Ethopian Famine - US/UK Warmonger in Somalia - Political Fever

Comrade Joe · #1 (**permalink**) 06-12-2008, 09:57 AM

Where is the outrage about this ? Why do the governments and media scream about Mugabe but not the infinitely worse Ethopian government and the troubles of Somalia ?

Quote:

A Government ready to rely on those friends of liberty, the Democratic Unionist party, to shred the liberties of our own people are almost by definition unembarrassable, but I hope this evening to add to the issues ventilated in a recent Channel 4 "Dispatches" programme to adumbrate the extent to which the tragedy in Somalia, which so many people are now becoming aware of, is another of our Government's dirty little secrets.

We must start the story in Ethiopia, where 4 million people, according to the United Nations, are facing starvation and 120,000 Ethiopian children have just one month to live, according to last week's media reports. Television viewers were shocked to see the pictures last week of the widespread suffering redolent of 1984 and the great famine of that year.

The US and Britain immediately pledged $90 million in famine relief. Just one week after its appeal to the international community for famine relief, the Ethiopian Government increased their military budget by $50 million to $400 million. The regime in Addis Ababa—when I knew them in the 1980s, they were pro-Albanian Maoists—are the most militarised and heavily armed in Africa. They are in a state of perpetual war or preparation for war with one neighbour, Eritrea, and they are supporting anti-Government rebels in Sudan, many believe with western connivance.

Most astonishingly of all, the Government of Ethiopia—that starving country whose little children are fly infested, kwashiorkor swollen, famished and famine stricken—have been encouraged, armed, trained, financed and otherwise facilitated to invade and occupy their neighbour, Somalia, and create a reign of terror in that land, which is testified to by this voluminous Amnesty International report, which, if I had time, I would extensively quote from.

Somalia has lost thousands of dead as a result of the Ethiopian invasion. Millions have been displaced. Somalia, under Ethiopian occupation, is the grimmest prison state in Africa—far worse than Mugabe's Zimbabwe. Who has done the encouraging, the arming, the training, the financing and the facilitating? The same US and British Governments who donated the $90 million to the same Ethiopian Government who are burning their money and burning the villages, the neighbourhoods and the people of occupied Somalia.

This Government are never done talking about the shortcomings of African leaders. Just last week in Rome, the Secretary of State for International Development was roaring at Robert Mugabe, yet there has not been a squeak out of him, or any other Minister, about the much bigger crime in which we are ourselves deeply complicit. Is it any wonder that African opinion considers so much of what we have to say about misgovernance in Africa to be the deepest, most cynical hypocrisy?...........

The President of the puppet regime imposed by the Ethiopian army in Somalia turns out to be British. He spends much of his time here—well, it is dangerous in Somalia, after all—and has property and family here. After presiding over a gang of torturers, murderers, grand larceners and extortionists, he flies back to England. Then there is the police chief whose officers kidnap people for ransom, which they extort from people living in our own country—in Leicester, in Birmingham, in London. They torture people, make them disappear, and kill them if their families will not pay. He too is British. As for the former Interior Minister who presides over an interior of mass refugee camps, starvation and misery, and who stands accused of stealing international aid and diverting food for political purposes—why, he is British as well.

Guess who is paying the wages of the murdering, kidnapping, torturing, quisling police force in Ethiopian-occupied Somalia? That's right: we are. The public dictatorship in Somalia is a very British crime, especially as our own Government—in particular, that pocket-sized Palmerston to whom I referred earlier, the Secretary of State for International Development—are so voluble on the subject of other problems in Africa.

So how did we get here? How did we get into bed with the former pro-Albanian Maoists of the Government in Addis Ababa? I am afraid that the answer is our old friend, our old acquaintance, the policy of "my enemy's enemy is my friend". The policy that has got us into so much trouble, from Afghanistan to Iraq and many other parts of the world, is what lies behind this obscene paradox.

We are supporting the Ethiopian Government's occupation of Somalia because George Bush told us to: because Somalia is a front line in George Bush's ill-conceived, counter-productive, utterly discredited, "about to be booted out in the United States" so-called war on terror. We were against the former Government of Somalia because they were an Islamic Government, just as we are against the Government in Sudan because they are an Islamic Government, and just as Ethiopia, on our behalf, opposed the Government in Eritrea because they are an Islamic Government.

Somalia (Human Rights): 11 Jun 2008: House of Commons debates (TheyWorkForYou.com)

There is more of this on the link, it's well worth reading.

leviathon435 · #2 (**permalink**) 06-12-2008, 11:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Comrade Joe

Where is the outrage about this ? Why do the governments and media scream about Mugabe but not the infinitely worse Ethopian government and the troubles of Somalia ?

