| I. General Introduction
Much has been written on my article �Attempted Blackmail of
Ethiopia by United States Congress� that was posted a couple of
weeks ago in a couple of sites. The article dealt with the ersatzic
meddling of some United States Congress Representatives in the
affairs of the sovereign nation of Ethiopia. It was a brief,
intimate response to a bill (H.R. 2760) introduced by Rep. Tom
Lantos (for himself and Pep Donald Payne) in the House of
Representatives, which bill unduly and unjustly interfered with a
very important national interest and questions of sovereignty and
territorial integrity of Ethiopia. The �truth� is bitter to
swallow in an age of Teflon personalities and limitless greed. Thus,
a number of people went epileptic in a frenzy of anger against my
ideas and my person. I simply shook off such pathetic nuisance or
effort of individuals who have no sense of history and a distorted
view of their otherwise insignificant role in the larger scheme of
things. I have also my supporters here, but mostly in Ethiopia that
literally goes into the millions. It is inconceivable to deprive
Ethiopia its historic Coastal Territories of Afar and the Red Sea.
It won�t happen, America or no America. The West in pursuit of its
own security and economic agenda is simply feeding a few Eritreans a
pipe dream. The very independence of Eritrea is an illegal activity
carried out by two individuals and their supporters with no
consideration of the future of millions of people. Even if there is
a negotiated settlement on the independence of �Eritrea� that
has to be seen in the context of bringing back both groups of people
into a single state structure once this craziness has blown
over.
It is a fact that the people of both regions are suffering. In
�Eritrea� over one third of the entire population, about a
million people, live in desperate situation as refugees and
immigrants throughout the Middle East, Europe, the Americas, Africa,
and Australia. Ethiopians have started a similar pattern of
migration because of economic reasons caused by political oppression
and debilitating economic policy. If anyone believes that the Arab
world is going to benefit �Eritreans,� such a person is in a
dream world. The oil wealth of the Arabs has already been siphoned
off by corrupt government leaders and their descendants where they
have removed such great amount of wealth into Western Europe and
America, there is no wealth left for the people of the region. How
are people going to recover such wealth in the future? They won�t;
it is a lost cause. Due to such abuse of the wealth of nations, life
is going to be even more unbearable for anyone from Africa living in
the Middle East. When there is a revolution and social upheavals,
the first people who will be targets of atrocities are Christian �Eritreans�
and Ethiopians. And soon after all Africans living in the Area
whether they are Moslems or not will be the next victims. There is
already gruesome evidence of such violence against Black people
where both �Eritreans� and Ethiopians were victims of brutality.
The sad fact is that there is enough room for all in our ancient
nation that would satisfy and accommodate all of us. There is no
need for any of us to be refugees in places where we are abused. We
have great expanse of land, great rivers, freshwater et cetera, the
envy of most. We can create paradise on Earth by our united effort
rather than fight like cats and dogs on bones thrown to us by the
Europeans and their progeny. The West had always worked to
dismantle, disunite, and destroy us throughout our history. What do
you think is the Algiers Agreement supposed to achieve? And the
1900, 1902, and 1908 alleged agreements are supposed to do? What was
Italy or Britain or America doing in Africa or in our neck of the
wood? You tell me? These colonial forced agreements, annexes, and
instruments are now turned around and are thrown at us as
bones-of-conflicts so that we end up fighting each other like wild
beasts rather than cooperating and pulling together for our
posterity and insure the continued existence of our children.
