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A Genocide We Can Stop, Ogaden.

By Ahmed Ali
November 02, 2007
ahjack72@yahoo.com 

The Ogaden territory lies between Oromia to the west, Afar land to the northeast, the republic of Djibouti to the North, Kenya to the South and Somali republic to the East. As it is known the borders which divide the continent of Africa into nation states were left behind by the European colonizers, which arbitrarily divided among themselves. The Ogaden territory was integrated into what was then the Abyssinian Empire currently known Ethiopia at the end of the 19th century. This well known historical fact took place at the early stage of European colonization of Africa and Abyssinia has no right or legal moral to occupy Ogaden.   

In 1648, the Treaty of Westphalia helped bring an end to the Thirty Years War in Europe. Under the terms of this treaty the boundaries of the various nation-states within Europe were clearly demarcated, and the respective governments of these political entities were provided with the legal authority to police their own territories. On the contrary the Organization of African Unity denied the people of Africa the opportunity to deal with the border issues right after independence and sake of that fundamental mistake, Ogaden Somali people remain under Ethiopia colonial rule, which consistently violates their human rights. Ogadenis face a genocidal strategy devised at their prejudice by the TPLF[1] dominated Ethiopian government under an undeclared martial law and journalists are effectively blocked from the region. Extrajudicial killings, arrests, extensive practice of torture, national denigration and religious denigrations carried out against Ogaden Somalis over many long decades alienated them completely from Ethiopian totalitarian state where they never felt they belong.  

While international community is rightly focused on one of the worst crisis ever, the Darfur tragedy, we (international community) cannot afford to divert our attention from one of the worst man-made tragedies of our lifetimes, the genocide in Ogaden. It has been six months since the international media declared that genocide was occurring in Ogaden. Since then, however, the Ethiopian government intensified its military operations against the innocent civilian population and the situation has deteriorated, even relief organizations are expelled from the region such as the International Committee of the Red Cross ICRC and Médicins Sans Frontières. Yet, as horrifying reports continue to emerge, and as a humanitarian emergency grows, there is no indication that the United States or the United Nations is prepared to intervene, despite promises of never again and explicit obligations under the 1948 Convention on Genocide. There is now a real risk of another imminent, extraordinary human catastrophe right under the eyes of the United Nations Security Council, and they are not acting promptly to stop the genocide taking place in Ogaden. If it does not thousands of lives will be lost over the next few months from killings by Ethiopian troops, but also starvation because the Ethiopian regime imposed a blockage on trade and movement of food supplies, and hundreds of thousands of displaced persons are cut off from humanitarian assistance. There has been no progress from the international community of stopping the Ethiopian regime carrying out raids on civilian population; violence against these people, including the rape of women and girls, continues with impunity. 

As the tragedy of Ogaden unfolds, history is watching, and international community will be judged by only one test: Did we stop the genocide in Ogaden? Unless the answer is yes, then no summit, no U.N. Security Council resolution or no act of Congress has any meaning. With that in mind, it is time for the United Nations and the international communities to take prompt action to stop the genocide in Ogaden before it is too late. The United Nations was effectively set up to stop genocidal acts from occurring and to foster world peace. But six months after the human catastrophe in Ogaden began, not one punitive measure has been imposed on the government of Ethiopia. It is too late to change the historical genocide record on Rwanda. But it is not too late to set a better precedent for the Ogaden Somalis. So it is time for the United Nations and United States to understand that anything other than demonstrable rapid international action led by the United States will result human catastrophe in Ogaden.  

The United States should put effective pressure on the government of Ethiopia. A clear signal must be sent that the United States will not reward Ethiopian regime for global war on terror in Horn of Africa unless there are real and verifiable changes in Ogaden, including unrestricted access for humanitarian organizations and concrete actions to rein in the Ethiopian troops. In the meantime, United Nations should go to the Security Council and insist on a series of sanctions, beginning with an arms embargo against the Ethiopian regime, travel restrictions on senior Ethiopian officials and a freeze on the assets of companies controlled by the ruling party (EPRDF[2]) that do business abroad. There are members of the Security Council that may oppose sanctions for the expense of their interest in the region, but this time international community cannot take no for an answer. United States should better to risk a veto than to pass unanimous resolutions that do nothing to end the violence and the international community must also hold to account, exerting serious diplomatic pressure on countries that oppose sanctions against the Ethiopian regime. 

The international community at large has a moral obligation to do everything to stop genocide in Ogaden and ethnic cleansing to bringing about a permanent end to these atrocities and let the Ethiopian regime know that genocide in Ogaden will not be tolerated. The genocide in Ogaden is a tragedy that shocks the conscience of everyone who cares about human rights and basic human dignity. The crisis in the Ogaden region will not be resolved without sustained and effective leadership from the United States and United States has a chance to change course from a destructive policy in Horn of Africa based on the global war on terror towards a policy based on democracy and human rights. Thus United States and international community must do everything possible to force the Ethiopian regime to halt the genocide in Ogaden; allow unimpeded access for humanitarian workers and supplies; and undertake political negotiations aimed at ending the crisis in Ogaden. The UN should also be laying the groundwork for accountability. It has been more than two months since the weeklong United Nations mission in Ogaden, suggested to establish a commission of inquiry to investigate the atrocities in Ogaden. The international community should be providing support for the commission and preparing mechanisms to bring those who are responsible the atrocities in Ogaden to justice.

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