Lipstick and Fingernail Polish

In July, 2008, the Zenawi regime commissioned an official report on riot control entitled “Modernizing Internal Security in Ethiopia”1. That report, prepared by retired British Colonel Michael Dewars, made “recommendations designed to create a modern security force that will function effectively by using strategies designed to pre-empt civil unrest which threatens the security of the State of Ethiopia and its People.” Col. Dewars, arguably one of the foremost experts in the world on riot control, was supposed to paint a kinder and gentler face for the Zenawi regime, and artfully excuse its manifest failure to prosecute the police thugs who murdered and wounded thousands of innocent Ethiopians after the 2005 elections. More on Dictatorship and Judicial Independence are Like Oil and Vinegar

MOGADISHU (Xinhua) — With Ethiopian Woyanne regime’s announcement of withdrawing its troops from Somalia by the end of the year, as well as the signing and culmination of the Djibouti peace and power-sharing agreements between the Somali transitional government and a major opposition faction, the political and military equations within the war-torn Horn of Africa country have changed, say analysts, but the future remains “as dark as ever.” More on What is next after Woyanne withdrawal from Somalia?

The African Union’s Panel of the Wise over the weekend called on the United Nations to form a stabilization force to further what it called the cause of peace in Somalia. The appeal came a day after Ethiopia Woyanne announced it would withdraw its troops from Somalia at the end of this year.