African Christianity under Attack: the Anuak Genocide

By: Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis
[

][Post to BookMarks @ AfroArticles.com]

[ Posted On: 2007-12-16 ]

Four years of silence and oblivion have passed since the ominous day of the appalling and inhuman slaughtering of 400 Anuak by the pseudo-Christian gangsters and thugs of the Abyssinian tyrant Meles Zenawi.

In an earlier article under title ‘Christian Anuak Massacred by Neo-Nazi, Pseudo-Christian ‘Ethiopians’, we referred to the abhorrent event of December 13, 2003, drawing a brief portrait of the Anuak, and their struggle for Independence, Freedom and Dignity.

One of the Anuak political organizations is the Anuak Justice Council, who advocate for peaceful resolution of the Anuak Drama all the way through the formation of an independent Anuakland.

We urge every conscious citizen and every concerned human to visit the Anuak Justice Council website (http://www.anuakjustice.org) and become more acquainted with the horrible burden of the Abyssinian tyranny.

The Anuak Justice Council

In the case of the Anuak, the real face of the Abyssinian Amhara and Tigray Racism has been revealed in a most repugnant and barbaric way. To shed further light on the activities of the Anuak Justice Council that we call you to fervently support, we republish here an integral text – profile of the Anuak Justice Council

“The Anuak Justice Council, a 501(c)(3) organization, is a representative voice for the Anuak community worldwide. Our mission is to advocate peacefully for the rights and security of the Anuak wherever they live.

The Anuak are a small minority group in Ethiopia and Sudan, residing mainly in the Gambella region of southwestern Ethiopia. They have been the predominant landowners in the region for several generations, enjoying relative peace and coexisting with other minority groups, although tensions with the Ethiopian government over land ownership have existed for decades. The current regime in Ethiopia has not acted favorably toward the Anuak and over the last decade has become an increasingly oppressive reality for the Anuak.

On December 13, 2003, members of the Ethiopian military and other ethnic groups massacred more than 400 people in the town of Gambella. Since that time, the Anuak have continued to suffer genocide and other on-going crimes against humanity.

In the months following the December 2003 massacre, many Anuak expatriates felt scattered and powerless in their efforts to raise awareness of the oppression against their people and to help family members in immediate danger. Compounding this frustration was the lack of coverage of this tragedy by the international press.

As the atrocities continued, the urgent need for an organized voice for the Anuak became apparent, and in response to that need the Anuak Justice Council was formed. Representatives from the AJC have presented testimony to governmental bodies in the UN, the US, Canada and the European Union.

The AJC has also formed partnerships with international law groups to bring legal pressure to bear against the current Ethiopian regime in international court, and through contacts with other human rights organizations has been instrumental in initiating extensive investigations into the alleged crimes of genocide. Noteworthy among those investigations is the report by Human Rights Watch, a report that strongly implicates the Ethiopian government as a perpetrator of genocide.

The hope of the Anuak Justice Council is that with the help of pressure from the international community, a process of negotiation with the Ethiopian government can begin that would lead to a peaceful solution to the violence in Gambella, and ultimately to a safe and secure homeland to which the scattered Anuak can return”.

The Monstrous Racism of the Pseudo-Ethiopians Highly Exposed

It is essential to pay attention to accusations of the tribal thugs of the Tigray Abyssinian gangster Meles Zenawi expressed by leading NGOs specialized in Human Rights Advocacy.

We republish here a background information text issued by the leading NGO Genocide Watch (http://www.genocidewatch.org/McgillAnuakjan04links.htm) under the title “The Anuak Genocide”; the insightful text was issued as a resource for Minnesota media only a few days after the Anuak Genocide took place (14 January 2004). It bears witness to the inconsistencies and discrepancies of our societies and governments, who knew and yet kept silent for 4 years.

In the light of this text, every support to the criminal gangsters who rule Abyssinia – fallaciously re-baptized ‘Ethiopia’ – cannot be considered but as an Anti-Christian and antihuman act that modern Western societies cannot tolerate, if they want to survive.

The Anuak Genocide

Issued by the Genocide Watch

“More than 1,200 members of the Anuak tribe of Ethiopia live in Minneapolis, St. Paul, and in southern Minnesota, having come as refugees to escape ethnic cleansing that has been carried out against their tribe over the past two decades. Including children born in this country to Anuak parents, the number of Anuak in southern Minnesota is well over 2,000.

On December 13, 2003, in by far the largest single incident in the genocide of the Anuak, more than 400 Anuak were killed by uniformed soldiers of the Ethiopian Defense Force, according to dozens of eyewitnesses. The killings have continued until this day and have caused more than 10,000 Anuak refugees to flee across the Ethiopia-Sudan border to the area near Pocalla, Sudan, where there is presently a humanitarian emergency due to low food and medical supplies.

On January 8, Genocide Watch, the widely-respected international NGO, put the Anuak massacre on their emergency list of ongoing genocides in the world. "The situation reminds me of Rwanda in 1993, when all the early warning signs were evident but no one paid attention," Dr. Gregory Stanton, president of Genocide Watch, has written.

The Minnesota media is an early warning system for this African genocide.

The December 13 massacre and subsequent killings have thrown the Anuak diaspora community in Minnesota into feverish work to help their suffering relatives at home. Meetings with the staffs of State senators and representatives are planned; a rally was held on the steps of the capitol on December 18; and efforts are being made to raise emergency relief funds and send aid workers to Pocalla”.

