ETHIOPIAN PM ABIY AHMED HITS BACK AT US ADMINISTRATION IN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN

Ethiopian Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed has in an open letter to US President Joseph R. Biden Jr. dated September 17, 2021 questioned the US’s failing East Africa foreign policy. The reformist Ethiopian leader in his letter, demanded from the Biden administration as to why it has not taken a strong position against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, TPLF – the very organization the US Homeland Security categorized as qualifying as Tier 3 terrorist organisation for their violent activities in the 1980s, given threats to national, regional and global security continue to be a key component of US interests in many parts of the world. PM Abiy Ahmed who reiterated that Ethiopia has remained the USA’s staunch ally in fighting the terrorism threat of Al Shabab in the Horn, pointed out that his nation expects the US to stand by her as a similar terrorist organization with hostility towards the region threatens to destabilize the Horn. He further noted that in the same manner that President Biden’s predecessors led the global ‘war on terror’, so is his administration, with the support of the millions of Ethiopians thirsty and hungry for their right to peace, development and prosperity, leading a national ‘war on terror’ against a destructive criminal enterprise, which poses a threat to both national and Horn region stability.

PM Abiy Ahmed’s open letter to the US President comes after the American leader released an Executive Order on the same day, September 17, establishing a sanctions regime that will allow the US target those responsible for, or in complicit, in prolonging the conflict in Ethiopia, obstructing humanitarian access, or preventing a ceasefire. The Executive Order stated that President Biden has provided the Department of the Treasury with the necessary authority to hold accountable those in the Ethiopian Government, Government of Eritrea, The TPLF and Amhara regional government among others that continue to pursue conflict over negotiations to the detriment of the Ethiopian people. The executive order went on to explain that these sanctions are not directed at the people of Ethiopia or Eritrea, but rather the individuals and entities perpetrating the violence and driving a humanitarian disaster.

Ethiopia’s Tigray region descended into conflict in November last year when the TPLF launched an attack on an army base of Ethiopian Defence Forces. Several attempts by PM Abiy Ahmed’s administration to bring the situation under control have proven futile as the criminal group, which the government has now designated as ‘terrorists’ is skilled at propaganda and spinning international human rights and democracy machinations to its favour. However, this is not stopping the even more determined PM Abiy Ahmed from taking the right path for his people as he stated in his open letter to President Joe Biden that, with the landslide victory his Prosperity Party enjoyed in the June 2021 elections, they are even more resolute in granting Ethiopians the dignity, security and development they deserve within the means they have and without succumbing to various competing interests and pressures. ‘And we will do this by confronting the threats to democracy and stability posed by any belligerent criminal enterprise’, Abiy stated.