Pathetic Spokesman McCormack Dares Question the Veracity of the HRW Report on Somalia

In five previous articles, entitled "Terrorist State ´Ethiopia´ to Be Punished for Evil Role in Somalia – HRW Report Summary" (http://www.buzzle.com/articles/terrorist-state-ethiopia-to-be-punished-for-evil-role-in-somalia-hrw-report-summary.html), "So Much to Fear - War Crimes and the Devastation of Somalia, HRW Report Recommendations" (http://www.buzzle.com/articles/so-much-to-fear-war-crimes-and-the-devastation-of-somalia-hrw-report-recommendations.html), "Amhara and Tigray ´Ethiopianist´ Regime: Osama Bin Laden´s Foremost Ally" (http://www.buzzle.com/articles/amhara-and-tigray-ethiopianist-regime-osama-bin-laden-foremost-ally.html), "Incommensurable Monstrosity of Amhara – Tigray Death Squads at Mogadishu, Revealed by HRW Report" (http://www.buzzle.com/articles/incommensurable-monstrosity-of-amhara-tigray-death-squads-at-mogadishu-revealed-by-hrw-report.html), and "The Destruction of Mogadishu: Genocidal Plans and Practices of the Evil Amhara - Tigray Regime" (http://www.buzzle.com/articles/the-destruction-of-mogadishu-genocidal-plans-and-practices-of-the-evil-amhara-tigray-regime.html), I re-published the chapters ´Summary´, ´Recommendations´, ´Methodology´, ´Background´, ´International Humanitarian Law and the Conflict in Somalia´, ´Civilian Deaths and the Destruction of Mogadishu´, and ´Human Rights Abuses by Transitional Federal Government Forces´ from the HRW Report on Somalia.

In the present article, I republish the Report´s most critical chapter, namely ´Laws of War and Human Rights Violations by Ethiopian Military Forces´.

Before that, I will republish excerpts from the daily press briefing offered to media representatives by the Spokesman of the State Department Sean McCormack - just three days ago.

Asked about the HRW Report, the indescribable spokesman McCormack failed to admit the reality, namely that his government´s unconditional support of the TFG and ´Ethiopia´ helped only exacerbate the Somalia crisis.

And to add comical reference to his lack of proper response, he suggested the journalists to refer to ….. "the transcripts from Jendayi", the inhuman and racist accomplice of the monstrous Abyssinian gangster Zenawi.

McCormack´s sentences about Somalia are a must read; they bear witness to the utmost inhumanity that characterizes the criminal American interlocutors of the barbaric and racist Abyssinian regime.

Somali, Ogadeni, Oromo, Afar, and Sidama blood is fresh in the hands of McCormack, Jendayi Frazer, Condoleezza Rice and President Bush.

As long as they don´t dissociate themselves from Africa´s most rancorous and hateful hyenas, the Amhara and Tigray Monophysitic Abyssinians who rule the fake state ´Ethiopia´, they are and they are viewed as their allies.

As long as they don´t impose an international embargo against ´Ethiopia´ on the basis of so many extremely analytical and scrupulously descriptive reports, they bear full responsibility as criminal partners in the world´s most odious crime which has been committed for more than 17 years against Somalia.

As long as they pursue the shameful tactics of silence and complicity, they bring on their heads the dramatic consequences that they deserve – and which they will not escape. It is sheer delusion for anyone to assume that a stance like this will have no consequences.

It is a real shame for any country to be represented by a pathetic accomplice able to merely utter that he is not sure "what Human Rights Watch is trying to do with this report".

What spokesman McCormack must be able at least to answer is "what the US is trying to do with the criminal policy of support to Abyssinia".

What this felon must definitely understand is that America will pay a heavy price for its alliance with Hitler´s Children in Africa, and that whatever America has done or may do in the future will not prevent the final dissolution and destruction of ´Ethiopia´ and the bleak but perfectly deserved days for the criminal and unrepentant perpetrators of serial genocides, the Amhara and Tigray Monophysitic (Tewahedo) tribes of Abyssinia.