Somalia (Human Rights): 11 Jun 2008: House of Commons debates (TheyWorkForYou.com)

There is more of this on the link, it's well worth reading.

Ahh good, more depressing news. My constituency labour party recently got the document which will form the base of the labour party manifesto and under new labour rules we get to suggest ammendments to any of it but it's recommended for times sake that we pick one area, we chose foreign policy (entitled "Britain in the World"). It was the biggest load of crap I've ever read with so much hypocrisy about promoting human rights and such, whilst confirming our alliance with America and promising to maintain troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. It even talked about encouragin developing nations to liberalise their economies and employ free trade, geez. Anyway, guess what it said about human rights abuses in countries we're allied to like America and Saudi Arabia? Absolutely nothing.

mlurp · #3 (**permalink**) 06-12-2008, 01:29 PM

And just what degree do either of you have if foreign policy? Or is it manifesto's?
I have never hear any thing good come of your ideas of the Uk or America. And both have done mor egood than most other countries. But you find the areas where less is done and expoite them to debase both countries.
While at th esame time what Muslim/Arab country has done anything period for mankind lately? Can you show me one thing, just one please?

leviathon435 · #4 (**permalink**) 06-12-2008, 01:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mlurp

And just what degree do either of you have if foreign policy? Or is it manifesto's?
I have never hear any thing good come of your ideas of the Uk or America. And both have done mor egood than most other countries. But you find the areas where less is done and expoite them to debase both countries.
While at th esame time what Muslim/Arab country has done anything period for mankind lately? Can you show me one thing, just one please?

The Islmaic nations that exist are mostly now developing countries and their recent contributions will be equal to countries in similar economic positions. I have no degree in foreign policy but that is what democracy is about, allowing the least of us to contribute recognising that we all have opinions, sometimes valid. This pointless nationalism amounts to little more than "my Dad's bigger than you Dad" type statements found throughout school playgrounds, instead of purely lauding the positives of which there are some we must look at all things and try to change them. I recently watched La Haine (hate), a really good film, and in it there is some very useful advice:

There was a man who fell from a 50 story building, and to reasure himself he kept saying to himself "so far so good, so far so good" as he fell. But it's not the falling that matters, it's the landing. Equally a society in freefall towards disaster keeps telling itself "so far so good, so far so good" but again it's not the fall that matters, it's the landing.

Comrade Joe · #5 (**permalink**) 06-12-2008, 02:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mlurp

And just what degree do either of you have if foreign policy? Or is it manifesto's?
I have never hear any thing good come of your ideas of the Uk or America. And both have done mor egood than most other countries. But you find the areas where less is done and expoite them to debase both countries.
While at th esame time what Muslim/Arab country has done anything period for mankind lately? Can you show me one thing, just one please?

What are you talking about ? Do you have anything to say about the issue raised in this thread ? Anything at all ?

Bosco · #6 (**permalink**) 06-12-2008, 02:53 PM

The War of terror is really going to far.The instigated war in this region is reaching fever pitch. Now wwe have Ethiopa,$400 in military when theres a famine occuring, but we with a social consious who propose it be spent upon the people are eveil and right deniers?

Instigating attacks on Eritea and Somalia

Now theres Chad aswell, oh and the British and American instigated Sudanese war, the only reason they want the South and Darfur out is because they have the oil, we hear about the crimes by the northern militia(which they undoubtably are) but not about the onse from the Southern Liberation group who happen to be backed by the Brits and the Yanks

Comrade Joe · #7 (**permalink**) 06-13-2008, 09:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bosco

Now wwe have Ethiopa,$400 in military when theres a famine occuring, but we with a social consious who propose it be spent upon the people are eveil and right deniers?

That really sums up the madness. That kind of stuff makes Mugabe look like a loveable elder statemen. The is how bad some of our friends are. The level of hypocrisy is astounding.

The Black Ghost · #8 (**permalink**) 06-13-2008, 11:39 PM

I wouldnt paint the picture quite the same way. Somali has been desperately trying to hold on to a stable democratic government for the last 10 years.

It is the Islamic fighters and the rebels of the Islamic Courts Union, aided by terrorist groups like Al Queda that are fighting the government, killing people, and causing the war. These extremists are the same people that started the war, the same people that supported the warlords in the early 90s that caused hundreds of thousands of civilians to die. The Ethiopian government has faced the same pressure from continual warfare against the ICU and terrorist cells, they have every right to defend their country and the welfare of their neighbor.

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