Meles, is your Daughter part of the ''Somalia Picnic''?

Somalia: Militants Vow to Defeat Ethiopian Incursion: Somalia's Islamist Shebab rebels warned Ethiopia on Sunday they would "break the necks" of their troops inside Somalia, a day after several hundred soldiers crossed into the war-torn country.

Semehal-Meles Zenawi's daughter

Ethiopians are experiencing tremendous human rights, prosperity, freedom of expression, stability, employment opportunities, bumper harvest and the like ever since you came to power and accepted with humiliation the ''new breeds of democratic African leaders'' a buzz word which was coined to you and your counterparts in Eritrea, Uganda and Rwanda by the then American president Bill Clinton back then in 90s. We're deeply indebted for these extra-ordinary jobs executed by you and your hard-working, selfless, devoted and patriot colleagues who continue to work around the clock to make sure we eat three meals/day, express ourselves in various manners and outlets, organize ourselves, criticize our government regardless of its perfect nature, and above all not only protect us but also send our brothers/sisters on picnic to help our neighbors who are in trouble and requested for support- as the saying goes A neighbor in need, A neighbor indeed. Our troops jubilantly came back after they received hospitable welcome by our friendly Somali neighbors and successfully accomplished their picnic in Somalia as it shows in the above clip. However, there're rumors by the likes of allafrica.com, cnn.com, bbc.com etc that

I'm running a Morgue, Ethiopia's Ambassador to Lebanon!!!

RIP sisters,

Unfortunately, you're one of the over thousands of Ethiopian victims of such barbaric killings by oil-rich citizens of middle-eastern countries. These crimes have been going on for decades and they seem to increase as neither supplying countries like Ethiopia nor the petrol-rich Arab nations couldn't care less about the lives and security of people like you. How many million poor & desperate girls/women should die before the world say ENOUGH to these countries by taking tough measures to stop the killings, sexual & physical abuses, exploitation of our sisters and daughters? It seems like our sisters/daughters are the most disposable creatures in this world and organized criminals at Addis Ababa are reaping millions of $$$ profits out of these desperate girls/women. The killings & ''suicides'' of our sisters came just a day after an ''Ethiopian Ambassador'' in Lebanon told CNN that ''I'm no longer running an Embassy, I'm running a morgue''. Ethiopia is a land many surprises, here we go, it assigns an undertaker as an ''Ambassador'', please quite your job and apply for some job which fits your merits; right now you don't qualify for this noble job. How much we can take to be disgraced and laughing stock to the world? Surprisingly, his master at Arat Kilo palace pledged to work with the Saudi business partners to boost modern slavery, after having a regular health check up last August in Saudi-Arabia. The atrocities against Shewaye Mollah by Muammer Qaddafi's daughter and these latest reports , expose the true colors of those allegations of the housemaids committing ''suicides'' in the middle east countries. Sadly, girls like these ones will keep on fleeing to their death row as they have neither hope nor opportunities nor good governance nor justice back home. This is a choice between lesser evil.

Kuwaiti held after Ethiopian maid beaten to death

Breaking News: Ethiopia's ''Mohammed Bouazizi'' died yesterday

Ethiopia's '' Bouazizi''
set himself on fire on 11/11/11

His name is Yenesew Gebre, 29, Ethiopian elementary school teacher at a small village called Waka in Southern region of the country. He was fired and then imprisoned along with over 90 residents of the village last month by local officials for demanding the rule of law, good governance, and other human rights issues. He was released after the court couldn't find evidence against him while it kept the rest of the protesters including the elderly under police custody. Yenesew immolated himself on 11-11-11 in front of the local administration office in protest against the rulings of the court which still keep the rest of the prisoners. Unfortunately Yenesew died yesterday afternoon at a local hospital, called Terecha. Residents of Waka told VOA Amharic service yesterday that

Blame it on the UK, Ethiopia Charges Opposition Figures, Reporter With Terrorism!

Ethiopia Charges Opposition Figures, Reporter With Terrorism

Meles Zenawi already gave the verdict a month ago at his rubber-stamp Parliament; his kangaroo court is nothing but a circus to portray his legitimacy and the prevalence of the rule of law which is otherwise. These people have no shame, otherwise how on earth Ethiopia's best known sluggish judicial system all of sudden charge its ''defendants'' at speed of light. This shows the desperation of Zenawi & co to intimidate the remaining independent journalists, opposition members and above all he is signaling to the duo Swedes that he can do whatever he wants to do. Obviously, this's a preemptive tactic to contain the ever increasing pressure from inside and outside, which in some ways might buy him time but will never spare him from the fate of his fellow dictators. Thanks to Anti-Terrorism Law of England, which our country copied it ''word for word'', three prominent journalists including more than half a dozen opposition leaders and members are now behind bars. Neither English journalists nor opposition figures stopped functioning or the UK government has secret court hearings and prisons for offenders of its ''Anti-Terrorism'' law. The Arab Spring freed Libyans, Tunisians &  Egyptians from decades old shackles and now it's time for Horn Africa's

Adius humanity, Africans' lives worth nothing

Refugees face organ theft in the Sinai

CNN's Fred Pleitgen investigates human organ trafficking in Egypt's Sinai

Bedouin smugglers involved in people trafficking are also believed to be stealing organs from Eritrean refugees who are unable to pay their demands for large amounts of cash to take them into Israel