In forthcoming articles, I will complete the re-publication of the enlightening Report that should become the basic set of guidelines of a total reconsideration of the American policy for East Africa.

Daily Press Briefing by Sean McCormack, Spokesman

http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2008/112927.htm

Washington, DC

December 8, 2008

QUESTION: There´s a new Human Rights Watch report on Somalia that´s very critical of the U.S. Government´s support, or what they call unconditional support, of the government, which they say is exasperating the political situation and aiding human rights abuses.

MR. MCCORMACK: Well, where to start with such an assertion? Look, I think you can go back and look at my transcripts, look at the transcripts from Jendayi, where I say we´re interested in working with all parties and have an interest in working with all parties who want to have a – work towards a better future in Somalia. That has been the case. It just so happens that the Transitional Federal Government is such an institution. It´s not exclusive. Those who want to make a constructive contribution to Somalia´s future, we´re willing to take a look at how we might work together.

The people with whom we won´t work are terrorists. So I´m not sure what the suggestion of Human Rights Watch is in that regard. The United States as well as other countries have also made extensive efforts to ensure the continuing flow of humanitarian goods into Somalia. So not only have we contributed to humanitarian relief, but we have also helped ensure that those humanitarian goods get into Somalia.

So, yeah, I´m not sure, you know, what Human Rights Watch is trying to do with this report, what points they´re trying to score. But Somalia is a deeply tragic place and has been for some time. We have been working with others to try to make it a less tragic place and a place that has a better future.

I want to start –

QUESTION: What do you mean by scoring points?

MR. MCCORMACK: I don´t know. I mean, I – you give me these sort of quotes talking about the United States and criticizing the United States -- I´m not sure – for its efforts in Somalia. I´m not sure really even the basis for making those kinds of statements, those kinds of assertions. It´s just ridiculous on its face.

QUESTION: Same topic, Somalia?

MR. MCCORMACK: Yeah.

QUESTION: Is the United – is the State Department assisting the FBI in searching for these Somali Americans who apparently have gone back to Somalia and are at risk of participating in terrorism?

MR. MCCORMACK: Not sure. I´ll –

QUESTION: Can you take it?

MR. MCCORMACK: I´ll have to take the question, yeah.

QUESTION: Same subject?

MR. MCCORMACK: Yeah, Dave.

QUESTION: The Ethiopians have announced that they´re going to leave the country within weeks. They´re certainly reporting that if that happens, Somalia will have, you know, an all-out, ungoverned, failed state. What sort of diplomacy are you involved in, I mean, to try to – are you trying to talk the Ethiopians out of leaving or trying to increase other foreign forces there?

MR. MCCORMACK: Well, what we´re taking a look at and we´re trying to work through the international system, that is, trying to find a way that you can have a responsible international force in Somalia to help provide some security and therefore some stability, and allow some of these weaker institutions to start to take hold in a positive way. So we´re looking at a variety of different ways of doing that, working with the AU, working through the UN.

Thus far, I don´t have the answer for you, but I – this is something that Secretary Rice, just on her last trip in the UK, she spoke with Foreign Secretary Miliband about. And so we´re continuing to look for a solution. There clearly needs to be an answer to this question. We just haven´t found the right one yet.

Yeah.

QUESTION: A transition question. When do you expect the first meeting between Secretary Rice and Senator Clinton? Or has it happened already and we don´t –

MR. MCCORMACK: No, it hasn´t happened. We´ll let you know.

QUESTION: Will that be here?

MR. MCCORMACK: We´ll let you know. We´ll let you know the details, as many details as we can provide.

QUESTION: Yeah, after the fact.

MR. MCCORMACK: Yeah.

Laws of War and Human Rights Violations by Ethiopian Military Forces

http://www.hrw.org/en/node/76418/section/11

As of early 2007, ENDF troops had a reputation among many Somalis interviewed by Human Rights Watch for being admirably disciplined in their day-to-day interactions with Somali civilians, even if most Somalis resented their presence in the country.[143] That discipline has been allowed to erode severely. Ethiopian forces have been implicated in numerous violations of the laws of war, including acts by individuals that amount to war crimes. They have indiscriminately bombarded populated areas with mortar shells, artillery, and rockets. They have increasingly responded to insurgent ambushes and other attacks by firing indiscriminately at anyone and everyone in the general vicinity. And incidents of killing, rape, and looting involving ENDF personnel have greatly increased.

