Ethiopia detains 4 US soldiers trying to contact Ogaden rebels
September 7, 2007 (ADDIS ABABA) — Ethiopia briefly detained what it said were four U.S. soldiers trying to contact a rebel group that has been fighting for greater autonomy for eastern Ethiopia, Ethiopian officials said Friday.
Bereket Simon, a senior adviser to Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, declined to say when the soldiers were detained or give any further details. Asked about the U.S. soldiers, he told The AP: “Four soldiers, or some soldiers, were detained. They were trying to contact the ONLF (the Ogaden National Liberation Front). That was not permitted.”
An official at the U.S. Embassy couldn’t immediately comment on the issue.
In an interview published in this week’s edition of Time magazine, Meles said Ethiopia had no proof the U.S. soldiers made contact with the rebels but they could have been “moving in that direction.”
“As far as we know, these personalities did not have official sanction to do that what they were doing. They were violating their own code of conduct,” the premier told Time in an interview conducted last month.
An official familiar with the case said the soldiers were detained in May in the eastern region of Somali State, as the Ogaden is known. The official said they were immediately released and their Ethiopian-American interpreter released in August.
At the time, the U.S. soldiers’ detention wasn’t made public.
In recent years, Ethiopia has been a key U.S. ally in the fight against the international terror network al-Qaida, which has been trying to sink roots among Muslims in the Horn of Africa. U.S. troops in Ethiopia train Ethiopian soldiers to better guard their borders. The Ogaden is along Ethiopia’s border with Somalia, another battleground in the war on terror.
The ONLF dramatically escalated its decade-long insurgency in eastern Ethiopia when in April it attacked a Chinese-owned oil exploration field, killing 74 workers. Until then it only made occasional hit and run attacks against government troops.
Since the rebels’ April attack, the army has intensified its counterinsurgency operations, which aid and human rights groups say has seen the military burn villages, block aid and trade into the region.
The government denies its forces have committed any violations.
(AP)