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Washington Update, May 7,2009

Monday, 11 May 2009

The legislation now pending in Congress regarding Ethiopia is substantially the same as last year’s but with improvements. This is the critical thing that we here in the United States can do to better the lives of Ethiopians. We must keep up the contacts with Congress. Please contact the following members of House Africa Subcommittee:

Rep. Donald Payne:      (202) 225-3436

Diane Watson:               (202)225-7084

Barbara Lee:                 (202) 225-2661

Brad Miller:                   (202) 225-3032

Gregory Meeks:            (202) 225-3461

Sheila Jackson Lee:      (202) 225-3816

Lynn Woolsey:             (202) 225-5161

Chris Smith:                 (202) 225-3765

Jeff Flake:                     (202) 225-2635

John Boozman:            (202) 225-4301

Jeff Fortenberry:           (202) 225-4806

The recent annual S tate Department report on Ethiopia points out t he terrible injustices being perpetrated by the Meles regime.

This regime is now getting a deserved ‘bad reputation’ in the wider world. His London trip only exposed him to questioners who could ask honest questions of him without fe ar. He did not do well in this. Let’s also try to contact the editorial page of your newspapers to inform them about the human rights situation in Ethiopia.

The story of the suffering of the people of Ethiopia is one that all Americans could relate to. The Horn of Africa has been front page news recently with the Somali piracy problem. An American ship carrying humanitarian food aid for hungry people in Somalia was hijacked and held for ransom. The regime in Ethiopia has now issued an order re stricting non-governmenta l organizations to aid only under their direction – another act of piracy. We need to spread the news about this.

Earlier today we met with a very well respected non-governmental organization (NGO) – The National Democratic Institute (NDI);

(http://www.ndi.org/)

Doctor Taye Woldesmiat, Kinijit AEUP Advisory board chair, Ato Abayeneh Berhanu, vp AEUP and myself met with the NDI’s Regional Director for Southern & Eastern Africa, Susan B. Page; Jerry Lavery, Senior Program Manager for Southern & East Africa; and Dale E. Archer, Program Manager. We had a very good meeting with these knowledgeable persons. We discussed what could be done to work on making elections fairer and more honest than the last ones.

We remind e veryone that this group was forced out of Ethiopia dur ing the 2005 ‘election’ for speaking out on the human rights violations taking place. The NDI counts many very notable personages in its ranks. Please let them know that we appreciate their interest in Ethiopia.

We in the All Ethiopia Unity Party are proud to announce that the AEUP now has sixty-three (63) offices open all over Ethiopia! This has come at a high price for our members. Many have been threatened with loss of employment – and worse – if they persisted in opposing the dictatorship.

Last Sund ay, May 3rd, we had the weekly broadcast of The Voice of Kinijit/AEUP Radio on WZHF- am 1390 in Washington, DC at 11:30 am EST. Doctor Taye and Wzrt. Mesobwework Kitaw was interviewed on the radio. You can listen in again next week on the 10th when we have a special guest! You can listen in anytime on the Web at:

http://www.kaeup.org

There you will find the copies of the shows that we are producing as well as our newspaper, Andent.
Mesfin Mekonen, Kinijit AEUP International Foreign Relations