Ogaden National Liberation Front [ONLF] Army mounted several targeted operations against Woyane Troops

According the military communique released by ONLF, the ONLF fighters has conducted several operations to punish the woyane troops who were sent to commit atrocities against the civilians in the area. The communique also released that  the death toll on the Woyane Army side during those operations was 168 dead. They also captured heavy weapons, food, medicine and item looted from the civilian population while freeing 50 conscripts from the local area, who were forcefully being trained to kill their own people.

Full communique follows

The Ogaden national Liberation Army mounted several targeted operations against Ethiopian Troops who were conducting punitive campaigns against the civilian population in Ogaden. On the May 31, 2012, in Birqot garrison, the Liberation Army waylaid two Ethiopia Army convoys and killed more than fifty soldiers on missions to commit atrocities against the civilian people the area. On the same day, the liberation Army, preempted another Ethiopian Army mission near Qabri Bayah in preparation for carrying out massacres around Obole area, by attacking them at Bula dari Garison, killing 98 soldiers, including 6 officers, while capturing and destroying all the camps in the garrison. The liberation Army killed another 19 soldiers after trouncing reinforcements from Jigjiga garrison town.

In total, the death toll on the Ethiopian Army side during those operations was 168 dead. The Liberation Army captured heavy weapons, food, medicine and item looted from the civilian population while freeing 50 conscripts from the local area, who were forcefully being trained to kill their own people.

This operation was in response to appalling acts carried out by the Ethiopian Occupation Army in Ogaden who massacred in Cool blood 18 civilians in the hamlet of Dhabo Jiriso, near Birqot, while abducting 15 others on May 27, 2012. The Ethiopian Army, which committed that crime against humanity, came from the town of Birqot on the highway between Degahbur and Qabri daher. The slaughterer troops used ghastly manners in carrying out the massacres- some of the victims were beheaded others were killed with stones, while the rest were mutilated. The Ethiopian Army conducted similar acts around Degahbur and Wardheer regions recently.

The Ogaden National Liberation Army will keep defending the Ogaden people until their right to self-determination is implemented.

Names of some of the executed civilians that were identified by ONLA:

1. Mo’alin Adan Hassan Kur’as

2. Mohamed Mohamud Ali-Madoobe

3. Bishar Ahmed Ali-Madoobe

4. Adan Hassan Abdi-Shide

5. Hassan Bashir Mo’alin Abdi

6. Ahmed-Nur Mohamed Hasan

7. Abdi-Rashid Sheikh Abdulahi Sheikh Ali-Dhagood

8. Taman Abdi Duwane Ismail

Below are the names of some of the missing reported by the civilian relatives:-

1. Farah Mohamed Abdi Odowa

2. Taman Ali Madobe

3. Ahmed-Faroole Mahamud Ali-Madoobe

4. Siraje Ahmed-Fiqane Hassan

5. Farhan Taman Ali-Madoobe

6. Abdulahi Ise

7. Mohamed Ali-Barre Aw-Hirsi

8. Kilas Abdulahi

9. Gaydh Abdi Odowa (with severe injury)

Issued by ONLF

June 1, 2012

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Mekseb Debesay claims stage victory at the final stage [5] of Tour of Eritrea [VIDEO]

Tour of Eritrea 2012 ended today in Asmara at the 5th stage. At the end of the race Mekseb Debesay stood 1st, Freqalsi Debesay 2nd, and Tesfay Abraha from MTN-Qhubeka 3rd.

Jacques Janse van Rensburg (MTN-Qhubeka) was the overall winner beating Freqalsi Debesay by just 00:01:09 at the end of the 5 stage event.
MTN-Qhubeka Team Manager Kevin Campbell said " the rest of the team worked tirelessly throughout the final stage to ensure that the lead did not slip from their grasp."
Jacques Janse van Rensburg has now become the first non-Eritrean to win the race since it started in 2001. Freqalsi Debesay from the Eritrean National Cycling team 2nd and Algerian Lagab Azzadine 3rd.

Tour of Eritrea 2012 Stage 5 [Last] Result

General Classification @ Last Stage [5]

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Another stage [4] win for MTN-Qhubeka's Jani Tewelde at Tour of Eritrea 2012 [VIDEO]

By MTN - Qhubeka

Stage 4 of the Tour of Eritrea saw riders climbing along the 94km route from Keren to Asmara. MTN-Qhubeka’s Jani Tewelde claimed his second stage victory of this year’s tour in front of his ecstatic Eritrean countrymen as he outsprinted a group of four breakaway riders to claim his team’s third win of the tour.

Jacques Janse Van Rensburg retained his overall race lead and is making good progress towards claiming his maiden Tour of Eritrea title.

Four riders escaped early on the day’s stage and as the peloton recognised that none of the leaders were a serious threat to the overall positions, the gap quickly grew to 2, then 3 then 4 minutes.

Dawit Haile riding for the Red Sea Camels then launched an attack up the only serious climb of the day, the Shindwa Pass, and before long he had ridden across to the leading quartet, which started alarm bells ringing in the peloton as he had started the day in sixth position overall, just 3min 55sec behind the race leader.

