In the past year alone, Meles’s ruling party has rigged elections, effectively banned independent human-rights groups, passed a draconian press law and shrugged off calls for an investigation into alleged atrocities in the restive Ogaden region. Yet in the same period, his country has become one of the largest recipients of U.S. aid in sub-Saharan Africa, getting a cool $1 billion in 2008. The Bush administration claimed that Ethiopia was the linch-pin of its regional counterterrorism strategy and a vital beacon of stability. But the evidence increasingly suggests Washington isn’t getting what it pays for, and is supporting a brutal dictator in the process. Candidate Obama pledged to strengthen democracy in Africa; if he’s serious, this is a good place to start.
America’s warm relations with Ethiopia date to the days after 9/11, when the country’s Christian-dominated government came to be seen as a natural U.S. ally in a region targeted by Islamic extremists. After disputed elections in 2005, however, Meles – once hailed by President Bill Clinton as part of a promising “new generation” of African leaders—began clamping down on dissent.
Yet Washington tolerated his lapses because it needed his help fighting Qaeda-linked Islamists in next-door Somalia. In December 2006, Ethiopia’s U.S.-trained Army duly invaded its neighbor, ousting the radical Islamic Courts Union government there. But the adventure hasn’t worked out as planned. No sooner had the ICU been toppled than an even more radical group, Al-Shabab, sprang up to fight the invaders. And although Seyoum Mesfin, Ethiopia’s foreign minister, recently told NEWSWEEK that the Islamists have been militarily “shattered,” they now control much of the country’s south and have tightened links with Al Qaeda. Meanwhile, the Ethiopian troops have pulled out, and the country they left behind has been thoroughly devastated. Two years of fighting forced about 3.4 million Somalis, some 40 percent of the population, from their homes. Yet only a few high-ranking terrorists were eliminated, and Russell Howard, a retired general and senior fellow at the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations University, says the occupation only “empowered” the radicals.
Such failures – and Ethiopia’s growing repression – suggest Washington should rethink the relationship. Just what Ethiopia offers the United States today is unclear. Addis Ababa has contributed troops to U.N. peacekeeping forces in Darfur and Burundi and plays a large role in shaping the policies of the African Union. But this shouldn’t earn it unquestioning U.S. support.
To reset ties, the United States should push Ethiopia to democratize. And it must urge it to reconcile with its archnemesis, Eritrea. Resolving the conflict between the two states is key to addressing a whole range of threats to U.S. interests. Tiny Eritrea won independence from Addis Ababa in 1993, but the two countries fought a 1998–2000 border war and relations have remained hostile ever since, in part because Ethiopia, with tacit U.S. support, has ignored an international ruling that redrew their border. Too weak to challenge Ethiopia directly, Eritrea has funneled support to its enemy’s enemies – including Al-Shabab and its America-hating foreign fighters. Eritrea also recently instigated a border conflict with Djibouti, home to an important U.S. military base.
Washington should thus push Ethiopia and Eritrea to make amends; better relations would mean an end to their proxy war in Somalia, which has helped turn that state into a Qaeda haven. Should it choose to use it, the United States has plenty of leverage. Most U.S. spending on Ethiopia goes for health and food aid, which aren’t easy to cut. But the Obama administration could make military aid and weapons sales contingent on Meles’s improving his behavior. The House of Representatives passed a bill in 2007 to do just that, but the measure died in the Senate without White House support.
Much will now depend on the man Obama has nominated for the State Department’s top Africa job, Johnnie Carson. Carson’s record is promising: while ambassador to Kenya from 1999 to 2003, he helped persuade longtime President Daniel Arap Moi to step down, clearing the way for multiparty elections. Should he bring similar pressure to bear on Washington’s new African ally, Birtukan, Ethiopia’s other political prisoners, Africans throughout the Horn and America itself would all benefit.
