Unrest in Jijiga, August 2018
(Bloomberg) — Authorities in Ethiopia’s gas-rich east imposed a curfew and banned public assemblies as 47 people including the former regional president were charged with alleged involvement in robbery and mass killings.
The restrictions in Jijiga, the capital of Somali state, will last at least three days as federal and local security forces hunt perpetrators of “politically instigated violence,” the region’s deputy security chief, Abdullahi Mahamed Abdi, said by phone.
It’s the latest upheaval in the Somali region, home to sizable natural gas reserves, where a new leader is battling to carry out Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s pledge of a political opening in Africa’s second-most populous nation. Violence erupted in late 2017 on the borders of Somali and Oromia regional states, forcing thousands of civilians to flee and eventually prompting a federal intervention.
Ex-President Abdi Mohamoud Omar and 46 others were charged Wednesday for allegedly backing a vigilante group in August. At least 58 people died that month in three days of violence, while a mass grave dating from before contained 200 victims, Ethiopia’s Fana Broadcasting Corp. reported Wednesday, citing an investigation by the Attorney General.
Abdi Mohamoud, who was deposed by Ethiopian federal troops in August, is already facing trial over his alleged involvement in human-rights abuses. Bloomberg hasn’t been able to contact his representatives for comment. His successor Mustafa Omer, who has vowed to reform a regime he’s accused of brutality, last week fired five members of his cabinet, alleging they had connections to the deposed leader.
Forty of the 47 accused haven’t been identified, and Attorney General Berhanu Tsegaye didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on the cases. The vigilante group, identified as Hego, is also accused of robbing businesses and involvement in the deaths of members of non-Somali communities in August, Fana said.
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Former President of Somali Regional State, Mr. Abdi Mohammed Omer ( The Lion of Jijiga) under arrest
(Africa News) — Former President of Ethiopia’s Somali Regional State, Abdi Mohammed Omer, has been charged for inciting violence that plunged the region into deadly chaos in August 20018.
Omer, also popularly referred to as Abdi Illey, has been in federal custody since he was forced out of office last year. He is charged along with over 40 others for similar charges.
Reports indicate that only six out of the lot are in detention. The charges were filed at a federal High Court Criminal Bench sitting in the capital, Addis Ababa. The court is due to reconvene on February 6, 2019.
Aside Abdi Iley, the others charged include: Rahma Mohammed Haybe, former head of women and children’s affairs bureau; Abdulrezak Sehane Elmi, former head of the diaspora affairs office; Ferhan Tahir, former police commissioner commissioner of the region and two private individuals: Worseme Abdi and Guled Abel.
The court also issued arrest warrants for other complicit parties numbering over 40 who are still at large. They include former head of the region’s notorious paramilitary focre, Liyu Police.
A week ago, Ethiopia’s attorney general hinted that his office had concluded investigations into crimes committed in the Somali state, announcing that Abdi Illey and dozens of other officials had plotted to incite a civil war and whiles he had ordered abuses including beheadings.
Abdi Mohammed Omer was arrested after three days of deadly violence in the regional capital Jijiga in August.
Rights groups have routinely reported that his administration had set out to provoke ethnic bloodshed and had ordered a paramilitary force to attack minorities.
According to the AG’s office, their five-month investigation, had informed the charges laid today but also that 40 other complicit officials were still on the run.
Fifty-eight people died and 266 others were injured during the violence, including a priest set on fire inside a church, the AG’s office said adding that pronouncements by Illey and others encouraging ethnic strife amounted to inciting a civil war.
Abdi Mohammed Omer spent more than a decade in charge of the remote and largely lawless region on the border with Somalia, much of that time spent trying to crush separatist ONLF rebels. Rights groups regularly accused his administration of abuses including torture during the fight with insurgents.
Breaking with the past
The political winds shifted dramatically in Ethiopia when Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came to power in April, promising to rein in the powerful security services and make peace with separatist groups, such as the ONLF.
Several security officials and senior members of past administrations have been arrested, accused of a range of crimes including corruption and rights abuses.
Government officials said in August that Abdi Mohammed Omer’s administration had sought to mobilise ethnic Somalis to support him as rumours spread that he would be arrested on suspicion of being involved in rights violations.
In November, during investigations into the violence, police uncovered a grave containing at least 200 bodies along the border with Oromiya region.
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