Ethiopia “Using Aid as Weapon of Oppression”

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations describes the seven nations – Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya, Somalia, the Sudan and Uganda – of the Horn of Africa, as one of the most food-insecure regions in the world. A team of journalists from the BBC and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism traveled through Ethiopia, posing as tourists, and discovered communities allegedly denied long-term development aid for failing to support the prime minister. The BBC report cautions that there is no evidence that emergency food aid targeting the region’s famine is being manipulated. The journalists report finding prosperous villages next to struggling ones, and opponents charge that aid is distributed, not based on need, but on support for the Ethiopian Peoples' Revolutionary Democratic Front. Government representatives deny the charges, and the UK and other funders promise greater accountability. – YaleGlobal