From: Biniam Tekle (biniamt@dehai.org)
Date: Mon Dec 21 2009 - 10:39:42 EST
http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Current-Affairs/Security-Watch/Detail/?lng=en&id=110663
21 Dec 2009
Ethiopia’s Ogaden Insurgency Threat
ONLF rebels pause for prayer
(cc) Jonathan Alpeyrie,flickr
A long-time buffer zone between Ethiopia and Somalia, the politically and
economically marginalized Ogaden region has transformed into a hotspot
entangled in wider regional and global politics, albeit shielded from
international public attention, Georg-Sebastian Holzer writes for ISN
Security Watch.
By Georg-Sebastian Holzer for ISN Security Watch
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The Ogaden National Liberation Front’s (ONLF) recent claim to have captured
seven towns and killed 1,000 soldiers in fierce fighting in Ethiopia’s
eastern Somali region was, although in substance exaggerated, a stark
reminder that Ethiopia’s harsh counterinsurgency campaign is not yielding
the results hoped for by Addis Ababa.
On the contrary, the ONLF can build on local grievances of the four million
or so ethnic Somali in Ethiopia’s most underdeveloped periphery and is
determined to keep up its struggle for national self-determination.
The movement also has once again warned oil searching companies operating in
the region under Ethiopian control to halt their plans to exploit oil there.
Such threats are indeed substantial. On 24 April 2007, ONLF fighters were
able to overpower Ethiopian troops protecting Chinese oil-exploration
workers in Obole, situated in the Degehabur zone. A total of 74 people were
killed, including nine Chinese workers. As a result, the Chinese Zhoungyan
Petroleum Exploration Bureau suspended its seismic tests for Ethiopian-owned
South West Energy in Ogaden.
Regional security complex
While the ethnic Somalis’ rebellion against the Ethiopian state dates back
to colonial times, the scale of the Obole attack was unprecedented.
It was made possible because of a security gap resulting from the invasion
and subsequent occupation of Somalia in late December 2006 by the Ethiopian
National Defence Force (ENDF). Many of its units used for the war in Somalia
were from the Ogaden.
With Ethiopia withdrawing its troops in January of this year, a second
supporting factor is still relevant. Eritrean military advisers are widely
assumed to have helped prepare the Obole attack. Moreover, the UN Monitoring
Reports indicate that Eritrea was training ONLF fighters on its own
territory and is still aiding rebels in the region, hence suggesting that
the Ethiopian-Eritrean conflict is also fought as a proxy in the Ogaden
region, not only in Somalia itself.
This is no surprise to any observer of conflict dynamics in the Horn of
Africa.
As Chatham House’s Sally Healy put it, “interactions between the states of
the region support and sustain the conflicts within the states of the region
in a systemic way. The different conflicts interlock with and feed into each
other, determining regional foreign policy positions that exacerbate
conflict.”
Perpetuating local grievances
The Ethiopian government itself - which had never seriously been threatened
by ONLF’s armed struggle - decided to crack down on the movement. ENDF’s
South-East Command in Harar under Brigadier General Seyoum Hagos launched an
operation based on collective punishment of the Ogaden clan, the core base
of the ONLF.
Human Rights Watch accused Ethiopia in a report titled Collective Punishment
of war crimes and crimes against humanity, saying the ENDF burned down
villages and killed, raped and tortured civilians in the counter-insurgency
campaign.
Addis Ababa responded by producing counter-report titled Flawed Methodology,
Unsubstantiated Allegations and expelled the International Committee of the
Red Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières from the Ogaden.
Since then, an unofficial economic blockade on the Ogaden population has
further aggravated the humanitarian crisis in the region.
Additionally, ENDF’s arming of non-Ogaden clans people will guarantee years
of inter-clan fighting in the region.
The governments’ harsh policies come on top of an already deep feeling of
marginalization on the part of Somali Ethiopians, who feel they are treated
as second-class citizens and are de-facto excluded from national
institutions. Even when put in the regional context of both Ethiopia’s
highlands and Somaliland/Somalia, public infrastructure and service delivery
in the region fares worse than with its neighbors.
The national government’s perpetuation of local grievances and the worsening
of the humanitarian crisis in the region have strengthened an otherwise
deeply divided rebel movement, which moreover lacks a clear long-term
agenda.
ONLF’s weaknesses and strength
ONLF’s modern struggle for Ogaden self-determination dates back to the
mid-1990s, when it began targeted killings and bombings, prompting Addis
Ababa to label it a terrorist group.
