In a span of minutes, Ethiopia’s TPLF army and air force massacred more than 700unarmed Oromo civilians attending Irreecha cultural festival, the largest outdoor cultural event in Africa attended by millions of visitors from all over Oromia state every year.  Based on interviews with the Ethiopian regime’s propaganda minister Getachew Reda, Ethiopia-based Western journalists misrepresented and framed the intentional massacre of Oromo civilians as “stampede.”

It was not a stampede; it was a planned part of an ongoing genocide—why refuse to call it by its real name?  Reporters with close ties to the TPLF regime of Ethiopia, such as Bloomberg News’ William Davison and Reuters’ reporter and TPLF-sympathizer and undercover propagandist Aaron Maasho and others at BBC and CNN, ran with disturbing headlines that squarely mispresented the cause for the intentional massacre of  hundreds and injuries of thousands of Oromo as ‘stampede’.

Across international media outlets, reporters parroted stories with a fixed number of “50” deaths grossly under-reporting the numbers and absolving the regime of the genocide it committed based on pre-selected images, pictures and edited footages that hid most of the reality of the actual victims who were shot from helicopters, ground forces and machine-gun mounted Humvees, according to eyewitnesses, bloggers and social media activists.

Source: Irreecha Massacre Was Not a Stampede: Planned and Mechanized Massacre of Hundreds Oromo Civilians in Minutes

On October 2, 2016, the Tigre-led Ethiopian regime massacred more than seven hundred Oromos and injured hundreds more at Irreechaa, the Oromo national holiday of thanksgiving held in Bishoftu in which millions had gathered. During the Irreecha festival, Ethiopian security forces shot live ammunition into the crowd and fired tear gas, although they claimed that the lives lost were due to a stampede. Western media have joined in this claim, spreading inaccurate information about the tragic events of this day.

However, Oromo victims know what happened to them and they are telling their truth. They have used videos, pictures, and social media to release accurate information.The victims say that the Tigre-led government used live bullets, tear gas, helicopter gunships, armored cars, and snipers to terrify and kill Oromo children, elderly, women and other sectors of the Oromo society that had gathered to celebrate Irreecha.

During the holiday, many young Oromos had chanted anti-government slogans to show support for Oromo Protests, a protest movement that has been taking place since November 2015. Although the holiday festival had this political moment, the massacre of hundreds of people on this day was an inhumane violation of one of the most sacred rituals of the Oromo. Irrechaa is a sacred holiday of peace and a celebration of culture, and the Ethiopian regime continues to push the limits of its inhumane violent practices.

Source: THE GENOCIDAL MASSACRES OF OROMOS AT THE IRREECHAA FESTIVAL: THE LIES OF THE TIGRE-LED ETHIOPIAN GOVERNMENT