Ambassador seyoum mesfin

Like many of his generation, he was an avid debater of different revolutionary ideas, and was one of the first to articulate the agenda of self-determination for the diverse nations, nationalities and peoples within the Ethiopian empire. He was appointed as head of foreign relations for the TPLF and became well-known internationally as the face of the Tigrayan struggle.

I first met him in , travelling within the TPLF-held areas of the country, and recall well the vigorous discussions we had about the challenges of the revolution and what should be their agenda when they took power. One of the things that most struck me about Seyoum was his lack of any personal bitterness towards the members of the military regime that was, at that time, waging unlimited war against the people of Tigray.

The leaders of the Dergue, he assured me, would face justice.

Seyoum Mesfin, who was killed in Tigray this week at the age of 71, was Ethiopia’s longest-serving foreign minister.

They were all detained in a university dormitory, with just two guards on the gate—to deter angry citizens from breaking in and attacking them. General Legesse Asfaw, who had ordered the most murderous aerial assault of the war when fighter jets bombed the market town of Hausien and killed about civilians, was kept in a special room for his own protection.

The TPLF could easily have executed him. The dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam had executed 61 senior officials of the overthrown imperial government in November in his seizure of power. The EPRDF would not follow that path of arbitrary revenge: instead, officials of the military regime were to be brought to court and charged according to due process of law.

Mengistu himself fled to Zimbabwe with his family. Seyoum responded without hesitation.

Seyoum Mesfin Gebredingel was an Ethiopian politician and diplomat.

He said that the sins of the father should not be visited on the children: they were Ethiopians entitled to passports and should be issued with them at once. Had he been a less modest man, Seyoum might have clamoured for international prizes to reflect his contribution. Instead, he invested his efforts in making sure that African nations adopted the norm and incorporated it into the Constitutive Act of the African Union.

Among them he identified the right of southern Sudanese to self-determination, should the Sudanese government fail to respect the ethnic diversity and democratic rights of all Sudanese.