Goal calls on Ireland to end aid to Ethiopia

RTE News

January 19, 2006

The aid organisation, GOAL, has demanded that Ireland ends all bilateral aid to Ethiopia, following the British government’s decision to suspend £50 million because of the sharply deteriorating human rights situation.

GOAL’s Chief Executive John O’Shea said Ethiopia is the second largest recipient of Irish taxpayers’ money.

He said that, following London’s decision, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has no option but to immediately end all grants to what he termed ‘this rogue state’.

Mr O’Shea said dozens of protestors had been shot and he quoted a Human Rights Watch report which found the Ethiopian government was using intimidation, arbitrary detentions and excessive force in rural areas to suppress all potential dissent. (RTE News)