I am not saying that the West has never done great things
especially in the field of technology (industrial economy) and in
political structure and human rights for itself, but in achieving
such industrial advancement and wealth, it has caused also
tremendous destructions. Do I need to remind anyone about the
millions that perished in the Atlantic slave trade, the millions of
native people exterminated in the Americas, the slaughter of the
innocents every where et cetera. The great wealth (gold, precious
metal, all kinds of mineral wealth, and the denudation of the great
forests) of the West was produced from looted wealth of the Peoples
of the World. In the period starting with the First World War to
date the West (that includes Soviet Union) has caused the death of
over one hundred million people in horrendous wars and battles
around the World. Nazi Germany alone had almost completely destroyed
European Jews, no less than seven million human beings. This
tabulation of the destruction of human life is not my own fantasy,
but a very conservative estimate from documentation available in
books and articles that anyone can check. Thus, one should put
things in perspective and not completely buy the idea of Western
economic development as the measurement of ones humanity.
This article is a very short response to articles and chat
statements posted by two groups of people in connection with my
previous article. The first group�s representative writing is that
of Sophia Tesfamariam. [I have no reason to doubt that Sophia
Tesfamariam is a real individual�s name and not a pseudo name.]
And the second group consists of individuals who use pseudo names
and pen-names, who claim to be patriotic Ethiopians, but display
none of the courage and tenacity of Ethiopians. Such cowardice such
as writing hiding behind anonymity is best illustrated by the chat
postings of �Fenjiregach.� Here we go back to our squabble and
fracas. II. Sophia Tesfamariam:
1. Misrepresentation and avoidance of serious issues Most of the
postings of this first group reflect the �Eritrean� government
propaganda lines (pieces) trying to confuse and misinform people. At
times their effort is very clumsy and amateurish. For example, the
allegation that I am Meles�s secret agent, is such a ridicules
statement one starts doubting the sanity of the writer. I am not
anybody�s agent, secret or otherwise. I have consistently
advocated the removal of Meles by any means and charging him and his
associates with treason and crime against humanity. Thus, it is a
laughable attempt to state that I was hibernating for ten years and
suddenly popped out into the scene working for Meles Zenawi. In the
last ten years, I have been very visible through three books I
wrote, and numerous articles I posted in the web, and the thousands
of Ethiopians I addressed in huge assemblies in the United States,
Canada, and the Netherlands. Maybe Sophia was living in another
Planet or on the Space Lab that she ended up writing a ridicules
piece accusing me of being �secret agent of the Tigrayan Clique in
Addis� who popped out or have been activated only recently. Sophia
in her article did not refute any of my serious statements. Her
article was a simple harangue and a series of argumentum ad hominem
culminating in an insult that has no place in any journal,
newspaper, or web site. By way of recouping the essential points of
my previous article, I restate here and completely reaffirm the
veracity of my previous statements on the background of Lantos and
Payne, on the invalidity of all international instruments between
Ethiopia and Italy of 1900, 1902 Annex, and 1908 Draft that was
never signed or implemented, and the fraudulent activities of
several governments and their leaders. One must never overlook the
fact that Italy by signing the Peace Treaty of Paris in 1947 had
effectively nullified any legal rights it might have that third
parties or succeeding states would have claimed through the
principle of the right of succession. The position of the Border
Commission as to the invalidity of those international instruments
is in their opinions.
The one item that may have been a source of some kind of a
serious contention would have been the Algiers Agreement if it had
been signed by competent authorities; however, the collusion and
fraudulent activities surrounding the Algiers Agreement is public
knowledge, and one can find all over the communications and
statements made by Meles and Issaias and their government
spokespersons treasonous activities that renders such agreement null
and void. We have also eyewitness accounts and affidavits of
individuals and copies of documents that the TPLF and EPLF leaders
agreed upon to divide up the sovereign nation of Ethiopia while they
were still in the bush as so called �liberation� fronts. Of
course, if there is collusion, fraud, and undisclosed secret
arrangement in between agents of sovereign nations et cetera no
agreement signed by such agents is valid, and it can be challenged.
