Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance & Other Ill Treatment In the early years of the 21st Century, 2000 to
2025 gvnet.com/torture/Ethiopia.htm
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CAUTION: The following links
have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in Ethiopia. Some of these links may lead to websites
that present allegations that are unsubstantiated or even false. No
attempt has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content. HOW TO USE THIS WEBPAGE Students If you are looking for
material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on this
page and others to see which aspects of Torture by Authorities are of
particular interest to you. You might
be interested in exploring the moral justification for inflicting pain or
inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment in order to obtain critical
information that may save countless lives, or to elicit a confession for a
criminal act, or to punish someone to teach him a lesson outside of the
courtroom. Perhaps your paper might
focus on some of the methods of torture, like fear, extreme temperatures,
starvation, thirst, sleep deprivation, suffocation, or immersion in freezing
water. On the other hand, you might
choose to write about the people acting in an official capacity who
perpetrate such cruelty. There is a
lot to the subject of Torture by Authorities.
Scan other countries as well as this one. Draw comparisons between activity in
adjacent countries and/or regions.
Meanwhile, check out some of the Term-Paper
resources that are available on-line. ***
ARCHIVES *** Ethiopia: Abiy’s First Year as Prime Minister, Review of Arbitrary
Detention, Torture and Detention Conditions Human Rights Watch,
5 April 2019 [accessed 19 May
2019] ARBITRARY DETENTION,
TORTURE AND DETENTION CONDITIONS BACKGROUND -- Torture has long
been a serious and underreported problem across Ethiopia. For years, Human
Rights Watch received frequent reports of torture in places of detention country-wide.
These included police stations, prisons, military camps, and various unmarked
detention sites. Other nongovernmental organizations and various media
outlets have also reported on torture over many years. Some of the most brutal torture has occurred
at the hands of the Ethiopian military and, since 2010, in the Somali Region,
at the hands of the Liyu police. Torture occurred in
facilities under federal, regional and local jurisdictions. For example, in Jijiga Central Prison, commonly known as Jail Ogaden, a regional detention facility in the Somali
Region, prisoners were brutally and relentlessly tortured and humiliated
individually and in groups. Many of them were accused of belonging to the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), a group banned
by the Ethiopian government. While patterns
varied across the country, Ethiopian officials have often relied on torture
to extract confessions, typically regarding a prisoner’s connection to one of
the groups that the government had designated a terrorist organization, to
gain information, or merely as punishment. Prisoners in some
detention centers had little access to medical care, family, lawyers, or even
at times to food. Overcrowding has been a problem in some places of
detention. Ethiopia
fires prison officials, confronts torture claims Elias Meseret,
Associated Press AP, Addis Ababa, 5 July 2018 www.startribune.com/ethiopia-fires-prison-officials-confronts-torture-claims/487381361/ [accessed 6 July
2018] "I was kept in
solitary confinement in complete darkness for most of my detention," one
former prisoner who was held for three years told Human Rights Watch. "I
was only taken out at night for torture. They did many things to me - they
electrocuted my testicles, they tied wire around them and they put a plastic
bag with chili powder over my head. I often had a gag tied in my mouth so I
wouldn't scream too much." 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: Ethiopia U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, 30 March 2021 www.state.gov/reports/2020-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/ethiopia/
[accessed 18 July
2021] PRISON AND DETENTION
CENTER CONDITIONS Prison and pretrial
detention center conditions remained harsh and in some cases life
threatening. Problems included gross overcrowding and inadequate food, water,
sanitation, and medical care. Pretrial detention often occurred in police
station detention facilities, where conditions varied widely and reports
noted poor hygiene. Freedom House
Country Report 2018 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/ethiopia/freedom-world/2018 [accessed 12 May
2020] F3. IS THERE PROTECTION FROM THE ILLEGITIMATE
USE OF PHYSICAL FORCE AND FREEDOM FROM WAR AND INSURGENCIES? Security forces
employed force against predominately peaceful protesters throughout 2016 and
2017, with rights groups estimating that hundreds of people were killed in
the crackdown. Persistent conflicts between residents of the Oromia Region
and Somali Region (also known as the Ogaden
Region), partly over land and grazing rights along the border, resulted in
clashes in September 2017 that killed at least 100 people and displaced tens
of thousands. A paramilitary force known as the Liyu
Police based in the Somali Region has been blamed for extrajudicial killings
and carrying out attacks on homes in the neighboring Oromia Region, and the
government has taken no apparent action to address the abuses. Conditions in
Ethiopia’s prisons are harsh, and detainees frequently report abuse, including
torture. Multiple times since 2016, Bekele Gerba,
the deputy chairman of the opposition OFC, and other Oromo political
prisoners have gone on hunger strike to protest poor treatment in prison;
they reportedly have been denied medical attention and access to legal
counsel and their families. Torture
in Ethiopia International
Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (irct) Developed in
collaboration with the Rehabilitation Center for Victims of Torture in
Ethiopia (RCVTE), Oct. 2014 www.irct.org/Admin/Public/DWSDownload.aspx?File=%2fFiles%2fFiler%2fpublications%2fCountry+factsheets%2fCF+Ethiopia+-+PUBLIC+EDIT+pdf.pdf [accessed 23 June
