CALL FOR PROTEST IN LONDON, UK ON JANUARY 25, 2013 AGAINST A SYSTEMATIC REPRESSION GOING ON FOR YEARS ON THE OROMO PEOPLE BY THE CURRENT REGIME IN ETHIOPIA

Oromo opposition politicians, Bekele Garba and
Olbana Lelisa, were arrested in August 2011 after
speaking with Amnesty International officials.
They were sentenced, with seven other Oromos
in November 2012, to long prisonterms for
working against the government.

In response to a call by Oromo Social studies(OSA) to campain against a systematic repression going on for years on the Oromo People by the current regime in Ethiopia, The Oromo Community in the UK, Oromo Relief Association, Oromia Support Group, Oromo Students Union UK and Oromo Youth Association has organized a public demonstaration.

The purpose of the demonstaration is to protest against wide ranging human rights violations including but not limited to arbitrary arrest, torture, extrajudicial killings and disappearances of innocent civilians (the youth and students inclusive) in the hands of dark and sinister security apparatus of the TPLF led regime.

Riyana Abdurahman, a young refugee and
teacher in Somaliland, was abducted on 22
 November 2012 and imprisoned in Ethiopia.

In particular we will ask the UK government : 

1. To stop giving material and political support to a repressive regime in Ethiopia and investigate the repeated claim by human rights organizations and the mass media about the use of aid money to repress the people and sidline the opposition.
   
   
2. To put pressure on the Ethiopian government that it shall release thousands of political prisoners including Bekele Gerba and Olbana Lelisa, and Addis Ababa University Oromo students who were arrested during the January raid,
   
   
3. To put pressure on the regime to stop evicting Oromo peasants from their own land, stop selling millions of acers of land at the cost of the indigenous people and cause serious environmental degradation,
   
   
4. To put pressure on the regime that it shall stop interfering in the internal affairs of the Muslim society to create religious conflicts.

Please join the protest and make the plight of the Oromo be heard. Your voice is of great value to them.

Place: In front of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office,
            King Charles Street,
            London SW1A 2AY

Date: 25 January, 2013

Time: 10:00am – 5:00pm