AAAS Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights and Law Program

View Alerts By > Case | Date | Country | Victim

AAAS Human Rights Action Network

Letter of Appeal from the AAAS Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility

6 June 2001


His Excellency Meles Zenawi
Prime Minister
Prime Minister's Office
PO Box 1031
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Fax: 011 2511 552020

Your Excellency:

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the largest organization of natural and social scientists in the United States, and the world's largest federation of scientific organizations, with 145,000 individual members and 300 affiliated groups. Our AAAS Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility was formed in 1976 to protect the human rights of scientists and to deal with issues relating to scientific freedom worldwide.

On behalf of the Committee, I am writing in response to the recent violence committed upon students, teachers, and other civilians at Addis Ababa University and other universities within Ethiopia. It is my understanding that, during peaceful protests, Ethiopian security forces have killed forty-one individuals, injured fifty-five, and detained about 2,500, some of whom are still being held incommunicado. Most of these individuals are students or academics.

The students and professors were protesting recent government actions that restrict academic freedom, increase government control on university grounds, and limit students' ability to participate in student unions and student government organizations. Of particular concern to the students, as well as to the international community, is the increased presence of security forces on campus at Addis Ababa University. It has been pointed out that Ethiopia is the only country in sub-Saharan Africa where a government has set up a police station on campus for the purposes of controlling dissenting students and professors. The international community stands in solidarity with the student and academics' right to peacefully protest this infringement on academic freedom and is extremely concerned with the Ethiopian government's disproportionate response to these protests.

I am also concerned about the arrests of Professor Mesfin Wolde Mariam and Dr. Berhanu Nega on 8 May 2001. Professor Wolde Mariam, 71, is a founder of the Ethiopian Human Rights Council. In 1991, he was fired from his teaching position in response to his human rights activism. Dr. Nega, an economist, is the President of the Ethiopian Economic Association, a non-governmental organization in Addis Ababa. In response to government claims that they instigated the recent student protests, both men have engaged in a hunger strike.

I urge the government to immediately and unconditionally release all students, government critics, human rights monitors, and especially Professor Wolde Mariam and Dr. Nega, who all appear to have been arrested solely in connection with their human rights activism. I would also urge the government to promptly investigate the conduct of security forces in causing the deaths during the raids at Addis Ababa University. This issue is of great concern, as the unrest at Addis Ababa University is known to have spread to at least ten other universities in Ethiopia.

Attacks against human rights defenders violate several international human rights standards, including:

Universal Declaration of Human Rights: (adopted without opposition by the United Nations General Assembly on 10 December 1948)
· Article 3: Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
· Article 5: No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
· Article 9: No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.
· Article 19: Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
· Article 20: Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: (Ethiopia is a state party)
· Article 7: No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
· Article 9: Anyone who is arrested shall be informed, at the time of arrest, of the reasons for his arrest and shall be promptly informed of any charges against him.
· Article 10: All persons deprived of their liberty shall be treated with humanity and with respect for the inherent dignity of the human person.
· Article 19(1): Everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference.
· Article 19(2): Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds
· Article 21: The right of peaceful assembly shall be recognized.
· Article 22(1): Everyone shall have the right to freedom of association with others.

I call on your good offices to ensure that there is an official and impartial judicial investigation into the attacks on these individuals. I further request that the Ethiopian government honor the international human rights standards of free expression and the principles of academic freedom.


Sincerely,

Carole Nagengast, Ph.D.
Chair
AAAS Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility


CC: Ambassador Berhane Gebre-Christos

Main | CSFR Letters | Science and Human Rights Program