U.N. disputes action killing Ethiopians

Press, 31 January 1986, Page 8

U.N. disputes action killing Ethiopians

NZPA-Reuter New York United Nations officials dispute assertions by a Paris-based relief group that as many as 300,000 Ethiopians faced death as a result of their Government’s resettlement policy rather than through famine.

Michael Priestley, the United Nations SecretaryGeneral’s special representative in Ethiopia, said there was “no argument that resettlement has to be an important ingredient in any rehabilitation programme” because of the effects of drought in the northern part of the country.’ Although there had been shortcomings in implementing the programme, including instances of coercion, “it is

not possible to get from people within Ethiopia... the same horrendous picture as apparently it is outside.” A group called Doctors Without Borders says that more Ethiopians are dying because of resettlement than famine, and that as many as 300,000 are likely to die because of the Government’s policy. Mr Priestley said the resettlement program was now in a “consolidation phase” and that the Ethiopian Government was using its resources to make the 588,000 people already moved as productive as possible.

Pressed about the assertion that 300,000 people might die, he said deaths were not uniformly

recorded in Ethiopia and it was impossible under present conditions to come up with any figure for deaths during 1985. Maurice Strong, executive coordinator of the United Nations office for emergency operations in Africa, said that no informed body of opinion would support that figure or the “extreme conclusions” reached by Doctors Without Frontiers.

Such reports might hinder efforts to help some seven million people still in need, he said.

“It would be a gross distortion of anyone’s humanitarian motivations to suggest that this be used as an occasion to reduce the amount of relief that goes to Ethiopia, or to slow it up,” he said.