2015] www.amnestyusa.org/reports/annual-report-ethiopia-2013/ [accessed 30
December 2017] Torture and
ill-treatment of prisoners are widespread in Ethiopia, particularly during
interrogation in pre-trial police detention. The fight against torture fails
at all stages Human
Rights Watch World Report 2015 - Events of 2014 Human Rights Watch,
29 January 2015 www.hrw.org/world-report/2015/...
or
www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/wr2015_web.pdf [accessed 18 March 2015] ETHIOPIA Hopes that
Ethiopia’s government would ease its crackdown on dissent ahead of the May
2015 elections were dashed in 2014. Instead the government continued to use
arbitrary arrests and prosecutions to silence journalists, bloggers,
protesters, and supporters of opposition political parties; police responded
to peaceful protests with excessive force; and there was no indication of any
government willingness to amend repressive legislation that was increasingly
condemned for violating international standards, including at Ethiopia’s
Universal Periodic Review at the United Nations Human Rights Council. Ethiopia
‘ruthlessly targeting’ and torturing Oromo people, says Amnesty Agence France-Presse AFP, Addis Ababa, 28 October 2014 www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/28/ethiopia-torture-oromo-group-amnestry-rape-killings [accessed 26
November 2014] Ethiopia has
“ruthlessly targeted” and tortured its largest ethnic group owing to a
perceived opposition to the government, Amnesty International has said. Thousands of people
from the Oromo ethnic group have been “regularly subjected to arbitrary
arrest, prolonged detention without charge, enforced disappearance, repeated
torture and unlawful state killings,” according to a damning report based on
more than 200 testimonies. “Dozens of actual or suspected dissenters have
been killed.” Former detainees
who have fled the country and were interviewed by Amnesty in neighbouring Kenya, Somaliland and Uganda described
torture “including beatings, electric shocks, mock execution, burning with
heated metal or molten plastic and rape, including gang-rape”, the report
added. One young girl said
hot coals had been dropped on her stomach because her father was suspected of
supporting the OLF, while a teacher described how he was stabbed in the eye
with a bayonet after he refused to teach “propaganda about the ruling party”
to students. The torture and
brutal murder of Alsan Hassen
by Ethiopian police will shock your conscience Horn of Africa News,
7 June 2014 www.opride.com/oromsis/news/3758-the-torture-and-brutal-murder-of-alsan-hassen-by-ethiopian-police [accessed 10 June
2014] A 21-year old Oromo
student, Nuredin Hasen,
who was abducted from Haromaya University late last
month and held incommunicado at undisclosed location, died earlier this month
from a brutal torture he endured while in police custody, family sources
said. Members of the federal and
Oromia state police nabbed Hassen (who is also
known by Alsan Hassen)
and 12 other students on May 27 in a renewed crackdown on Oromo students.
Friends were not told the reason for the arrests nor where the detainees were
taken. They found their
beloved son badly tortured, his face disfigured and
barely recognizable. His throat was slit leaving only the muscles and bones
at the back of his neck connecting his head to the rest of the body. There
were large cuts along his eyelids, right below the eyebrows as if someone had
tried to remove his eyes. There were multiple wounds all over his face and head.
