OMRHO Press Release: No Place for Oromos to Flee Persecution

No place for Oromos to flee persecution

Oromo Human Right and Relief Organisation received yesterday very alarming news that Mr. Mohamed Ahmed Mahamud was arrested by Somaliland Authorities on October 15, 2008 and handed over to Ethiopian Security. Mr. Mohamed Ahmed Mohamud is an elderly Oromo who fled persecution by the Ethiopian security years a go. His crime was nothing but only his political opinion like thousands of Oromo refugees. At the time of his abduction, Mr. Mahamud was under UNHCR mandate as a legal political refugee in Somaliland. Now Mr. Mahamud is back in to the hands of his persecutors to face physical torture, imprisonment or even death.

It is well known that the Somaliland authorities have progressively become helplessly a stooge of the Ethiopian government since the latter’s military incursion in to the southern Somalia. This fact has had a tremendous repercussion on the lives of thousands of Oromo refugees in Somaliland. The Oromo Human Right and Relief Organisation (OMRHO e.V.) has no doubt that Mr. Mahamud’s tragic fate would soon be the fate of many other Oromo refugees.

It appeals therefore to all international human right organisations to rescue the life of Mr. Mahamud and to follow up the adversary actions of the Somaliland authorities against Oromo refugees in general.

OMRHO e.v.