For the past three years, Ethiopia has been Washington’s key ally in fighting terrorism in the Horn of Africa. Its two-year U.S. backed occupation of Somalia led to the ouster of one Islamist government in Mogadishu, but fueled the rise
of a more radical group, known as Al-Shabab. But government’s domestic activities have put the most strain on the alliance. The disputed 2005 elections ended with security forces killing 193 demonstrators and the jailing of opposition
leader Birtukan Mideksa and more than 120 other opposition figures, journalists and activists. Birtukan was pardoned in 2007 and released from jail, but landed in prison again in December after the government said she violated terms
of her release. Many analysts say the jailing had more to do with Birtukan organizing a challenge in national elections next year. NEWSWEEK’s Jason McLure talked with Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin about democracy,
Somalia and the durability of Ethiopia’s alliance. Excerpts:
Your government has said the invasion of Somalia was a great success. How so?
Ethiopia never invaded Somalia. We intervened in Somalia upon the request of the transitional Parliament and the government of [former Somali transitional president] Abdullahi Yusuf and on the basis of guaranteeing our own security.
The Union of Islamic Courts was composed of not only moderate Islamists but extremists. Extremist groups from outside the region had been trying their level best to use Somalia as a springboard to launch terrorist activities in the
region. Ethiopia has neutralized this force. Today there is only Al-Shabab and a few groups working as small units without any formidable organization. Their military backbone has been completely shattered.
Many people disagree. They say that while the intervention did oust the Islamic Courts, it fueled support for Al-Shabab, which is more radical and now controls a large part of southern Somalia. There are now 3.4 million
displaced Somalis and piracy has become endemic.
This is absolutely wrong. Today they are reduced into fragmented groups. This radicalization has not come about as a result of Ethiopia’s intervention in Somalia because for some time they were trying to establish a Taliban-type state in
Somalia. Piracy is now a major threat to international waterways. This has not come as a result of the intervention of Ethiopia. These groups have been there and they are running this business not only from Somalia, but other areas as
well.
There’s concern about a crackdown on political opposition in Ethiopia. At local elections last year, out of 3.6 million seats, opposition parties won three. There’s the passage of the NGO law cutting off funding for groups
like the Ethiopian Human Rights Council and, probably most significantly, the jailing of opposition leader Birtukan Mideksa.
The EPRDF [Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front] government has made it abundantly clear that democracy and respect of political and human-rights groups is not a matter of choice. It’s a matter of survival for the
nation. Ethiopia is continuously building institutions of democracy and good governance. Elections do not explain the whole sense of building institutions. Trying to micromanage the building of democracy from anybody outside is not
going to help. This is a fledgling democracy. The challenges are huge.
Many people would argue that the EPRDF lost confidence in democracy after the 2005 elections.
Absolutely not. In fact, the EPRDF is building this institution of governance with utmost confidence.
Are you worried that by keeping Birtukan Mideksa in jail under a life sentence, she becomes a symbol of repression?
Birtukan was not imprisoned because she was a political figure. [After the disputed 2005 elections] she was involved in attempting to dismantle the constitutionally constituted government of the country. She was sentenced. She asked
for a pardon. Then she went out of prison and said she had never asked for the pardon. Automatically, under Ethiopian law, a person who declares she did not ask for a pardon has to go back to serving her sentence.
Your government is due to welcome Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to Addis Ababa this month. What’s the message that you want to come out of this summit? And how do you think Western nations will react to
seeing one of their closest allies in Africa cozying up to an indicted war criminal?
The real issue is that Africa, in a collective voice, has said that the International Criminal Court’s issuance of an arrest warrant is not going to serve the interest of Sudan or the victims of Darfur. It’s not going to achieve peace and
stability. It brings more complexity and difficulty to the peace-building process. That’s why Africa, collectively at the African Union summit, asked the U.N. Security Council to defer the ICC process to allow Africa and Sudan to focus
on resolving this situation.
Doesn’t this interfere with serving justice for the victims of Darfur?
Peace and justice are inseparable. How can one expect that justice will be served when there is no peace and stability in Darfur?