Indiscriminate Attacks

Rockets, Mortars, and Artillery

ENDF forces in Mogadishu have routinely and indiscriminately bombarded populated residential areas of Mogadishu since March 2007. They have made regular use of "Katyusha" rockets in Mogadishu, often fired from BM-21 "Grad" multiple-rocket-launchers.[144] Their use in populated urban environments is inherently indiscriminate, in violation of international humanitarian law.

The crushing impact of these bombardments on Mogadishu residents has been well-documented.[145] Nonetheless, there is no evidence that Ethiopian forces have in any way curtailed them.

Ethiopian forces carried out similar indiscriminate bombardments in fighting in the strategically important town of Beletweyne. In July 2008 Al-Shabaab fighters launched mortar shells against ENDF troops stationed at a base just outside Beletweyne unlawfully using the town's civilian population as cover.[146] ENDF forces responded by indiscriminately bombarding large swathes of the western districts of the town for three days beginning on July 24.[147] Humanitarian organizations estimated that at the end of July, 74,000 people-more than 75 percent of the town's population-had been displaced as a direct result of the bombardment and related fighting.[148]

Indiscriminate Gunfire

There have been increased reports in 2008 of Ethiopian forces responding to insurgent ambushes and other attacks by firing indiscriminately into populated areas. Incidents of indiscriminate ENDF fire that claimed civilian lives appear to have occurred with increasing frequency, particularly in Mogadishu, Baidoa, and along the Mogadishu-Afgooye road.

One of the most notorious incidents of 2008 occurred on August 15 when an ENDF convoy was struck by a roadside bomb along the Mogadishu-Afgooye road, home to hundreds of thousands of displaced persons from Mogadishu and a frequent site of armed clashes. Ethiopian soldiers in the convoy responded by firing wildly in all directions, and when the shooting stopped at least 40 Somali civilians were dead, including the passengers of two public minibuses.[149] Human Rights Watch put these allegations to the Ethiopian Embassy in Washington, DC, which responded that a thorough investigation had demonstrated the civilian casualties were the result of a roadside bomb planted by insurgents. As of the time of writing, no evidence to support this version of events, which is contrary to all other credible eyewitness accounts, has been made public by the Ethiopian government.[150]

Many similar incidents have been reported, often in the immediate aftermath of insurgent attacks on ENDF personnel. In late March or early April, another incident near Afgooye saw an ENDF convoy hit by a roadside bomb. A witness to the incident told Human Rights Watch that ENDF soldiers responded by "spraying bullets" in all directions. Most people in the area escaped but several were cut down by ENDF gunfire that continued for about 10 minutes. "When we came back, we came face to face with dead and injured people," the witness recalled. "One of the bodies had one of the hands shot off."[151] On April 30 ENDF troops in Baidoa reportedly opened fire wildly after their convoy was struck by a roadside bomb, killing several civilians.[152]

The descriptions that emerge from interviews with witnesses to these incidents indicate that the indiscriminate shooting by Ethiopian soldiers in response to insurgent attacks reflects poor discipline rather than criminal intent. ENDF troops rotated into Somalia from the end of 2007 were reportedly less experienced and well-trained than the soldiers they replaced. This, combined with the escalating daily violence, may have contributed to an overall breakdown in discipline and misuses of force causing civilian casualties.[153] At the same time, there have been no reported instances where ENDF soldiers have been investigated or held accountable for possible war crimes. This absence of accountability of Ethiopian soldiers has doubtlessly contributed to violations of international humanitarian law by Ethiopian forces.

