By William Davison, Oct 15, 2014

Temesgen Desalegn

An Ethiopian editor is facing as many as 10 years in prison after being convicted of inciting the public against the government through his newspaper articles, his lawyer said.

Temesgen Desalegn, the former editor of Feteh, a defunct weekly newspaper, was convicted yesterday by the Federal High Court on charges that also included defaming the government and distorting public opinion, after a case that lasted

about two years, lawyer Ameha Mekonnen said. He will be sentenced on Oct. 27.

“Temesgen becomes the first journalist who’s accused and found guilty only for what he’s written in a newspaper,” Ameha said by phone today from Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa. “The evidence was only his writing, nothing else.”

Communications Minister Redwan Hussien said that the conviction was for articles Temesgen wrote for Feteh about two years ago. The case concerned “incitement and misinforming the public,” he said by phone.
Ethiopia is Africa’s second-biggest jailer of journalists after neighboring Eritrea as of Dec. 2013, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists. Government officials say journalists are not above the law and aren’t prosecuted because of their profession.

ETHIOPIA: A Minor Gets Prison Terms for Alleged Instigation

HRLHA – URGENT ACTION October 14, 2014

The Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa (HRLHA) strongly condemns the sentencing of Abde Jemal, a fourteen-year old minor, in adults’ court to four years in prison and $700.00 Birr fine for allegedly inciting people to political violence. According to HRLHA’s correspondents, Abde Jemal was arrested by the security agents while tending his parents’ cattle out in the field. HRLHA has learnt that Abde Jemal was severely beaten up (in other words, physically tortured) following his arrest by members of the security force in order to coerce him into confessing in court to the alleged crime. To begin with, this was allowed to happen despite the provisions of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child 1990, to which Ethiopia is a signatory, and which clearly states under Article 37(a) that State Parties shall ensure that “No child shall be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”; and additionally guarantees under article 40, sub-article 2(a) that every child alleged as or accused of having infringed the penal law should … “Not be compelled to give testimony or to confess guilt.”