TPLF/EPRDF Talks of Negotiations with All But Declares War on All

Quite few people were hoping that the demise of the Ethiopian dictator Meles Zenawi will offer a new window of opportunity to open a new chapter in bringing peace to this country. Now everybody seems to have given up on this hope and false expectation that the ruling TPLF EPRDF tried to nurture. Although the Ethiopian officials and spokespersons speak of negotiating peace with guerrilla fighters in Somali Ogaden Region, with neighbouring Eritrea and initiate diplomatic rapprochement with far away tiny Emirate of Qatar, but shows no sign to make peace with its own people inside Ethiopia.

On the contrary, the TPLF/EPRDF regime seems to have declared war on every force at home. On Muslims who requested non–interference in their religious affairs, Christians in monasteries who objected to taking their land for sugar projects, all ethnic groups who want correct implementation of federal arrangement and above on our people, the Afars in the North–Eastern part of the country. 

 

Since announcement of the death of the late dictator Meles Zenawi, in August TPLF/EPRDF tyrannical regime of Ethiopia has been continued to impose their unlawful and discriminatory policy of marginalization and killings on our people. Recently, the TPLF/EPRDF regime had committed arbitrary arrests and unlawful detentions, gross violations of human rights, rape and sexual violence and politically motivated killings against the Afar civilians in different districts of Afar Region on the grounds that these people were accused of being ARDUF or sympathizers or what the regimes calls “anti-peace elements” who oppose state commercial projects such as the infamous Sugar Project in their grazing lands. 

In the last month alone, more than 60, 000 TPLF/EPRDF military personnel deployed into Afar region not only to guard Eritrean-Ethiopian border, but exclusively to control, intimidate, terrorize and kill any Afars. The existence of undisciplined TPLF military forces in Afar grazing land and neighbourhoods localities is a crime itself, contrary to civil liberty laws and to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and inevitably leads to widespread arbitrary arrests, unlawful killings and forced eviction of their ancestral lands. Afar Region is presently facing a grievous political, economic, social, and insecurity problems, gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity created by TPLF/EPRDF regime. Today, the Ethiopian peoples in general are now living in fear and insecure situation due to TPLF/EPRDF regime bad governance, interference of their lives and religious affairs and political and economic marginalization imposed on them by the regime. 

Because of rivalry between its component elements, TPLF/EPRDF absence of morality, lack of inability to rule the country on the rule of law and to find a peaceful political solution to its political entanglement. The new Prime Minister could not even form a new cabinet because of this political deadlock. Recently a German NGO called Heinrich Boll Foundation had closed its office in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, because it had become impossible for the organization to work for democracy, gender equality and sustainable development under the current circumstances. 

ARDUF would like to inform the people of Ethiopia and international community globally that ARDUF will continue its armed struggle against TPLF/EPRDF regime until:

• Our legitimate right to Self-Determination of Afar people is recognized to determine their own economic, social and cultural development and political system democratically and freely including a fair and free election to choose their political representatives accountable to their electorate and answerable to the Afar National Parliament;
• TPLF/ EPRDF regime forces pull out from Afar pastoralist grazing lands;
• TPLF/EPRDF regime dismantle Issa-Somali tribe’s illegal settlements built in the Middle Awash particularly in Adaytu, Qunxa-Foqo and Gadamaytu areas of Afar region;
• Our human rights are fully respected according to the human rights laws and the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR);
• TPLF/EPRDF’s Sugar Projects and foreign land grabbing companies are completely halted in Afar region.

It is ARDUF’s responsibility and obligation to defend the Afar land, protect any person in the Afar region and to respond to TPLF/EPRDF’s indiscriminate aggression on our people. ARDUF will not enter into any negotiation with TPLF/EPRDF regime until the regime recognizes and accepts the above mentioned political demand fully and unconditionally. Afar people want to regain their right to self-determination through a democratic process acceptable to our people. 

ARDUF call on all Ethiopian political organizations and the oppressed peoples of Ethiopia by TPLF/EPRDF regime to work together to fight TPLF/EPRDF dictatorial regime and to re-establish a true democratic political system that guarantees the right to determine their future in free and fair election. 

Long Live Afar people’s struggle for freedom
Information Desk
Afar Revolutionary Democratic Unity Front (ARDUF)
Afar Revolutionary Democratic Unity Front (ARDUF) UGUUGUMO
Contact: mabay44@yahoo.com