February 5/2001

 THE BRUTAL MURDER OF DIRES TESHAGER

 Dires Teshager, a father of four and a recognized refugee in the Sudan, was handed over to the EPRDF last June 2000 and credible reports have now affirmed that he had been taken to his home area o SHINFA (in Gondar region) and executed summarily. Dires Teshager was a member of the opposition EPRP and for many years a guerrilla fighter in the EPRP’s army (EPRA).

Dires Teshager had been imprisoned in the past in the Gondar Bahta prison from where he had managed to escape and to flee. He was living as a refugee when the Sudanese government arrested him following an EPRDF demand and subsequently handed him over to the government in Addis Abeba. Dires was taken to Gondar and brutally tortured before being executed in his home area of Shinfa.

SOCEPP, which had denounced the arrest and deportation of Dires last June, unequivocally condemns the Sudanese government which deported Dires and the EPRDF regime which denied him due process of law and subjected him to arbitrary execution.

SOCEPP holds the EPRDF government responsible for this brutal and cold- blooded murder. It is to be noted that the EPRDF’s relentless repression against members and sympathizers of the opposition EPRP continues without let up. It is sad to note that the UNHCR, which is trying to forcefully repatriate refugees from the Sudan, has uttered no protest as regards the deportation and execution of Dires.

SOCEPP