In the last couple of years there has been an increase in the name
calling and attack on each other by the leadership of the
governments of both �Eritrea� and Ethiopia, in Addis Ababa and
Asmara. Government officials and official government controlled
Newspapers have stated repeatedly acrimonious statements. This is
one more fraud perpetrated by the leadership in Addis and Asmara on
the people of Ethiopia and the world community at large to give the
semblance of legitimacy that there is no collusion, or secret
agreement, or back-door illegal deal to defraud the people of
Ethiopia of their national sovereignty and territorial integrity. I
emphasis here the fraudulent participation of the Border Commission
in matters far beyond the competency of arbitration tribunals. The
members of the Tribunal, as scholars and jurists, should have known
the fraudulent nature of the basic international document, the
Algiers Agreement, which they used as their source of power or
authority. If that document is shown to be fraudulent and invalid
the whole arbitration construction collapses. And as such even on a
cursory examination of the surrounding facts, and the process of
setting up the arbitration tribunal should have clearly indicated to
any of the members of the Tribunal that the Tribunal is being set up
with an illegal objective of resurrecting of long dead and defunct
international instrument only for the sole purpose of giving a total
advantage to one party preempting the legally rights of the other.
Some of the Commission members had already arbitrated on issues that
raised similar legal issues or issues that required an affirmation
of some foundational facts common to the current Border arbitration
in the Hanish Islands/Yemen case. This is a clear violation of
conflict of interest and the age old principle against decisions
prior to processes and deliberations.
Moreover, the Arbitration Commission, no matter what, cannot
claim unto itself powers that even the Security Council does not
have--the power to deny the long established rights of citizenship
and sovereignty and territorial integrity of a nation state that was
in existence long before the creation of the United Nations itself.
The international law principle of Jus Cogens is sacrosanct and
inviolable by anybody, and list of all, by a lowly arbitration
tribunal like the Border Arbitration Tribunal. In fact, I consider
the activities of the Members of the Arbitration Tribunal bordering
criminality, thus open to criminal charges or indictment and arrest
for treason and/or endangerment of the security of a sovereign
nation under its laws.
2. Argumentum Ad hominem
Sophia found it necessary to attack my person, not just my ideas.
She insulted me by calling me �tokla� a �wolf� in sheep
skin. I have never insulted her personally. In fact, I never
insulted anyone personally. I have identified certain individuals as
traitors, dictators, tyrants et cetera because that is who they are.
I have identified or judged some ideas, activities, or opinions of
certain individuals to be idiotic, moronic, silly et cetera because
such ideas, activities, and opinions deserve to be called that
because they lack rationality, coherence, and factual bases.
However, I have never insulted the personhood of anyone. Insulting
people is cheap. Although I am tempted to identify Sophia
Tesfamariam by a domestic animal, I will not do so. I will not lower
myself to her pathetic self. I would not live at peace with myself
having degraded another human being and a �sister� at that even
though a revolting one, by identifying her with an animal. It is one
reason why we should not attack the personhood of anyone no matter
how disagreeable such a person maybe by degrading him/her to a
status of animals. However, by way of completing the education of
Sophia Tesfamariam, I must indicate to her and others like her that
the �wolf� she identified me with is the most courageous,
community oriented, and loyal animal, which would take on much
larger and ferocious enemies in defense of its group and family. Let
me remind you all that ancient civilizations such as Pharonic Kemet
held the wolf with great respect as one of their gods, and both
ancient Europeans and North American natives saw the wolf as a great
�spirit.� For such early people to belong to the �wolf clan�
was the pinnacle of achievement. The wolf is a much revered symbol
of the Romans and their eternal city of Rome. I am sure you know the
story of Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, who were saved
from certain death and suckled by a wolf. With the advent of
Christianity, the wolf lost some prestige in the Christian world and
was portrayed as a vicious animal for some time. Now, present day
zoologists and animal conservationists see the wolf in its old glory
as an animal of great courage and loyalty, and not as aggressive to
human beings as once thought. Sophia seems to be using my part
Tygreian birth right as some form of a limiting factor or a fact
that would cast suspicion to my activities defending the sovereignty
and territorial integrity of Ethiopia. Far from that, I am proud to
belong to the cradle of Ethiopian civilization, to a people great
with courage and with overflowing generosity. I am proud of my
ancestors who help build our Ethiopia that included the present day
�Eritrea� as well; they were great warriors, scholars, farmers,
merchants et cetera. It is also a sophomoric attempt to create a
division between people where there is none by simply identifying me
with one ethnic source because my birth right includes a lot more. I
am as much Hamassen, Afar, Shoa Amhara, Gojjame, Wollega Oromo,
Borena, Gurage, Issa, Wollaita, Adere, Wolloie Amhara, Dinka et
cetera as much Tygre. In short I am an Ethiopian, the greatest
people that have given birth to all of mankind and its
civilizations. III. The Faceless Group Some of you may think that it
is easy for me to say harsh words criticizing any Ethiopian (my
reference to Ethiopia includes Eritrea). The fact of the matter is
that every time I write a statement criticizing or castigating a
fellow Ethiopian, I feel that I am piercing my own heart with all
the excruciating pain that one can suffer under such infliction. But
certain things cannot be glossed over or passed in silence for they
are harmful to the larger body politic or community of Ethiopians.
