Ethiopia blasts US for report on rights record (Sudan Tribune)

The 2009 human rights report by the U.S. state department, accuses Prime minister Meles Zenawi-led government of illegal detention, killings, arrests, torture, violation of press and religious freedom, intermediating and restricting rights of opposition members...read more..

Forget about democracy (The Economist))

Human-rights campaigners think the limpness of America and European Union countries, especially Britain, in the face of Mr Zenawi gives him a free rein to abuse his own people. This week’s report by Human Rights Watch, a New York-based lobby, claims that, after 20 years in power, Mr Zenawi’s ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front has “total control of local and district administrations to monitor and intimidate individuals at a household level.” With a general election due on May 23rd, opposition supporters, says the report, are often castigated as subversives by the government, denied the right to assembly, and harassed. The press has been “stifled”. Newspapers avoid writing about opposition parties or people the government says have terrorist links..read more..

Ethiopia: an aid success story or a tyranny? (Times Online)

Those allegations are reinforced today in a report by Human Rights Watch. It describes farmers denied seeds, teachers sent on propaganda training and people unable to get a government job without a reference from a party official. It accuses the Government of building a culture of fear ahead of elections in May....read more..

Live Aid-Arms Aid? (The Economist)

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Nor is it likely the EPRDF will be brought to book over alleged harassment of opposition politicians in the run up to the election, including the murder this week of an opposition candidate in Tigray in unclear circumstances. A former ally of Mr Meles, Gebru Asrat, of the main opposition party, Forum for Democratic Dialogue, said that the candidate's body had been cut into pieces, to intimidate other Tigrayans into staying with the TPLF. The minister of information maintains he was killed in a bar brawl. But the willingness of Mr Meles's former comrades to speak out could mean a rockier and bloodier election campaign......Read full history

How food and water are driving a 21st-century African land grab (Guardian U.K)

Ethiopia is one of the hungriest countries in the world with more than 13 million people needing food aid, but paradoxically the government is offering at least 3m hectares of its most fertile land to rich countries and some of the world's most wealthy individuals to export food for their own populations....more..

Internet access is 'a fundamental right' (BBC)

Recently, the EU adopted an internet freedom provision, stating that any measures taken by member states that may affect citizen's access to or use of the internet "must respect the fundamental rights and freedoms of citizens".
In particular, it states that EU citizens are entitled to a "fair and impartial procedure" before any measures can be taken to limit their net access. ...more..