The Predicament of Oromos in Somalia

By Abdi Galgalo

January 19, 2007

In response to an impassioned plea from Oromo refugees suffering in Somalia, the International Oromo Youth Association (IOYA) appeals to the United States, UNHCR, Somalia’s Transitional Government, and the people and States of the Horn of Africa to help stop the increasing cold-blooded killing, detention and kidnapping of Oromo refugees by the Ethiopian and Somali governments’ militia.

The ongoing Ethiopia-led military operation in Somalia is being widely covered by many international media. Unbeknownst to the world, however, is the fact that Ethiopia’s parliamentary resolution that authorized military intervention in Somalia also contains articles that authorized actions against supporters and members of the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF).

During one of the parliamentary sessions prior to this resolution on Somalia, Prime Minster Meles Zenawi, who routinely defines and redefines laws on his own accord, had stated that “being a member, supporter, or sympathizer of OLF is punishable by the law of the country”. Many Oromos and other people in Ethiopia believed, and rightly so, that this is an endorsement of ethnic cleansing against the Oromo people. Thus, the indiscriminate detention and killing of Oromo citizens in Somalia by Ethiopian forces appears to be in line with the stated missions of the Ethiopian regime.

The Oromo youth associations calls such acts by Ethiopian militia and its Somali allies as “barbaric and inhumane” and appeals that the international community has a moral responsibility to stop these acts of ethnic cleansing that is directed at the Oromo people.

Source: The Conservative Voice

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