Thus, I write; I criticize, and I infuriate some and please others.
As a consequence I suffer in private. That is nothing compared to
the type of life my fellow Ethiopians under successive brutal
governments had to endure.
Even if it has no substantive merit, Sophia Tesfamariam wrote her
piece not hiding behind some made-up name. She has the singular
courage to stand up for what she believed in. I respect that. On the
other hand there is this second group of individuals, who claim to
be �patriotic Ethiopians� with strange and childish pseudo names
such as �Fenjiregach�, trying to imply great courage, who should
really call him/herself �arr-regach� or something else, writing
idiotic statements undermining legitimate causes. Some have been
attacking me for bringing out in no uncertain terms the destructive
role being played out by some Congressional Members and the
Executive Branch of the United States Government. The �patriotism�
those Ethiopians showed, hiding behind pseudo names, defending the
United States destructive effort to blackmail Ethiopia into
accepting a situation absolutely against the interest of Ethiopia
and the impact of which is catastrophic marginalization for
generations, is a situation absolutely despicable and treasonous.
Abatun saiawke be ayatu yimlal. Is the United States in such dire
circumstance that it is in need of defense by individuals who do not
even have the courage to write statements under their own names?
This is particularly laughable coming from people from the fringes
of American politics and life. The first step in the pursuit of
freedom is to liberate oneself from fear. The Stoics held the view
that the worst evil is �fear.� How true it is affirmed every day
when I read faceless, nameless individuals writing under assumed
names or pseudo names attacking me for defending the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of Ethiopia. I wonder how such individuals
perceive their places in society. Do they really think governments
of countries would spend their scarce resources tracking down such
individuals and in some way affecting their pathetic lives? Are they
afraid of me? Such presumption is nothing less than a sickness of
the mind.
There are few lessons that all so called �patriotic Ethiopians�
who have been throwing poisoned darts at me from behind pseudo
names, should learn from the likes of Sophia Tesfamariam who did not
hide behind some fictitious name in order to attack me. Stand by
your convictions, do not hid behind curtains and throw insults at
people. No one has forced you to write anything that even remotely
opens your lives to some form of danger. But if you have the urge to
be involved, which is fine, do get involved by all means. Show some
courage and do not hide behind pseudo names. We all make choices in
our lives. We all weigh relative danger to our actions before we
make a decision to act in certain manner. No one can force anyone to
be brave or courageous; thus, if you do show courage, then stand
behind your beliefs, there is no need to hide behind ridicules
pseudo names. There is no glory in throwing poison laden darts from
shadowy corners hidden or camouflaged, on some one who is walking in
broad daylight in full public-view as I do. Individuals the likes of
�Fenjiregach� (whom I have renamed as �arr-regachi�), hiding
behind pseudo names are throwing poisoned questions at my integrity,
my courage, and my loyalty. On the other hand such individuals
hardly ever take any initiative to protect and promote the interests
of the Ethiopian people. They are involved eternally in conspiracy
on how to acquire political power. They hardly ever try to improve
their understanding or knowledge. They are vegetative and despondent
when it comes to self-improvement. If they are incapable of even
improving themselves how do they expect people will entrust them
with improving their lives? There is no amount of money or honor
that could tempt me to shut up from telling the truth as I see it. I
already have the greatest wealth that I ever wanted--the path of
righteousness, not harming my fellow man, and the love and
admiration of my family and friends and even people I do not know.