Assault, Rape, Killings, and Looting

ENDF soldiers have been implicated in serious violations of human rights and humanitarian law against Somali civilians with increasing frequency since the end of 2007.[154] In Mogadishu, many of these abuses are not committed by Ethiopian soldiers acting alone but during joint operations with TFG security forces. Somalis interviewed by Human Rights Watch recounted horrifying accounts of ENDF abuses in 2008, including assaults, rape, killings, and looting.

Following a clash between EDNF troops and insurgent fighters in northern Mogadishu in April 2008, TFG and ENDF forces cordoned off an area around the site and began conducting house-to-house searches. A 22-year-old man from Mogadishu told Human Rights Watch:

Some Ethiopian and government soldiers came to our house and said, "Where are you hiding them [the insurgents]?" We said we were not hiding anyone, and that's when they shot my father. He was just explaining to them that we did not see the people they are looking for and that we had been in the house all day, and they shot him, telling him he was lying. They shot him in the chest. My sister and mother were screaming at me to leave the place. But I wanted to resist, and I said, "Why are you doing this?" but they started beating me with the back of their guns.

The young man and his family were members of a minority clan that traces its ancestry partly back to immigrants from Portugal and so were unusually light skinned. The Ethiopian soldiers began joking that the young man's two sisters and mother looked more like Eritreans than Somalis. With the family's father lying dead on the floor in front of them, several Ethiopian soldiers took turns raping the three women. "And I was sitting there helpless," the young man said. "They started raping my sisters and they were screaming. They were there for almost three hours. I saw them raping my mother in front of me…I could not help my mother or help my sisters." At his mother's insistence, he left Mogadishu the next day.[155]

Human Rights Watch interviewed a farmer who had fled his home in the outskirts of Beletweyne when fighting between Al-Shabaab and ENDF forces erupted there in July. He boarded a truck with others heading towards Somaliland along a back road[156] but they were soon stopped by a group of ENDF soldiers:

They stopped our car and said we are hiding some of the people they are looking for. We came out of the truck and they started searching. When they saw that there were two pretty girls with us they just took them. There was nothing we could do to resist. They did not even ask anything, they just grabbed them and started going with them. The girls were crying but the soldiers were slapping them and dragging them across the ground.

We waited for them. I was hearing their screams and cries, they were just near to us. They shot one girl because she was screaming a lot. We took the dead body and buried her. They shot her in the chest…The other girl did not want to talk about it but she said three of them were raping her at the same time.[157]

The truck and its passengers were then allowed to continue on their way.

In April 2008 one of the year's most widely publicized atrocities occurred during an ENDF raid on a mosque in northern Mogadishu. ENDF soldiers, operating jointly with TFG forces, reportedly killed 21 people during that raid, seven of whom were found with their throats cut. Amnesty International reported that the dead included Islamic scholars who were inside the mosque at the time of the raid. The soldiers also detained several dozen children who were present at the mosque at the time of the raid.[158] The Ethiopian government denied that these or any other serious abuses involving ENDF soldiers took place.[159] Following the April 2008 mosque killings the only Ethiopian government response was to issue a statement denying the allegations and declaring that their operation in the area had been "successful beyond expectation."[160]

ENDF forces have also been implicated in acts of looting in Mogadishu, though these incidents do not appear to be nearly as common as those involving TFG forces. One former shopkeeper from Hodan in Mogadishu said that his shop was looted twice by joint ENDF and TFG patrols in late 2007.[161] A former merchant whose shop was in the Bakara market area said that another joint patrol looted his store in April 2008. And a prominent Hawiye political figure from Mogadishu told Human Rights Watch that some groups of ENDF soldiers went on looting sprees during search and seizure operations in 2008 prior to being rotated out of the country.[162]

Notes

143] See Human Rights Watch, Shell Shocked, p. 73. This reputation has eroded due to the events of the past year but many Somalis still see a difference in the discipline of ENDF and TFG forces. For example one refugee who fled Mogadishu in May 2008 told Human Rights Watch that, "The Ethiopians will attack you if they are attacked and use heavy weapons but they will not come into your homes and attack you like the Somali government forces." Human Rights Watch interview, Dagahaley refugee camp, Kenya, June 30, 2008.

