TNAG-1066-FCO40-1316-Human-rights-in-Hong-Kong-1981 — Page 192

ETHIOPIA

E/CN.4/1503

Annex II page 9

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26. In the seven years which have elapsed since a military takeover changed the political face of the Ethiopian empire and set it the path of socialism, events so devastating have occurred that millions of people have been internally displaced or have fled to surrounding countries.

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27. Ethiopia's heterogeneous population of some 30 million people, belonging to possibly as many as 75 ethnic groups, knew little change during the half century in which the late Emperor Haile Selassie dominated the largely feudal empire-state. Ethiopia, its soil eroded after widespread deforestation, its peasants heavily taxed and having to battle for survival, was classified as one of the 10 least developed countries in the world. Despite the introduction of reforms in education and the presence in foreign universities of large numbers of Ethiopian students

students for whom places in the national university did not suffice, an estimated 95 per cent of the adult popu- lation remained illiterate. While a

a leading role in the Organization of African Unity was assumed by the then Emperor, Ethiopia's own political life largely stagnated. In 1974, years of mounting unrest epitomized by the gathering momentum of the student movement were capped by general indignation at the inertia of the imperial government at a time of severe famine in Wollo and Tigre provinces which took a very heavy toll of lives. A revolutionary situation rapidly evolved which culminated in the gradual overthrow of the old régime by the armed forces and police, supported by the intelligentsia.

28.

The new military administration was to tackle tasks of revolutionizing the political, economic and social structures of the vast and disparate country in the face of major insurrec- tions in the north and south east and a maelstrom of religious, tribal and ideological battles. Disruption of the economy resulting from the drafting of very substantial numbers of men into the army and People's Militia, from acts of sabotage or of war, from drought conditions and from locust infestation exacerbated conditions

the young socialist state. Forces were set in motion which internationalized some of the conflict and had serious repercussions for Ethiopia and its neighbours, Djibouti, Somalia and the Sudan in particular. Some estimates of the numbers displaced within Ethiopia or across its borders put them as high as six million.