(A4O, 24 August 2013) In his Open Letter to the UK Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Foreign and Commenwealth Affairs), Dr Trevor Trueman of the OSG clearly concludes by saying “the authoritarian regime in Ethiopia is a major cause of instability affecting the whole of the Horn of Africa. Supporting it and investing in it is a short-sighted policy.”

Dr Trevor further  states “Tesfahun Chemeda was a student activist in Ethiopia and a political activist among refugees in Kenya, where he was granted refugee status by UNHCR. He was arrested with a colleague, Mesfin Abebe, by Kenyan anti-terrorist police on 2 April 2007. Although cleared by the anti-terrorist unit and by the FBI, the men were subject to refoulement to Ethiopia at the request of the Ethiopian authorities. Tesfahun was transferred from Zeway prison to Kaliti, where he had been held in solitary confinement for nearly two years before he was killed. This is not the first time young Oromo men have been killed in detention. For example, Alemayehu Garba, partially paralysed with polio, was shot dead with 18 others in Kaliti prison in November 2005.”

More details:https://advocacy4oromia.org/our-task/advocacy/death-in-ethiopian-custody-of-tesfahun-chemeda-after-refoulement-from-kenya/