Madam, - Having worked on relief and development in and with Ethiopia since the famine of the 1980s, I am frustrated by its depiction by John O'Shea of Goal (July 20th), and others, as a country known only for famine and conflict, where nothing has improved in the past 20 years.
The Ethiopian-Eritrean conflict in 1998-2000 was not a civil war. Both are independent sovereign states, and Eritrea invaded Ethiopia in June 1998. I was there at the time, and conducted assessments and interviews along the front line area to help establish systems to assist those displaced from their home areas. Ethiopia initially held back from retaliation, going straight into mediation attempts, and entered Eritrea two years later only to recover occupied territory after mediation broke down.
The war was not of Ethiopia's choosing, and calling for blockages of aid and debt relief because of Ethiopia's expenditure on self-defence is both unjust and irrational.
The shooting of people in Addis Abbaba cannot be defended. However, it is important to recognise that the transition from military dictatorship to an open and democratic society, in one of the world's poorest and least developed countries, with no history or tradition of democracy, was never going to be quick or easy. Ethiopia must be judged by the progress made, by Ethiopians for Ethiopians, in only 14 years of democratisation, as well as by mistakes and failings.
Irish people are entitled to fuller information about the context in which Irish development aid is given, how it is used, and what change is helps bring about. They are also entitled to know more about the role Africans - governments and people - are playing in their own development.
This demands a shift in emphasis from simplistic famine and conflict reporting to more recognition and analysis of the complexities and challenges of political and developmental change. It also requires a shift away from the stereotypical, inaccurate portrayal of all African countries as corruption-riddled, incompetent, failed states, waiting passively for rescue from a gallant international community. - Yours, etc,
FIONA MEEHAN, Drumkeerin, Co Leitrim.
Madam, - Dan McLaughlin says it is a moot point whether taxpayers in the West are prepared to pay for African development (Opinion & Analysis, July 18th). As the current Government was elected on a platform which included meeting the "absolute commitment" made on our behalf to the world's poor, perhaps it's not such a moot point after all.
It's unfortunate that Mr McLaughlin doesn't ask the Government to simply get on with it. - Yours, etc,
COLIN ROCHE, Advocacy Officer, Oxfam Ireland, Dublin 2.