My fight for Ethiopia is simply my way of living the righteous life.
Fighting for the rights and dignity of the most incredible people
with the most fabulous history is a great privilege for me.
LEST
LIES ARE MISTAKEN FOR TRUTH:
Addendum
to �Blackmailing... Phase Two�
By Tecola W. Hagos
September 21, 2003
Because I was focused on
the fundamental issue of the Sovereignty and Territorial integrity
of Ethiopia that was being challenged, I let slip a shameful lie of
Sophia Tesfamariam about my background uncorrected specifically.
Sophia had stated that I �was a member of the communist party
under the brutal Mengistu regime.� [See Article in Shaebia, August
31, 2003] This is an absolute and shameful lie. I invite anyone to
check official documents at the United States Department of State
and the Immigration and Naturalization Services for my record. I
left Ethiopia in 1976 (one thousand nine hundred seventy six) and
applied for political asylum the same year, and was granted my
request on my showing of past persecution and well founded fear of
future persecution by the Military Regime. I was in the United
States living as a political refugee when Mengistu Hailemariam
established his Workers Party (communist) in 1977/78 and unleashed
his Red Terror. Thus, I was not a member of any communist party
under Mengistu or anybody else. I am not some super being who can be
at two different places thousands of miles apart at the same
time.[It is to be recalled that seventeen members of the committee
for democratic governance from the Ministry of Finance and I as
their chairman were in detention in 1974 at the Alem-Bekagn Prison
in Addis Ababa for opposing the establishment of the Provisional
Military Government of Ethiopia. We were the first organized group
to confront the Derg Military leaders demanding for civilian
leadership and participation in the transition. As a matter of fact,
I was in the same prison compound where the Sixty Ethiopian High
Governmental Officials including two Prime Ministers were murdered
by firing squads. It was by mere chance and the influence of a
couple of progressive members of the Derg ruling council (who were
later murdered on allegation that they were EPRP members) that our
lives were spared, but that is another story for another time. Our
superb Ethiopian defense Lawyer who defended us courageously at our
trial is now living in the United States who could easily verify my
statements. We were released from prison with two years probation.
However, some of my colleagues were later murdered during the Red
Terror; my fate would have been no different had I been in Ethiopia
during the Red Terror or during the Regime of Menghistu.]
The first time I traveled
back to Ethiopia, since I left the country in 1976, was with the
EPRDF/TPLF change of government in late 1991. I helped in the
structuring of the new transitional government of EPRDF. However,
due to conflict of vision for the future of Ethiopia with the new
leaders, I chose to leave Ethiopia in late 1992 and have been living
in the United States ever since with a short stop over in Europe.
I have never been a member
of any communist party any where in the World. I have never been a
member of any communist organization in Ethiopia. I left Ethiopia in
1976 long before any Communist or socialist party was established by
Mengistu. I have my sympathy to this day for all people who fight
oppression and economic exploitation every where. Maybe Sophia
should inquire of her boss about communism, some one who received
his subversive training in China. Or even better, maybe she should
ask Menghistu�s ex-political advisor who is now the senior most
official and advisor of her leader about communism, or Mengistu and
his collaborators. I have no political skeletons in my closet unlike
many of Sophia�s associates and bosses. Tecola W. Hagos
September 20, 2003
Tecola W. Hagos
Washington DC
September 2003
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