Mengistu Haile Mariam: Biography from Answers.com

Lt. Col. Mengistu Haile Mariam (born 1937) became the head of state of Ethiopia and chairman of the ruling military government (the Derg) after a 1974 revolution deposed Emperor Haile Selassie. He was also the head of the central committee of Ethiopia's Socialist Workers Party. Mengistu resigned as head of state in 1991 and fled into exile.

There are few details available on the early life of Mengistu. He was born in 1937 in the southern Ethiopian district of Walayta. His father was a soldier and his mother a servant. Some accounts of his youth maintain that at a young age he moved to Addis Ababa with his mother and grew up in the household of a prominent nobleman Ras Kebbede Tesemma.

Rose to Position of Power

As a young man Mengistu joined the army and served as a private before attending Ethiopia's Holeta Military Academy. He graduated in 1966 with the rank of second lieutenant and was assigned to the logistical and ordnance section of the Ethiopian army's Third Division in Harar, a strategically important southwestern market town. By 1974 Mengistu had risen to the rank of major and had developed effective leadership skills which made him popular among his fellow junior officers and the rank and file of the Third Division. These talents proved important in his rise to the top of Ethiopia's military government in the political vacuum during the revolution.

Mengistu rose to prominence as a result of the military's key role in the Ethiopian revolution that in September 1974 deposed Emperor Haile Selassie, who had ruled Ethiopia since 1916. The revolution began in the wake of the 1973 oil crisis, revelations that the Haile Selassie government had covered up a major famine in the north, and general dissatisfaction in the modern sector with the rule of Ethiopia's elite classes. In the rural south and west absentee landlords from the north imposed heavy taxes and tributes on peasant farmers whose lands had been conquered by northern armies a generation earlier. In the political vacuum which followed the fall of the imperial government Ethiopia's military gradually took control, a process which culminated in the massacre of 60 members of the Haile Selassie government in November 1974.

Emerged as Leader

In the summer of 1974 the new 126-member Provisional Military Advisory Council (PMAC), or Derg, had nationalized many key foreign investments and declared a policy of Ethiopia Tikdem (Ethiopia First). In July 1974 the PMAC elected Mengistu as its chairman. When the PMAC was formally organized in September he was named first vice-chairman, a position he held until he took complete control in February 1977.

As the program of the PMAC grew more socialist in orientation between 1974 and 1977 struggles for power ensued in which higher ranking and conservative officers were pushed out by younger and more politically radical officers. Mengistu Haile Mariam emerged as the most effective - and ruthless - of these. Under his leadership the military government of socialist Ethiopia had made a number of social and economic reforms, including a major land reform in 1975 and large-scale nationalization of foreign-owned banks, factories, insurance companies, and agricultural projects. He was promoted to lieutenant colonel in 1976 and commander-in-chief of the Ethiopian armed forces in February 1977. During 1977 and 1978 the military government withstood a major challenge from radical students and bureaucrats during the period of the "Red Terror." Many young Ethiopians were killed and imprisoned when the struggle for power between civilian and military factions erupted on the streets of the capital.

By the time Somalia invaded Ethiopia in 1977 Mengistu had become the dominant political figure in the country. When the United States refused to ship arms to the Ethiopian government to defend its eastern front with Somalia, Mengistu and the Ethiopian government turned to the former Soviet Union as their source of military hardware and political advice. After the defeat of the Somali army, Mengistu and the Ethiopian government aligned the country's foreign policy and many internal programs toward the former Soviet Union and the Eastern bloc. Internally, Mengistu called for the collectivization of agriculture along Soviet lines and continued to push for a military solution to the problem of Eritrea, a former Italian colony and province of Ethiopia in which rebels had been fighting for independence since 1962.

Formed New Governing Body

In mid-1980 Mengistu announced the formation of COPWE (Committee to form the Party of the Workers of Ethiopia), intended to replace the PMAC as the ruling body of the country. Mengistu served as chairman of the executive and central committees of COPWE, whose seven-man central committee was made up of the PMAC's own central committee with Mengistu at the head. COPWE served for four years as an arm of the government which paralleled many of the functions of the Council of Ministers and which prepared the ground for the announcement of a new socialist party. Many observers felt that Mengistu and other top military officials resisted pressure from the former Soviet government to form such a party since it represented a threat to Mengistu's rule at the top.

Mengistu's foreign policy followed closely that of his allies, and he was recognized by Fidel Castro of Cuba as a true revolutionary leader. Between 1977 and 1984 Mengistu made seven visits to the former Soviet Union, and a number of other visits to political allies Cuba, Libya, South Yemen, and Mozambique. From 1983 to 1984 Mengistu served as head of the Organization of African Unity, a result of Ethiopia having served as site for the 1982 OAU meetings.

In September 1984 the celebration of the tenth anniversary of the Ethiopian revolution culminated in the formal declaration of the Party of the Workers of Ethiopia, a Marxist-Leninist party designed to take over from the PMAC. Mengistu was named head of the party, retaining his titles as commander-in-chief, chairman of the PMAC, head of the Supreme Planning Council, and head of the Council of Ministers.

