Response to the American Ambassador to Ethiopia.

Greetings to all.

Six years has now passed since the advent of the present Ethiopian regime to power. Six

years in which Amharas were singled out on the basis of their ethnicity and demonized,

labeled, attacked, displaced and slaughtered in mass, not only by regional governments,

but, more seriously, by the Federal government.

Mind you, Amharas have been attacked by various ethnic based organizations on the basis

of ethnicity for the past 50 years, that is, ever since the revolution in 1974, but what has

changed in the past six years is the emergence of the government as a major actor in these

ethnic based attacks.

In view of the government’s involvements in these attacks, we as

Amharas had no choice but to defend ourselves. We must learn from history. Only

governments are capable of genocide, especially those that are ethnically charged as the

Ethiopian government.

We thus fight as a people against genocide in quest of our right to

live, which is the foundation of all rights. That is why we insist our struggle is more than

politics, though we recognize that the ultimate solution lies on politics itself.

We are also well aware that periodic negotiations are part of armed struggles, and to this

end the US government is doing its best to facilitate a meeting between Fano, as

representative of the Amhara people, and the Ethiopian federal government.

For this

initiative to bear fruit, a pan Amhara organization, with major Fano groups as its constituent

parts, has to be established first. We need some time to complete this process. Only such an

organization can speak authoritatively on behalf of Amharas.

We thank the American

government, and the broader international community for that matter, for their efforts to fend off

genocide in Ethiopia.

God be with all of us.

Eskinder Nega.

Amhara fano people's force.(AFPF)