Both of his arms were broken between his wrists and his elbows. It appeared as if the federal forces
employed all forms of inhumane torture tactics, leaving parts of his body
severely damaged and disjointed. Torture in the
heart of Addis, even as leaders gather in gleaming AU building Laetitia Bader, The
East African, 19 October 2013 www.theeastafrican.co.ke/OpEd/comment/Torture-in-the-heart-of-Addis-Ababa/-/434750/2038982/-/qfft6cz/-/index.html [accessed 23 Oct
2013] In a new report, ‘They
Want a Confession’: Torture and Ill-Treatment in Ethiopia’s Maekelawi Police Station, Human Rights Watch documents
how the police who run Maekelawi have tortured and
ill-treated detainees during investigations. Former detainees held in the
facility since 2010 described how investigators slapped, kicked, and beat
them with batons and gun butts. Some were held in painful stress positions
for hours upon end. Some are held in
solitary confinement for days or months. Getachew
said he was held alone and shackled for five months: “When I wanted to stand
up it was hard,” he told me. “I had to use my head, legs, and the walls to
stand up.” Those held in Maekelawi’s two worst detention blocks, nicknamed by
residents Chalama Bet [dark house] and Tawla Bet [wooden house], described
particularly dire conditions. To make matters
worse, investigators use access to basic facilities and needs to punish or
reward detainees. Even access to the toilet can depend on the whim of the
police, as Getachew explained: “I was only allowed
to use the toilet once a day, although after two or three months, I was
allowed twice… They want to get something, and either they get some evidence
or they don’t.” Access to daylight
is also restricted; one person said that he was taken outside for just a few
minutes three times in 42 days in the dark cells. Ethiopian police
torture political detainees: Human Rights Watch Drazen Jorgic,
Reuters, Addis Ababa, 17 October 2013 uk.reuters.com/article/2013/10/18/uk-ethiopia-abuse-hrw-idUKBRE99H00120131018 [accessed 18 March
2014] Ethiopian police
investigators in Addis Ababa's main detention center have tortured political
detainees and regularly mistreat people in custody to extract confessions, Human
Rights Watch (HRW) reported on Friday. In a report about
conditions inside Addis Ababa's Federal Police Crime Investigation Sector,
known as Maekelawi, HRW said many former detainees
were slapped, kicked and beaten with sticks and gun butts during investigations. "Human Rights
Watch found that investigators used coercive methods, including beatings and
threats of violence, to compel detainees to sign statements and
confessions," the group said in a statement, referring to events over
the past three years. Civil Society
Crackdown in Ethiopia Laetitia Bader, New
Internationalist, 4 January 2013 www.hrw.org/news/2013/01/04/civil-society-crackdown-ethiopia [accessed 25 January
2013] On 1 January 2013,
Ethiopia took up its seat on the United Nations Human rights Council. The
uncontested election – Africa put forward five countries for five seats – has
raised some eyebrows, given the country’s own poor rights record. Elected
member countries are obliged to ‘uphold the highest standards in the
promotion and protection of human rights’. Yet, in Ethiopia, hundreds of
political prisoners languish in jails where torture is common and a crackdown
on the media and civil society is in full swing. The blogger Eskinder Nega exemplifies the
fate of those who dare to speak out. Eskinder was
arbitrarily arrested and jailed following the controversial 2005 elections.
After his release from prison two years later, he was placed under ongoing
surveillance and banned from publishing. Then, in 2011, he was rearrested,
convicted in an unfair trial under Ethiopia’s broad terrorism law, and
sentenced to 18 years in prison. Conclusions and
recommendations of the Committee against Torture U.N. Convention
against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment -- Doc. CAT/C/ETH/CO/1
(2011) www1.umn.edu/humanrts/cat/observations/ethiopia2011.html [accessed 27
February 2013] Widespread use of
torture 10. The Committee is
deeply concerned about numerous, ongoing and consistent allegations
concerning the routine use of torture by the police, prison officers and
other members of the security forces, as well as the military, in particular
against political dissidents and opposition party members, students, alleged
terrorist suspects and alleged supporters of insurgent groups such as the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) and the Oromo
Liberation Front (OLF). It is concerned about credible reports that such acts
frequently occur with the participation, at the instigation or with the
consent of commanding officers in police stations, detention centres, federal prisons, military bases and in
unofficial or secret places of detention. The Committee also takes note of
consistent reports that torture is commonly used during interrogation to
extract confessions when the suspect is deprived of fundamental legal
safeguards, in particular access to legal counsel (art. 1, 2, 4, 11 and 15). The Committee urges
the State party to take immediate and effective measures to investigate,
prosecute and punish all acts of torture and to ensure that torture is not
used by law enforcement personnel, including by unambiguously reaffirming the
absolute prohibition of torture and publicly condemning practices of torture,
especially by the police, prison officers and members of the Ethiopian
National Defense Force (ENDF), accompanied by a clear warning that anyone
committing such acts or otherwise complicit or participating in torture will
be held personally responsible before the law for such acts and will be
subject to criminal prosecution and appropriate penalties. Impunity for acts
of torture and ill-treatment 11. The Committee
is deeply concerned at numerous consistent reports about the State party’s
persistent failure to investigate allegations of torture and prosecute
perpetrators, including members of ENDF and military or police commanders. In
this regard, it notes the absence of information on cases where soldiers and
police or prison officers were prosecuted, sentenced or subjected to
disciplinary sanctions for having committed acts or torture or ill-treatment.
