Zelalem Kibret Beza
Zone 9 Blogger and Scholar-in-Residence, Center for Human Rights and Global Justice, NYU

Valid ID and RSVP required, RSVP here 

Light lunch will be provided.

About the Talk

In October, the Ethiopian government declared a state of emergency in response to a wave of mass protests across the country. The government has since detained over 1600 people and banned or heavily restricted opposition broadcast and social media, protest, and even certain political gestures. Rights groups report that those detained are not accounted for and may in fact be greater in number, and that over 500 people have died since the protests began in late 2015.

Ethiopia and the United States have a century-old diplomatic relationship. Today, Ethiopia is one of the largest recipients of U.S. development aid in Africa and a key strategic ally in a region fraught by wars, instability, and terrorism. How did this come to be? And what impact does it have on the current state of affairs in Ethiopia?

About the Speaker

Zelalem Kibret Beza is a lawyer, former law instructor at Ambo University, journalist, and member of the Zone 9 blogging collective, six bloggers who organized in May 2012 as a response to restrictions on independent press in their country. In April 2014, Ethiopian authorities arrested the Zone 9 bloggers and charged them with terrorism under an anti-terror law that, like so many other laws enacted around the world since 2001, is a legacy of the U.S. “war on terror.” Jailed for over a year, they were released in July 2015, weeks before President Obama was scheduled to visit the country. Join us to hear Zelalem’s perspective on what is unfolding today in Ethiopia and why American influence matters.