Indeed, both the rebels’ and government’s harsh punishments for those who
refuse their support make civilians the prime victims of the conflict, not
least reflected in refugee movements into the neighboring states of Kenya,
Eritrea, Djibouti and Somalia.
ONLF actually draws its support exclusively from the Ogaden clansmen, in
particular the Rer Harun, a sub-set of the Rer Isaaq sub-clan, and of the
Hirsi Khalaf, a sub-set of the Rer Abdille sub-clan. While the Rer Isaaq and
Rer Abdille are two of the biggest Ogaden clans, this still means that ONLF
can count on the support of no more than one-third to one-half of the Ogaden
clan, which contradicts the group’s claim to represent all
Ethiopian-Somalis.
The group now has an estimated 8,000 fighters, trained and equipped with
Eritrean help mostly with automatic firearms as well as some
rocket-propelled grenades. But the leadership and organization is - besides
their split along clan-lines - deeply divided over its links with Eritrea.
The group around former Somali admiral Mohamed Omar Osma (since 1998
chairman of ONLF’s central committee) favored Asmara’s help.
In contrast, the group around the former head of the UK-based Ogaden Action
Group, Dr Mohammed Siraad Dolaal, opposed Eritrea’s involvement. Dolaal
himself was killed on 18 January 2009 in Denan, when he returned to Ogaden
as a commander.
The ONLF still controls much of the rural hinterlands of Fiq, Degehabur,
Qorahe, Wardheer and Godey zones, all areas predominantly inhabited by the
Ogaden clans of the Darood clan family. Nevertheless, when attacking
government strongholds they are not able to hold territory and hence have to
resort to hit-and-run tactics.
The federal government’s policy of co-opting non-Ogaden and moderate Ogaden
groups while fighting the more radical ONLF worked fairly well for some
time. However, the war in Somalia and the proxy conflict between Ethiopia
and Eritrea were triggers for a spark in violence.
Ethiopia’s ethnic federalism, introduced in 1991 with the coming to power of
the Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), itself a
former rebel movement from Ethiopia’s marginalized periphery, failed to
deliver. The federal government’s brutal counter-insurgency tactics yielded
results contrary to those intended: the Ogaden-clans, in large numbers,
turned into ONLF supporters.
The ONLF itself lacks a clear, long-term vision, as neither the creation of
a landlocked Ogaden state nor a union with Somalia are realistic options.
Rocking the boat
With the Ogaden desert having a high potential to be the most resource
abundant region in Ethiopia, the ONLF has a well founded agenda at hand to
give voice to mounting local grievances.
It is indeed hard to understand why one of the poorest regions in the world
should not gain from its wealth in natural resources. Hence, it is clear
that oil firms will remain a central military target for the ONLF as long as
the Ethiopian government is not willing to find a wealth sharing agreement
with the region. And while ONLF is internally split, it does keep its
‘nuisance’-potential in Ethiopia’s Eastern region.
Currently, Malaysia’s Petronas and Vancouver-based Africa Oil Corporation
are back in the Ogaden and Ethiopia is offering up to 14 more exploration
permits over the next three years.
In this context, the absence of international engagement in the Ogaden
crisis is striking. The most accepted conventional wisdom among
internationals in Addis Ababa is that public criticism of the government
never yields any positive results. But it appears that embassies, UN
agencies and NGOs first and foremost are reluctant to do anything that would
endanger their relationship with the government of Ethiopian Prime Minister
Meles Zenawi.
Nearly all international actors have conflicting agendas in Ethiopia, from
the US strategic security relationship with Addis Ababa to NGOs whose
programs in other parts of the country could be endangered by rocking the
boat over the Ogaden.
Ethiopia’s political vision appears to be a continuation of armed engagement
in the Ogaden mainly fought with loyal Ethiopian-Somali militias. While
political dynamics in the Somali periphery will probably not influence
national politics in Addis Ababa, like the upcoming national elections in
May 2010, the armed resistance movement in the strategically important
Ogaden is likely to gain momentum through Ethiopia’s current
counter-insurgency strategy.
For now, neither the government in Addis Ababa nor the ONLF seem to have the
capacity to imagine a more peaceful future for the region.
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Georg-Sebastian Holzer is an analyst and free-lance journalist. He focuses
in particular on conflict dynamics in the wider Horn of Africa.
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