Red Terror in Ethiopia

The Red Terror was a systematic program of murder, violence, and torture carried out by the military government of Ethiopia between 1976 and 1978. The violence was orchestrated by Ethiopia’s Provisional Military Administrative Council (PMAC), better known as the Derg, a military junta that had wrested control of the nation in a 1974 coup. One of the coup plotters, Mengistu Haile Mariam, later seized control of the Derg and became Ethiopia’s head of state. During the Red Terror, government-backed militias and armed civilians were given almost free reign to violently enforce government authority and stifle discontent. The resulting violence left tens of thousands of Ethiopians dead, with some estimates placing the death toll at about 150,000.

Background

Ethiopia is a nation in the Horn of Africa, a region in east-central Africa that juts out into the Arabian Sea. The nation is one of the oldest on the continent with a history dating back thousands of years. In the thirteenth century, the region was conquered by Yekuno Amlak, who claimed to be a descendant of the biblical King Solomon. Amlak established the Ethiopian Empire, which was also known by the name Abyssinia.

The empire endured for centuries and even maintained its independence during the European colonization of Africa in the nineteenth century. In 1930, Haile Selassie I assumed the title of emperor and began a series of reforms that attempted to modernize the nation. He was deposed during World War II (1939–1945) when Ethiopia was invaded by Italy, but regained his status at war’s end.

Although he began his rule as a reformer, Selassie became more authoritarian as he grew older. He suppressed dissent and removed any political opponents from power. While he lived the lavish lifestyle of an emperor, the country was hit by severe unemployment and famine in the early 1970s that eroded the people’s confidence in his government. Selassie and his government were overthrown on September 12, 1974, by the Provisional Military Administrative Council, or Derg, a name that means “committee.” He remained under house arrest until August 27, 1975, when he died at the royal palace in Addis Ababa, the nation’s capital. Although the official cause of death was said to have been natural causes, many claim he was assassinated.

Overview

The Derg was led by a group of military officials who adhered to Soviet-style Marxist ideology. The coup was initially bloodless, but that changed within two months when fifty-nine members of the Ethiopia’s former government were executed. Soon, local insurgencies flared up across the nation, plunging the former empire into political chaos. By 1976, Ethiopia’s urban centers were plagued by revolutionary violence, with one Marxist splinter group, the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Party (EPRP), specifically targeting members of the Derg for assassination.

The Derg responded with a government-sanctioned effort of violence, torture, and extrajudicial killings against the EPRP. The Derg referred to the effort as the Red Terror, a reference to both its Soviet-inspired revolutionary ideals, and a coordinated series of violent actions by the same name carried out in Russia from 1918 to 1922.

The Red Terror began in September 1976 in Ethiopia’s cities as the Derg executed several members of the EPRP over the next few months. However, in February 1977, Mengistu Haile Mariam, a Derg leader and one of the main plotters of the 1974 coup, violently eliminated his rivals and seized control, becoming Derg chairman and Ethiopia’s head of state.

Mengistu expanded the scope of the Red Terror significantly. The systematic violence and mass killings he ordered were mainly concentrated in the nation’s cities and were highly coordinated. Mengistu empowered armed militias known as Defense of the Revolution Squads to target EPRP members and other enemies of the Derg. He also handed out guns to loyal members of neighborhood groups known as kebeles who were tasked with the same mission. Each militia unit or kebele would meet to go over the plans for its attack. They would identify targets and discuss which ones they were to kill and which ones they were to capture.

From March to June, an estimated 2,500 people were killed and thousands more were detained in Addis Ababa alone. At one point, international officials estimated about 150 to 200 people were being killed each night. Their bodies were left to rot were they were killed or they were piled in the streets. Anyone who checked the corpses the next day to see if a loved one was among the dead was also arrested or killed.

Within a few months, the EPRP in the nation’s capitol was effectively wiped out, but the Red Terror began branching out to other cities. People as young as eight could be killed or detained on suspicion of supporting the EPRP or being against the revolutionary cause. At times, the ability to read and write was simply enough to fall under suspicion of being a counter-revolutionary. Throughout 1977 and into 1978, the killings increased, although they became less public. Executions were conducted in prisons and detention centers rather than in the streets. Across the nation, an estimated twenty to thirty people were killed on an average day, with tens of thousands believed to have been imprisoned and tortured.

By April 1978, the Red Terror had mostly ended, but some executions were carried out in secret in the months the followed. A total estimate of the death toll from the Red Terror remains elusive, with most experts agreeing it was somewhere between 10,000 and 150,000.

In 1987, Ethiopia became a republic and Mengistu was named president, technically becoming a civilian leader rather than a military one, albeit with the same dictatorial power. In the late 1980s, Mengistu began to lose his grip on power, and in 1991, his government was overthrown and he fled to Zimbabwe. In 2007, Mengistu was tried in absentia and found guilty of genocide for his role in ordering the Red Terror. The charge carries a death sentence. As of 2023, he remained in Zimbabwe where the ruling party has refused all attempts at extradition.

Bibliography

Bader, Laetitia. “To Heal, Ethiopia Needs to Confront its Violent Past.” Human Rights Watch, 28 May 2020, www.hrw.org/news/2020/05/28/heal-ethiopia-needs-confront-its-violent-past. Accessed 7 June 2023.

Conley, Bridget. Memory from the Margins: Ethiopia’s Red Terror Martyrs Memorial Museum. Palgrave Macmillian, 2019.

“The Derg/Dergue.” Global Security.org, 2023, www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/ethiopia/history-dergue.htm. Accessed 7 June 2023.

“Ethiopia.” South African History Online, www.sahistory.org.za/place/ethiopia. Accessed 7 June 2023.

Moloo, Zahra. “Thousands Died During Ethiopia’s Red Terror, but the Culprits Still Evade Justice.” CBC/Radio-Canada, 2023, www.cbc.ca/documentarychannel/features/thousands-died-during-ethiopias-red-terror-but-the-culprits-still-evade-jus. Accessed 7 June 2023.

“The Red Terror.” Human Rights Watch, www.hrw.org/reports/pdfs/e/ethiopia/ethiopia.919/c6terror.pdf. Accessed 7 June 2023.

Wiebel, Jacob. “The Ethiopian Red Terror.” Durham University, 3 Aug. 2017, dro.dur.ac.uk/22534/1/26822.pdf. Accessed 7 June 2023.