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By JEFFREY
GETTLEMAN
KHARTOUM, Sudan, Sept. 2 — A powerful rebel
group in the Ogaden desert of Ethiopia has
declared a temporary cease-fire to allow a
United Nations fact-finding team to gain
access to the war-torn region, a rebel
spokesman said Sunday.
Fighters from the group, the Ogaden National
Liberation Front, will not attack government
soldiers while United Nations officials are
in the area, said Abdirahman Mahdi, a
spokesman for the rebels.
“We appreciate what they are doing and won’t
put any obstacle in their path,” he said.
The Ogaden desert is a desolate corner of
eastern Ethiopia where impoverished nomads
are waging a separatist war against the
Ethiopian military, one of the biggest
armies in Africa. After the rebels killed
more than 60 Ethiopian guards and Chinese
workers at a Chinese-run oil field in April,
government troops cracked down by blockading
much of the area, Western diplomats and aid
workers say.
Many Ogaden residents have described a
widespread and longstanding reign of terror,
with Ethiopian soldiers gang-raping women,
burning down huts and killing civilians at
will, accusations that the Ethiopian
government vehemently denies.
Concerned by the reports of human rights
abuses and the risks of a government-made
famine, United Nations officials set off
last week on a fact-finding mission to the
Ogaden. The mission included human rights
officers and experts in child welfare, food
and health.
The Ethiopian government has said it has
nothing to hide, though several aid
organizations have recently complained about
lack of access to the Ogaden. On Friday,
Doctors Without Borders, an international
aid agency, said its workers were being
blocked from the region.
The agency said in a statement that there
were “urgent health needs and a
deteriorating humanitarian crisis” in the
Ogaden and that “despite a signed agreement”
with the group, the Ethiopian authorities
continued to deny it access to the area.
In July, the Ethiopian government expelled
the Red Cross from the Ogaden, accusing its
workers of being rebel spies.
An Ethiopian government spokesman, Zemedkun
Tekle, said Sunday that he did not know
which aid organizations had been restricted
but that “the U.N. mission will be free to
conduct its work.”
--Ogaden Online News
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