I thought I saw the worst but this CNN clip proved me wrong. I still couldn't believe how human beings do such barbaric and inhumane things to others. It doesn't get worse than this, it seems like Africans' lives are the cheapest and the most disposable on the whole planet. Most of these victims are refugees who are fleeing from Ethiopia, Eritrea and the Sudan where extrajudicial killings & imprisonments, torture, rape, famine, diseases, corruption, lack of freedom of speech, expression and religion as well as the rule of law are rampant. Unfortunately, a few make their dreams come true while others are end up like this or are being tortured, raped, exploited, imprisoned and killed by Libyan and Egyptian gangs on daily basis. The few ''lucky ones'' who made it to Israel have no guarantee of protection; instead the Egyptian & Israeli authorities are still deporting them back to hell on earth. I still don't understand what kind of crimes we, Africans do/did, to be treated like sub humans by our owns as well as the rest of human race. US led NATO and some of its allies waged war to protect Libyan civilians from Gaddafi's killing machines while they ignored sub-Saharan Africans to be butchered by their Libyan allies or drowned in thousands on Mediterranean sea. I read a story about an Ethiopian dad's plea to save his daughter's life at Yemeni hospital after he lost his wife along hundreds of Ethiopian, Somalian & Sudanese refugees on a capsized boat while on board to the gulf of Aden. The indifference and the silence towards such tragic incidents are so shocking and it feels like this has become so ''normal'' to the wider public and African life worth nothing.

''One becomes a vegetable'' Martin Schibbye

''One becomes a vegetable'' Martin Schibbye- this is how the Swedish Journalist described his, his colleague Johan Persson and other Ethiopian prisoners' daily life- to his wife during her brief recent visit at Kaliti (the worst prison in the world) when she went to attend the Meles Zenawi's kangaroo court hearing last week. Well, that's the whole idea of Zenawi's brutal regime's prisons. Thanks Linnea Schibbye Steiner for sharing what your beloved husband and many other inmates have been through in my country where organized criminals are terrorizing the whole nation under psydo-democracy, sham election and kangaroo courts. This's not something new to us; he did this hundreds times over the last 20years; a case in point: Meles & his clones made sure Ethiopia's renown surgeon Prof. Asrat Woldyes to vegetate in their prison until he was sick fatally, they imprisoned opposition and civil society leaders, journalists, ordinary citizens, teachers, farmers etc just to satisfy his sadistic and megalomaniac misdemeanor. What makes Zenawi's brutality different from the rest of his partners in crimes including his predecessor-Mengistu Hailemariam-is that his viciousness as well as using kangaroo courts and cooked up evidences as guises to torture, humiliate, degrade and kill slowly his victims psychologically and physically by dragging the court hearings for ever with his remote control. He always plays safe especially with cause celebére (not to mention his exceptional killing sprees) to deceive about his legitimacy and the prevalence of independent judiciary which is otherwise. This's what Meles & co. are doing to millions of Ethiopians on daily basis with impunity and ironically the world is parading him at single senseless meetings and conferences as a reward.

If it was Zimbabwe...

This's so typical predictable and laughable behavior of TPLF, it's always the police who is their witness to corroborate the ''cooked up charges''. Meles Zenawi & his stooges used their self-serving kangaroo court to deceive the world about the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law which are otherwise. They've such a short memory and gullible arrogance that they apply the same trick over and over thinking the rest of the world would believe what they're saying/doing at face value. How on earth journalists with camera train guerrilla fighters? It doesn't matter how many times they make a fool of themselves; otherwise they charged leaders of opposition parties and civil societies, peaceful demonstrators including journalists with treason and genocide after they themselves rigged the 2005 election and then in its aftermath killed over 200 people. A year or two later they accused Ethiopian pop star Teddy Afro with ''hit & run'' charge by placing a corpse on a road  he was driving home after arriving in Addis from a foreign tour. There're hundreds of such similar politically motivated cases unfortunately Johan Persson & Martin Schibbye are

Land-grabbing vs Ethiopian Journalists - Conspiracy of Silence or Conflict of Interests?

''Instead of asking per Diem, journalists have been bargaining with urban mayors to grab plots of land. Some of the journalists have grabbed massive plots of lands in different towns. Some of them gained not one or two plots of land; they grabbed eight to nine plots.” (ERTA reporter, personal communication, 14 July 2010). (Birhanu Olana, 482, 2010)*

This is an excerpt that I read on Facebook group (which I created for Ex-ETV journalists)  from a recently published research findings about new corrupt trends of Ethiopian journalists especially those who work for the government media. I'm still in shock and in disbelief (who wouldn't unless s/he is involved in such practices) that  was actually an account  from an Ethiopian TV (where I served myself as reporter/producer from 2000-2004) reporter. One plot of land, usually 200m2, would sell for 60,000 birr (about USD 5,000) on average. This means that a journalist who has grabbed nine plots of land could sell them for 540,000 birr (about USD 45,000) (Birhanu O., 482, 2010) which is unprecedented  fortune for any ordinary Ethiopian journalist.

Even though the findings revealed the wide-spread of corruption practices among Ethiopian journalists of both private and government owned media institutions, according to the researchers- an ex ETV employee, Birhanu Olana (who's doing his PhD at University of Sydney, Australia) and his reviewer Terje S. Skjerdal (a Norwegian media researcher)- those who work for the government media were/are not only involved in land-grabbing practices but also use systematic methods to cover it up. Another research which was conducted