144] Residents of Mogadishu refer to these as "BM," because the rockets are often fired from BM-21 multiple rocket launchers or as "whistling" because of the whistling sound "Katyusha" rockets make while in the air. See Human Rights Watch, Shell Shocked, pp. 56-60.

145] Human Rights Watch, Shell Shocked; also see above, Civilian Deaths and the Destruction of Mogadishu.

146] Beletweyne sits a few kilometers off of the main road leading north from Mogadishu towards the Ethiopian border, a key link in the supply lines of ENDF forces in Somalia. It is the largest town in Hiran region and a large ENDF base sits along the highway just outside the town.

147] Documents on file with Human Rights Watch; Human Rights Watch interviews with journalists and Somali civil society activists, Nairobi and Djibouti, September 2008. The eastern half of Beletweyne (which is divided by a river) is largely populated by Somalis of the Xawadale clan, who are seen as sympathetic to the TFG. The western half of the town is seen as a hotbed of Al-Shabaab and ICU activity.

148] Human Rights Watch interviews with UN officials, Nairobi, September 2008; "Monthly Cluster Report: Humanitarian Response in Somalia," UN OCHA, September 2008, p. 2.

149] Human Rights Watch interviews with Somali civil society activist, Nairobi, September 20, 2008. See also "About 50 people killed in separate Somalia attacks," Reuters, August 15, 2008.

150] Letter on file with Human Rights Watch.

151] Human Rights Watch interview with J.I., Ifo refugee camp, Kenya, June 28, 2008.

152] See "Ethiopian soldiers kill 12 Somali civilians after roadside bomb attack," Garowe Online, April 30, 2008, http://www.garoweonline.com/artman2/publish/Somalia_27/Ethiopia_soldiers_kill_12_somalis.htm (accessed October 15, 2008).

153] Human Rights Watch interviews, Nairobi and Hargeisa, July 2008. See also Amnesty International, Routinely Targeted: Attacks on Civilians in Somalia, p.11.

154] For more accounts of such abuses see Amnesty International, Routinely Targeted, pp. 10-13.

155] Human Rights Watch interview with D.M., Hargeisa, July 11, 2008.

156] The interviewee told Human Rights Watch that ENDF forces had forbade the use of back roads as a security measure but that they took such a route anyway because they were afraid of suffering violence at ENDF checkpoints along the main tarmac road. Human Rights Watch interview, Hargeisa, July 11, 2008.

157] Human Rights Watch interview with S.E., Hargeisa, July 11, 2008.

158] See Amnesty International, "Ethiopia Must Release Mosque Attack Children," April 24, 2008, http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/news/ethiopia-must-release-children-captured-mosque-attack-20080424 (accessed October 27, 2008).

159] See "Ethiopia Denies Mosque Killings," BBC News Online, April 24, 2008, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7364543.stm (accessed October 27, 2008). See also Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, "No massacre at the mosque but a successful operation against Al-Shabaab," Week in the Horn, April 24, 2008, http://www.mfa.gov.et/Press_Section/Week_Horn_Africa_April_24_2008.htm (accessed October 27, 2008).

160] See Agence France-Presse, "Amnesty Urges Ethiopia to Probe Mogadishu Mosque Executions," April 25, 2008, http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5g4MQRvn2wVE-Wrz-9WCmwLU26Gpw (accessed November 10, 2008).

161] Human Rights Watch interview, Ifo refugee camp, Kenya, June 28, 2008.

162] Human Rights Watch interview, Nairobi, June 25, 2008.

Note

Picture: The arrival of the Abyssinian forces in Mogadishu in the last days of December 2006 (http://www.appletreeblog.com/?p=1280); the destruction of Somalia will soon pale when compared to the forthcoming destruction of the criminal, evil state of ´Ethiopia´ and the chaos that will prevail in the fake pseudo-Amhara capital "Addis Ababa" that will be evacuated by all Amhara and Tigray settlers. The calamities that will soon hit Gondar and Mekele will have no parallel in the Aafrican History.