Team MTN-Qhubeka calmly upped the pace and slowly reeled in the gap to the break and Tewelde crossed the finish line only 1min44sec ahead of the yellow jersey bunch.

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Tour of Eritrea 2012 Stage 4 Result

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General Classification @ Stage 4

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Tesfom Okbamariam of Red Sea camels ERI Wins Stage 3 of Tour of Eritrea 2012 [VIDEO]

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Tour of Eritrea 2012 - Stage 3

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#	Rider's Name	Time	Country
1	Tesfom Okbamariam		ERI
2	Mekseb Debesay		ERI
3	Daniel Teklay		ERI
4	Freqalsi Debesay		ERI
5	Meron Amanuel		ERI
6	Tesfay Abraha		ERI-MTN
7	Solomon Habte		ERI
8	Azedin --		ALG
9	Jani Tewelde		ERI-MTN
10	Bereket Yemane		ERI

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Tour of Eritrea 2012 - General Classification @ Stage 3

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#	Rider's Name	Time	Country
1	Jacques Janse Van Rensburg		MTN-Qhubeka
2	Azzedine Lagab	@55”	Algeria
3	Frekalsi Debesay	@1m46”	Eritrean National Cycling Team
4
5
6

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Ethiopia bans Skype and other VoIP services.

June 17, 2012
Ethiopia has banned Skype and other use of Voice-over-Internet-Protocol (VoIP) services that offer audio and video related communications.

The new law was passed late last month and breaking the law is punishable by 15 years in prison.

According to Reporters Without Borders, the Horn of Africa country endorsed the law national security reasons.

Internet-based phone calls have been a popular means of communication for government opponents and their supporters abroad. Addis Ababa’s actions are interpreted to be a attempt to cut off these lines of communication with Ethiopians abroad, from which the opposition secure most of their funding.

However, it is also believed that the new law is intended to protect the state’s monopoly over telephone communications.

People in Ethiopia prefer to use internet based phone calls than telephone calls because they are far cheaper.

The law is also said to allow the Ministry of Communications and Information to ban the import of communications equipment.

Reporters Without Borders criticised Ethiopia’s crackdown on Internet users and accused the East African country of trying to "attack every means of information exchange."

Ambroise Pierre from the Reporters Without Borders Africa service told the BBC: "There’s already a very strict control over written press, and last year several journalists were arrested, and now the government is tackling communications over the Internet”.

Local journalists have accused the Ethiopian government of trying to take control of Internet-based telecom services by intensifying a crack down on Internet cafés during the past few weeks.

Last week, Reporters Without Borders accused Ethiopia of further intensifying press and internet censorship by what the group alleged was using a sophisticated technology, the Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) - an advanced network filtering used to selective blocking websites.

It also accused the country’s state owned printing presses of trying to impose political censorship on media content prior to publication.

A number of international press freedom groups have accused Ethiopia of press censorship and endangering safety of journalists using controversial laws.

According to CPJ research, Ethiopia drove more journalists into exile than any other country, over the past decade. The country is also Africa’s foremost jailer of journalists after neighbouring Eritrea.

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US 'expanding' spy bases in Africa - 06/15/2012

AFP 06/15/2012

The United States military is expanding a secret network of air bases across Africa in order to spy on Al-Qaeda and other militant groups, the Washington Post reported.

The surveillance is carried out by small, unmarked turboprop planes with hidden state-of-the-art sensors that fly thousands of miles (kilometers) between air bases and bush landing strips across the vast continent, it said.

The program, dating back to 2007, underscores the massive expansion of US special forces operations in recent years and the steady militarization of intelligence operations during the decade-long war on Al-Qaeda.

Bases in Burkina Faso and Mauritania are used to spy on Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), while bases in Uganda are used in the hunt for the Lord's Resistance Army, a brutal guerrilla movement led by Joseph Kony, who is wanted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court.

The Post said there were plans to open another base in South Sudan to help hunt for Kony, who is wanted in connection with a series of atrocities and operates in some of the most remote and inaccessible parts of central Africa.

In East Africa, US aircraft operating out of Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya and the Seychelles archipelago spy on Somalia's Qaeda-inspired Al-Shebab militia and have reportedly launched attacks on wanted militants.

The Post said the fleet of surveillance planes is made up of single-engine Pilatus PC-12s, small passenger and cargo planes manufactured in Switzerland.

The newspaper said one of the secret bases is in a secluded hanger in Ouagadougou, capital of the predominantly Muslim country of Burkina Faso in West Africa.

It said dozens of service members and contractors strive to be discreet, but stand out in the city center and are appreciated for the business they bring to bars and restaurants.

Burkina Faso's Foreign Minister Djibril Bassole, in an interview with the

Post, declined to answer questions about US special forces operations in his country but said he appreciates US security cooperation.

"We need to fight and protect our borders," the Post quoted him as saying. "Once they infiltrate your country, it's very, very difficult to get them out," he said, referring to Al-Qaeda.

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