soldiers – in the northernmost State of Tigray.

Eritrean Martyr’s Day

On June 20th, Eritrea celebrates Martyr’s Day, in honor of those who fell in the 30-year war for independence from Ethiopia, from 1961-1991, and those who have fallen in the ensuing off-and-on war with Ethiopia’s Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). A former Italian colony, Eritrea aspired to independence after the Italians suffered defeat in World War II, but it was instead drawn into the Cold War politics that dominated the Horn of Africa—and most of the world—once it was over. To reward Ethiopia for its service during the war, the United States pressured the United Nations to give Eritrea to Emperor Haile Selassie to administer and then to annex in 1962. In 1961, a group of students, professionals, and college professors founded the Eritrean Liberation Front and began the longest war for independence in Africa, in which ten percent of Eritrea’s population are thought to have died.

Notes From Wartorn Ethiopia, Part Five

As I scroll through my cell phone snapshots, I come across one taken several days ago from the back seat of a bajaj, aka “tuk tuk,” one of the three-wheeled blue taxis in service all over Ethiopia. Drivers decorate these vehicles with their favorite decals, including the phrases “#NoMore” and “It’s My Dam,” images of Ethiopian Emperors Menelik and Tewodros, and the image of Bob Marley. The driver of this bajaj had affixed a red, green, and gold “RASTA” decal to one side of his front window and a red, green, and gold cannabis leaf decal to the other. Emperor Haile Selassie gave land to a Rasta community in Ethiopia, but smoking the sacred herb is still illegal. This is one of many things I still don't understand here.

Notes from Eritrea

I had no idea until today that International Workers’ Day is a national holiday in Eritrea. I missed the celebrations because I was rushing to the airport to get from Addis Ababa to Asmara, the Eritrean capital, but today I took a cell phone snap of the banner “Long Live May 1 International Workers’ Day” still hanging outside a park. It’s no surprise that the US has done everything it can to turn a nation that celebrates International Workers’ Day into a pariah state. Free education through college and subsidized health care don’t suit its neoliberal model either, nor does its determination to negotiate fair prices for its considerable natural resources. Eritrea may have most offended US policymakers, however, by its defiance of the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the US puppet that ruled Ethiopia with an iron fist from 1991 to 2018, then started the ongoing Ethiopian war by attacking the nation’s Northern Command base in Tigray Region in November 2020.

Notes From Wartorn Ethiopia, Part III

The discovery of mass graves and underground prisons in Ethiopia has exposed the crimes of the Tigray Peoples’ Liberation Front or TPLF, the U.S. puppets who tyrannized Ethiopia for 27 years with divide-and-conquer ethnic politics from 1991 to 2018, when a popular uprising forced them from power. The TPLF then retreated to Tigray Region and, in November 2020, started the ongoing civil war by attacking the national army’s Northern Command. US officialdom and both state and corporate media in the US have since described the Ethiopian conflict as the government's persecution of the Tigrayan People’s Front and the Tigrayan people. Biden’s USAID Chief and arch warmonger Samantha Power warned of “Tigray genocide” and the usual humanitarian war scenario began to unfold.

How Tedros Violated UN Rules To Advance TPLF Interests In Ethiopia

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, World Health Organization (WHO) Secretary-General and overseer of the UN’s global coronavirus response, has established a shadow relief operation that sidesteps the authority of Ethiopia’s sovereign government and directly coordinates with his political allies in the country’s civil war. The alleged actions by Tedros, which have come to light through leaked audio conversations of UN workers, constitute a violation of UN code, which stipulates staff maintain neutrality and refrain from intervening in the affairs of member states. A participant in the leaked discussion also states that Tedros tried to replace the UN’s top coordinator in Ethiopia with someone willing to advance his political objectives.

US-Backed TPLF Seeks Protection From UN After Facing Military Defeat

On December 23, Ethiopian government’s Minister of Communication Service, Legesse Tulu, announced that all parts of eastern Amhara and the entire Afar state have been liberated from the occupation of the US-backed Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). The TPLF, which started the civil war in November 2020 by attacking a federal army base in Tigray state’s capital city Mekelle, had invaded these two neighboring states after the federal government’s unilateral ceasefire on June 29.

Ethiopia: TPLF Announces Retreat

The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) has announced that it will withdraw its forces to “give peace a chance.” This marks a key milestone in the civil war it started in November 2020. Why was the TPLF forced to retreat? What prospects lie ahead for the country? Elias Amare, editor of Horn of Africa TV, explains.

Ethiopia: The West’s Diplomats Meet In Secret To Help The TPLF

Former ambassadors and current diplomats for the United States, Britain and EU had a Zoom meeting this past Sunday with an official for the TPLF in what amounts to a green light from the West for the terrorist group’s attempts to overthrow the democratically elected Ethiopian government. And there’s evidence to prove it: a phone-cam video of the two-hour meeting. “I hope that you’ll have military success fairly soon, because it seems as if the situation is only becoming more drastic,” said Vicki Huddleston, who was Chargé d’Affairs ad interim in Ethiopia during years the TPLF were in power. France’s retired diplomat and writer Stéphane Gompertz openly speculated on the potential for Abiy to be forced from power.

Ethiopia: Abiy Will Lead Army In Anti-TPLF Struggle ‘From The Battlefront’

In a Monday statement, the Ethiopian head of government said he would "lead the fight from tomorrow onwards," calling on all Ethiopians to unite in defense of their country and on all Black people across the world to defend Ethiopia in the spirit of pan-Africanism. "Starting tomorrow, I will mobilize to the front to lead the defense forces," Abiy said in the release. "Those who want to be among the Ethiopian children who will be hailed by history, rise up for your country today. Let's meet at the front." “We are now in the final stages of saving Ethiopia,” he added. “Our enemies are attacking us on the outside and on the inside … This is the struggle of all Black people. It is a conspiracy to humiliate Black people and subdue Ethiopia in a new colonial yoke.”

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