The Committee is also concerned about the reported exercise of police
functions by ENDF in the Somali Regional State and by private militia groups
(arts. 2, 4, 12, 13 and 16). The State party
should ensure that all allegations of torture and ill-treatment are promptly
and impartially investigated, and that the perpetrators are prosecuted and
convicted in accordance with the gravity of the acts, as required by article
4 of the Convention, without prejudice to appropriate disciplinary actions
and sanctions. The State party
should ensure that law enforcement functions are exercised by the police
rather than ENDF, including in areas of armed conflict where no state of
emergency has been declared. The State party should prevent the circumvention
by private militia groups of legal safeguards and remedies against torture
and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.. AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL From an old article -- URL not available Article was
published sometime prior to 2015 TORTURE AND OTHER
ILL-TREATMENT Torture and other
ill-treatment of prisoners were widespread, particularly during interrogation
in pre-trial police detention. Typically, prisoners might be punched,
slapped, beaten with sticks and other objects, handcuffed and suspended from
the wall or ceiling, denied sleep and left in solitary confinement for long
periods. Electrocution, mock-drowning and hanging weights
from genitalia were reported in some cases. Many prisoners were forced
to sign confessions. Prisoners were used to mete out physical punishment
against other prisoners. Allegations of
torture made by detainees, including in court, were not investigated. Prison conditions
were harsh. Food and water were scarce and sanitation was very poor. Medical
treatment was inadequate, and was sometimes withheld from prisoners. Deaths
in detention were reported. ARBITRARY ARRESTS
AND DETENTIONS The authorities
arrested members of political opposition parties, and other perceived or
actual political opponents. Arbitrary detention was widespread. According to
relatives, some people disappeared after arrest. The authorities targeted
families of suspects, detaining and interrogating them. The use of unofficial
places of detention was reported. Search … AMNESTY
INTERNATIONAL For current
articles:: Search Amnesty
International Website www.amnesty.org/en/search/?q=ethiopia+torture&ref=&year=&lang=en&adv=1&sort=relevance [accessed 31 December
2018] Scroll
Down ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** Human Rights Reports
» 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61569.htm [accessed 25 January
2013] 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61569.htm [accessed 3 July
2019] TORTURE
AND OTHER CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT – Although the law
prohibits the use of torture and mistreatment, there were numerous credible
reports that security officials often beat or mistreated detainees.
Opposition political parties reported frequent and systematic abuse of their
supporters by police and regional militias. EHRCO reported that
on May 14, Abdeta Dita Entele, a member of the opposition coalition Oromo
National Congress/United Ethiopian Democratic Forces of Siraro
District in the Oromo Region, committed suicide following the severe beatings
he received from kebele officials. On October 16, two
men armed with pistols attacked Daniel Bekele, a policy advocate for the NGO
ActionAid Ethiopia and a member of the executive committee of the Network of
Ethiopian Nongovernmental Organizations and Civil Society Organizations,
which monitored the May 15 elections. According to ActionAid, the armed men
beat him in the eye. At year’s end, Bekele was in police detention on charges
of treason and genocide. Authorities
took no action against police responsible for the February and March 2004
police beatings of students, teachers, and parents at Oromiya
Region high schools and universities; or against militia responsible for May
2004 attacks
on its members reported by the opposition All-Ethiopia Unity Party. In October 2004 an
undisclosed number of the approximately 330 students expelled from Addis
Ababa University following the January 2004 Oromo student protests, who had
been ordered by police to kneel and run barefoot on sharp gravel for several
hours, were readmitted to the university (see section 2.b.). There were no
significant developments in cases of beatings and torture committed by
security forces in 2003. On August 11, local
and international media reported that the federal high court sentenced to
death two former senior government officials accused of torturing political
opponents during the former Mengistu regime --
former National and Public Security Minister Tesfaye
Woldeselase and Leggesse Belayneh, former head of criminal investigations. All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this
webpage as: Patt, Prof. Martin, "Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance
& Other Ill Treatment in the early years of the 21st Century-
Ethiopia", http://gvnet.com/torture/Ethiopia.htm, [accessed
<date>] |