Used Military Force to Maintain Authority

Beginning in 1983 Ethiopia again faced a serious famine, possibly worse than the one that helped end the imperial government of Haile Selassie. In response, Mengistu's government turned to the West for food and technical aid while retaining its strong military and diplomatic ties to the former Soviet Union. The problems of chronic famine in the north, the continued war in Eritrea, and the overall lack of growth in the Ethiopian economy forced Mengistu to rely more heavily on military authority and close political allies.

Unrest continued in the country. Mengistu maintained control through ruthless dealings with the rebellious guerrillas. Eventually rebel groups won decisive victories against his political factions. In 1991, Mengistu resigned and fled the capital city of Addis Ababa into exile.

Mengistu Haile Mariam

Chairman of the Derg and Head of State of Ethiopia
In office 3 February 1977 – 10 September 1987
Preceded by	Tafari Benti
Succeeded by	Himself, as President of the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
1st President of Ethiopia
In office 10 September 1987 – 21 May 1991
Succeeded by	Tesfaye Gebre Kidan

Born	1937 (1937) ^[1]
Political party	Workers Party of Ethiopia

Early life

Mengistu's father, Haile Mariam, was a former slave who was in the service of an aristocratic sub-provincial governor, the Shoan landowner Afenegus Eshete Geda. Eshete encountered Haile Mariam while he was on a hunting expedition at the administrative district of Gimira and Maji (in Southern Ethiopia), then under the governorship of Dejazmach Taye Gulilat. He later became an enlisted man in the Ethiopian army. Afenegus Eshete Geda was the half-brother of Dejazmatch Kebede's wife, Woizero Yitateku Kidane, and it was through this connection that Mengistu's parents are alleged to have met.

Ethiopian popular legend states that his family was far from proud of his political accomplishments. His grandmother, known by her nickname Totit ( "monkey"), was still alive when he seized power, and had become an Orthodox nun. Supposedly, on the special orders of her grandson, she was exempted from the nationalization of private land. She continued to own the land near the Holetta Military Academy just 30 miles from Addis Ababa, which Empress Zauditu had granted her for services prior to her expulsion from the palace in 1928. However, the elderly nun did not thank her grandson for this favor, and indeed used to curse him for deposing the Emperor. His father likewise would curse his son for overthrowing the Emperor and for bringing a reign of terror on the country. Haile Mariam is said to have defiantly hung Emperor Haile Selassie's portrait on the walls of his living room in the villa the Prime Minister, Fikre Selassie Wogderess, built for him in the middle class district of Asmera Menged.^[4]

Mengistu's features were far more "Negroid" than the average highlander Ethiopian, which Paul Henze believes gave him an inferiority complex; Henze also notes that while receiving military training in the United States, Mengistu experienced racial discrimination, which led him to a later strong anti-American sentiment (Henze, however, was unable to find evidence of any such incidents).^[5] When he took power, and attended the meeting of Derg members at the Fourth Division headquarters in Addis Ababa, Mengistu exclaimed with emotion:

In this country, some aristocratic families automatically categorize persons with dark skin, thick lips, and kinky hair as "Barias" (Amharic for slave)... let it be clear to everybody that I shall soon make these ignoramuses stoop and grind corn!

Professor Bahru Zewde notes that Mengistu was distinguished by a "special ability to size up situations and persons" Although Bahru notes that some observers "rather charitably" equated this ability with intelligence, the professor believes this skill is more akin to "street smarts": "it is rather closer to the mark to see it as inner-city smartness (or what in local parlance would be called aradanat)."^[6]

Mengistu followed his father and joined the army, where he attracted the attention of the Eritrean-born general, Aman Andom, who raised him to the rank of sergeant and assigned him duties as an errand boy in his office. Mengistu graduated from the Holetta Military Academy, one of the two important military academies of Ethiopia.^[7] General Aman then became his mentor, and when the General was assigned to the commander of the Third Division took Mengistu with him to Harar, and later sent him to the United States to study military weapons technology for six months. Upon return, Mengistu was assigned a job in the armaments depot at the Third Division.^[4]

The rise of the Derg

In 1974, Emperor Haile Selassie's regime had lost public confidence within Ethiopia following a famine in Wello province, leading to the Ethiopian revolution. As a result, power came into the hands of a committee of low ranking officers and enlisted soldiers led by Atnafu Abate, which came to be known as the Derg. Originally, Mengistu was one of the lesser members, officially sent to represent the Third Division because his commander, General Nega Tegnegn considered him a trouble-maker and wanted to get rid of him.^[5] Between July and September 1974, Mengistu became the most influential member of the shadowy Derg, but preferred to act through more public members like his former mentor, general Aman Andom, and later Tafari Benti.^[7]

Haile Selassie died in 1975. It is rumored that Mengistu smothered the Emperor using a pillow case, but Mengistu has denied these rumors.^[8] Though several groups were involved in the overthrow, the Derg succeeded to power. However there is no doubt that the Derg under Mengistu's leadership ordered the deaths without trial of 61 ex-officials of the Imperial government on 23 November 1974, and later of numerous other former nobles and officials including the Patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, Abuna Theophilos, in 1977. Mengistu himself has acknowledged that the Derg ordered these deaths, but refuses to accept blame saying he was personally not responsible for the deaths. Members of the Derg have contradicted him in interviews given from imprisonment saying he inspired and was in full agreement with their decisions.

