Ethiopia opposition leaders arrested

ADDIS ABABA – Ethiopian security forces held some opposition leaders under house arrest yesterday, a day after police and troops fired into crowds killing at least 26 people in the country’s worst bloodshed in four years.

Troops patrolled deserted streets and, for a second day, most shops were shut and blue taxis that usually clog the capital’s streets were nowhere to be seen. The violence on Wednesday flared after weeks of opposition accusations that the ruling party had intimidated voters and rigged the polls to hold on to power in the strategic Horn of Africa nation.Some opposition leaders were being kept at their homes, party sources and European Union observers said.”The mission has conveyed to the government its condemnation of the house arrests and other harassment and threatening measures imposed on the opposition,” EU chief observer Ana Gomez said late on Wednesday.Some older residents in Addis Ababa worry the country is on the verge of returning to its totalitarian past rather than embracing a democratic future.They say the protest crackdown is an eerie reminder of the coup that deposed Emperor Haile Selassie and brought Marxist dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam to power in 1974.- Nampa-ReutersThe violence on Wednesday flared after weeks of opposition accusations that the ruling party had intimidated voters and rigged the polls to hold on to power in the strategic Horn of Africa nation.Some opposition leaders were being kept at their homes, party sources and European Union observers said.”The mission has conveyed to the government its condemnation of the house arrests and other harassment and threatening measures imposed on the opposition,” EU chief observer Ana Gomez said late on Wednesday.Some older residents in Addis Ababa worry the country is on the verge of returning to its totalitarian past rather than embracing a democratic future.They say the protest crackdown is an eerie reminder of the coup that deposed Emperor Haile Selassie and brought Marxist dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam to power in 1974.- Nampa-Reuters