Contacts for Interviews

Omot Ochan
St. Paul, Minnesota
c: 612-408-8145
h: 651-686-5854

Obang Jobi
Secretary, Anuak Community Association of North America (ACANA)
St. Paul, MN
952-736-9946

Obang Metho
Director, Gambella Development Agency
Saskatchewan, Canada
(306) 933-4346
(306) 955-7549

Omot Nyigwo
Mankato, Minnesota
(507)386-0837

Ojulu Odola
Sydney, Australia
61 2 9631 3629

LeRoy G. Christoffels
Pastor, Worthington Christian Reformed Church (many Anuak parishioners)
Worthington, MN
o: 507-372-2811
h: 507-376-4092

Ujulu Goch
Washington, DC
(202) 431-0839

Anuak massacre eyewitness speaks out

Published by the Aegis Trust

We find necessary to refer to another website that provides a series of audio files, shedding more light on the circumstances of the appalling genocidal act perpetrated by the pseudo-Christian racist Amhara and Tigray thugs. The Aegis Trust, launched in 2000, is motivated by those who have experienced genocide. Aegis activities include research, policy, education, remembrance, awareness of genocide issues in the media and humanitarian support for victims of genocide.

Aegis website provides 12 audio files that consist in a unique document against the illegal bogus-state of ‘Ethiopia’ that is made out of invasions of foreign lands and survived due to ceaseless practice of genocides, massacres, inhuman tyranny, and cruel racism carried out systematically by the Amhara and Tigray Abyssinians against all the rest. They files can be found in the following link: http://www.aegistrust.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=430&Itemid=88. Here, we re-publish integrally the introductory text.

“From 13-15 December 2003, highlander militia and Ethiopian troops (rogue elements, according to Addis Ababa) killed an estimated 400+ Anuak civilians in Gambella town, capital of Gambella province, western Ethiopia. Now an eyewitness to that massacre has given a rare interview to the Aegis Trust – on the events of those three days, and on the conditions for Anuak in Ethiopia today.

During the 2003 massacre, the interviewee claims to have witnessed the murder of seven Anuak civilians by Ethiopian soldiers, several shot or knifed, one of whom was stopped, checked for the presence of tribal scarring on his face that would indicate he was not Anuak, and then tied up and run over with a military truck.

He offers a disturbing assessment of endemic racism against the Anuak, in the Government, the Army and the population at large. The picture that emerges is one of systematic discrimination in health, education, employment, governance and security, accompanied by a high level of violence against civilians.

Among the most troubling aspects are the disarmament of Anuak civilians by the Army in tandem with attempts to foment trouble between the Anuak and other minorities, such as the well-armed Nuer; accounts of public encouragement of flight to Sudan by senior Government officials, and accounts of rape, murder and the destruction of property accompanying clearance of land for oil exploration in Gambella.

On a positive note, the interviewee notes that since 2003, tensions between the Anuak and Nuer have been contained thanks to active efforts on the part of both communities, and in particular the church, to maintain good relations. He stresses however that any breakdown in this détente would be catastrophic for the Anuak, given the level of Nuer armament.

He states that the Anuak rebels – increasingly active since 2003 – consistently attack highlander civilians in retaliation for violence against the Anuak on the part of the Army; outrages that do nothing to aid their cause.

In conclusion, he offers a bleak assessment of the prospects for the Anuak in Gambella, over 30% of whom have become refugees abroad since 2003 – and 30,000 of whom remain precariously encamped at Pochalla in Sudan, where earlier this year they were surrounded and intimidated by Ethiopian troops.

“If things continue this way, after some years there will be no Anuak people maybe in Gambella,” he says. “The Anuak have lost their potential leaders and their community elders are all in exile in different countries. Young Anuak, some are not going to school because if education after all means you get in prison or killed then it’s meaningless, so I think it will be very difficult for the Anuak people in the future”.

Asked how the international community can help, he calls for international monitoring of what is happening in the Gambella region, and for the Ethiopian Government to be encouraged to sit down and negotiate with Anuak representatives to achieve a fair distribution of resources to Gambella and to end the violence.

Since the film of the interview totals 21 minutes, this has been broken into shorter segments (see below).

The interviewee was filmed at a secret location. His name is withheld, his voice has been scrambled, and his face masked to protect his identity”.

Article Source: http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard

About The Author: Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis - is Orientalist, Assyriologist, Egyptologist, Iranologist, Islamologist, Historian and Political Scientist. Dr. Megalommatis, 49, is the author of 12 books, dozens of scholarly articles, hundreds of encyclopedia entries, and thousands of articles. He speaks, reads and writes more than 15, modern and ancient, languages.

| View Profile & All Articles By: Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis |

		Post Comment
		Blog This Article!
		Discuss Article in Forum(s)
		Publication \| Reprint Terms

Please Rate this Article

Not yet Rated

Click the XML Icon Above to Receive Racism, Prejudice & Hate Articles Via RSS!

| Category Feeds | All-in-one Feed | Other Feed & Syndication Options |

Additional Articles From - Home | Society & Culture | Racism, Prejudice & Hate

	Print This Article
	Post Comment
	Add To Favorites
	Email To Friends
	Ezine Ready \| Syndication
	Make PDF Article
	Post To del.icio.us
	Post To Furl
	Add To Google Bookmarks
	Submit To Netscape
	Add To Yahoo! My Web
	Add Main Feed To Outlook
	Post to BookMarks @ AfroArticles.com

	Post To BookMarkAfrica.com

Site Home

Article Categories

More Search Options

Site Map

Submit Articles

Top Authors

Most Recent Articles