| Related Stories Ethiopia opens 'Red Terror' museum News24 Recording Ethiopia's Red Terror BBC Red Terror (Ethiopia) From Wikipedia "The Ethiopian Red Terror, or Qey Shibir (also Key Shibbir, etc., Amharic: ቀይ ሽብር ḳäy šəbbər; 1977–1978), was a violent political campaign in Ethiopia that most visibly took place once Communist Mengistu Haile Mariam achieved control of the Derg, the military junta, 3 February 1977....More |
Ethiopia reburies Mengistu victims
29 April, 2010 | AFP
A funeral convoy of dark vehicles made its way through the
capital's main streets carrying coffins draped in the Ethiopian flag, as
a military band played sombre tunes.
Relatives observed a minute's silence at a museum where they were
to be re-buried.
The museum opened last month after three years of construction. It
is to honour victims of the 1977-78 campaign of state terror carried
out on Mengistu's orders to wipe out his opponents.
Only ten bodies have been identified since they were exhumed in
1994 by Argentinian forensic experts from a former security
compound in the north of Addis Ababa.
"These young Ethiopian victims were rounded up by government
agents and strangled by rope in 1978," Ayne Tsige, the head of the
victims' association, told AFP.
Sixty-seven year-old Zeineba Seid recalled the events that followed
her brother's disappearance.
"They kept telling us he was alive and well. We only confirmed after
the bodies were found," she said, referring to local authorities.
Her brother's remains were identified in 1994 with the help of her
own DNA.
"Although his loss is painful for us all, I am extremely happy that we
have finally laid him to rest," said Meaza Gulema, a cousin of the
slain man.
Mengistu, now in exile in Zimbabwe, was sentenced in absentia two
years ago to death for genocide along with 17 of his henchmen
following a decade-long trial in Addis Ababa.
The former army lieutenant-colonel was a member of the Marxist
junta known as the Derg which ruled Ethiopia from 1974 to 1991
after the ouster of emperor Haile Selassie.
As many as 100,000 people were killed during the campaign as
Mengistu sought to transform the country into a Soviet-style
workers' state.
The regime, then battling a number of insurgencies throughout the
country, used several tactics to scare opponents, one of which was
leaving dead bodies on streets as a warning.
Courtesy
29 April, 2010 | AFP
- ADDIS ABABA —
Dozens of Ethiopians
marched Thursday
to rebury family
members massacred
during dictator
Mengistu Haile
Mariam's "Red
Terror" purge which
claimed tens of
thousands of lives
some 30 years ago.
A funeral convoy of dark vehicles made its way through the
capital's main streets carrying coffins draped in the Ethiopian flag, as
a military band played sombre tunes.
Relatives observed a minute's silence at a museum where they were
to be re-buried.
The museum opened last month after three years of construction. It
is to honour victims of the 1977-78 campaign of state terror carried
out on Mengistu's orders to wipe out his opponents.
Only ten bodies have been identified since they were exhumed in
1994 by Argentinian forensic experts from a former security
compound in the north of Addis Ababa.
"These young Ethiopian victims were rounded up by government
agents and strangled by rope in 1978," Ayne Tsige, the head of the
victims' association, told AFP.
Sixty-seven year-old Zeineba Seid recalled the events that followed
her brother's disappearance.
"They kept telling us he was alive and well. We only confirmed after
the bodies were found," she said, referring to local authorities.
Her brother's remains were identified in 1994 with the help of her
own DNA.
"Although his loss is painful for us all, I am extremely happy that we
have finally laid him to rest," said Meaza Gulema, a cousin of the
slain man.
Mengistu, now in exile in Zimbabwe, was sentenced in absentia two
years ago to death for genocide along with 17 of his henchmen
following a decade-long trial in Addis Ababa.
The former army lieutenant-colonel was a member of the Marxist
junta known as the Derg which ruled Ethiopia from 1974 to 1991
after the ouster of emperor Haile Selassie.
As many as 100,000 people were killed during the campaign as
Mengistu sought to transform the country into a Soviet-style
workers' state.
The regime, then battling a number of insurgencies throughout the
country, used several tactics to scare opponents, one of which was
leaving dead bodies on streets as a warning.
Courtesy
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- Ethiopian woman confronts
'Red Terror" ghosts
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'Red Terror" ghosts
-Zimbabwe to extradite
Mengistu to Ethiopia
- War crimes tribunal
violated human rights
| Human Rights |
| Useful Links Ethiopian Human Rights Council Ethiopia Human Rights Solidarity Committee for Ethiopian Political Prisoners Ethiopia: Country Reports on Human Rights Practices |
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| Ethiopian court sentences Mengistu to death ( Reuters ) " ...Mengistu seized power in 1974 after the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie, and clawed his way to the top in the military junta called the Derg." More Mengistu defends 'Red Terror' BBC |
| Visitors look at pictures of victims of Ethiopia's 'Red Terror' campaign (AFP) |