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Ethiopian authorities must immediately and unconditionally release journalist Dawit Kebede and stop harassing members of the press, the Committee to Protect Journalists said on Friday.
On November 30, federal police arrested Dawit, editor-in-chief of the online news outlet Awramba Times, while dining with friends at a restaurant in Addis Ababa, the capital, according to Dawit’s brother Bisrat Bahta, who lives in United States, and the wife of the journalist Tigest. They both spoke to CPJ through the messaging app. On December 1, police officers searched Dawit’s home and seized magazines, recording devices, books, cell phones and CDs, they said.
He is being held at the Addis Ababa Police Commission, also known as Sostegna, Tigest said. Police allege that Dawit spread false information, tarnished the government’s image at his work and committed a variety of other crimes, but has not formally charged him with a crime, according to media reports and a person familiar with his case who spoke to CPJ on condition of anonymity, citing security concerns.
“The authorities must unconditionally release Dawit Kebede, as well as all other journalists detained in connection with their work, and end an emerging pattern of legal harassment of the press,” said Muthoki Mumo, CPJ representative in sub-Saharan Africa. “Ethiopian journalists must feel free to publish critical reports and comments, and this cannot happen in an environment where the police can arrest and hold them for weeks without charge, blatantly taking advantage of the judicial system to intimidate the media.”
On Dec. 2, Dawit appeared before the Federal Trial Court in Arada, where police charged him with spreading inaccurate information, inciting violence and attempting to violate the constitution, according to reports from the state-owned Fana Broadcasting Corporation and the private company Addis. . Standard news website. The court gave the police the ability to hold him for 13 days pending an investigation, according to those reports.
On December 15, in the same court, the police further accused Dawit of sending information that allegedly tarnished the image of the federal government to Tigray TV and Dimtsi Woyane, broadcasters affiliated with the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front, a group in conflict. with the federal government. according to the person familiar with the case, who was in court at the time, and a report from online broadcaster EthioTube.
The police also accused Dawit of creating a negative perception of the government through interviews with leaders of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front; spread false information and incite violence through its Twitter page; and sharing false information on the Awramba Times YouTube page, according to the person who spoke to CPJ. The court gave police an additional 10 days to keep Dawit in custody, according to that person.
Dawit said he is only being detained for doing his job as a journalist, according to the EthioTube report and the person who spoke to CPJ.
In November, the Awramba Times posted news content on YouTube and Facebook, including a comment on the conflict between the Ethiopian federal government and forces in Tigray state, according to CPJ’s review of those pages. Awramba Times has around 41,000 followers on Facebook, and its YouTube videos regularly receive tens of thousands of views.
On November 28, the Awramba Times republished a March 2020 interview with Debretsion Gebremichael, leader of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front. In that video, Debretsion spoke critically of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and his party.
On Twitter, where he has about 18,000 followers, Dawit’s latest posts included allegations that the Ethiopian government was ethnic profiling Tigrayan identity people; accusations that security personnel except refugees who fled from Tigray to Sudan; and a suggestion that Abiy had mischaracterized the demographics of the refugees fleeing from Tigray to Sudan.
The federal attorney general’s office did not respond to emails from CPJ requesting comment on Dawit’s case.
In early December, Federal Police spokesman Jeylan Abdi said he did not know about Dawit’s case and referred CPJ to the prime minister’s office for comment. When CPJ called and messaged Jeylan again today, the call did not go through and he did not respond to messages.
CPJ sent an email to the prime minister’s office seeking comment on Dawit’s case, but received no response.
In 2010, Dawit received CPJ’s International Press Freedom Award for his work amid government obstruction and repression.
Dawit is one of seven Ethiopian journalists who were jailed on December 1, 2020, according to CPJ’s most recent prison census. Two of those journalists, Medihane Ekubamichael of Addis Standard and Udii Musaa, who previously worked with Oromia Media Network, have been released on bail, according to news reports, and one of Udii’s lawyers, Abduljebar Hussein, who spoke to CPJ via of the messaging application. .
CPJ has also documented several incidents this year in which Ethiopian authorities have detained journalists, sometimes for months, without formally charging them and in defiance of court orders.
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