Leadership in Ethiopia

Mengistu did not emerge as the leader of the Derg until after the 3 February 1977 shootout, in which Tafari Banti was killed. The vice chairman of the Derg, Atnafu Abate, although with some support at this time, clashed with Mengistu over the issue of how to handle the war in Eritrea and lost leading to his execution with 40 other officers and clearing the way for Mengistu to become the complete master of the situation.^[9] He formally assumed power as head of state, and consolidated his position with the execution of his close associate and potential rival, Atnafu Abate, on 13 November of that year for allegedly having "placed the interests of Ethiopia above the interests of socialism" and other "counter-revolutionary" activities.^[10] Under Mengistu, Ethiopia received aid from the Soviet Union, other members of the Warsaw Pact, and Cuba.

The Red Terror

From 1977 through 1978, resistance against the Derg ensued, led primarily by the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Party (EPRP). Mengistu cracked down on the EPRP and other revolutionary student organizations in what would become called the "Red Terror." The Derg subsequently turned against the socialist student movement MEISON, a major supporter against the EPRP, in what would be called the "White terror."

The EPRP's efforts to discredit and undermine the Derg and its MEISON collaborators escalated in the fall of 1976. It targeted public buildings and other symbols of state authority for bombings and assassinated numerous Abyot Seded and MEISON members, as well as public officials at all levels. The Derg, which countered with its own counter-terrorism campaign, labeled the EPRP's tactics the White Terror. Mengistu asserted that all "progressives" were given "freedom of action" in helping root out the revolution's enemies, and his wrath was particularly directed toward the EPRP. Peasants, workers, public officials, and even students thought to be loyal to the Mengistu regime were provided with arms to accomplish this task.^[11]

Col. Mengistu gave a dramatic send-off to his campaign of terror. In a public speech, he shouted "Death to counterrevolutionaries! Death to the EPRP!" and then produced three bottles of what appeared to be blood and smashed them to the ground to show what the revolution would do to its enemies. Thousands of young men and women turned up dead in the streets of the capital and other cities in the following two years. They were systematically murdered mainly by militia attached to the "Kebeles," the neighborhood watch committees which served during Mengistu's reign as the lowest level local government and security surveillance units. Families had to pay the Kebeles a tax known as "the wasted bullet" to obtain the bodies of their loved ones.^[12] In May 1977 the Swedish general secretary of the Save the Children Fund stated that "1,000 children have been killed, and their bodies are left in the streets and are being eaten by wild hyenas . . . You can see the heaped-up bodies of murdered children, most of them aged eleven to thirteen, lying in the gutter, as you drive out of Addis Ababa."^[13] Mengistu Haile Mariam is alleged to be responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Ethiopians between 1975–1978.

Military gains made by the monarchist Ethiopian Democratic Union in Begemder were rolled back when that party split just as it was on the verge of capturing the old capital of Gondar. The army of the Republic of Somalia invaded Ethiopia having overrun the Ogaden region, and was on the verge of capturing Harar and Dire Dawa, when Somalia's erstwhile allies, the Soviets and the Cubans, launched an unprecedented arms and personnel airlift to come to Ethiopia's rescue. The Derg government turned back the Somali invasion, and made deep strides against the Eritrean secessionists and the TPLF as well. By the end of the seventies, Mengistu presided over the second largest army in all of sub-Saharan Africa, as well as a formidable airforce and navy.

Embracing Marxism

In the 1970s, Mengistu embraced the philosophy of Marxism-Leninism, which was increasingly popular among many nationalists and revolutionaries throughout Africa and much of the Third World at the time. Some have argued that Mengistu, whom his commanders did not consider to be an intellectual, was more of a nationalist than a convinced Marxist, but that Marxism provided the best ideology for those trying to resist the dominant world powers, a policy that had been skilfully followed by previous Ethiopian leaders not least Emperor Menelik II.

In the mid-1970s, under Mengistu's leadership, the Derg regime began an aggressive program of changing Ethiopia's system from a mixed feudo-capitalist emergent economy to an eastern bloc style command economy. Shortly after coming to power, all rural land was nationalized, stripping the Ethiopian Church, the Imperial family and the nobility of all their sizable estates and the bulk of their wealth. During this same period, all foreign-owned and locally owned companies were nationalized without compensation in an effort to redistribute the country's wealth. All undeveloped urban property and all rental property was also nationalized. Private businesses such as banks and insurance companies, large retail businesses, etc were also taken over by the government. All this nationalized property was brought under the administration of large bureaucracies set up to administer them. Farmers who had once worked on land owned by absentee landlords were now compelled to join collective farms. All agricultural products were no longer to be offered on the free market, but were to be controlled and distributed by the government. Despite progressive agricultural reforms, under the Derg, agricultural output suffered due to civil war, drought and misguided economic policies.

During the Ogaden War, learning that after the fall of Jijiga to units of the Somali army (2 September 1977) Ethiopian units had started to mutiny, Mengistu flew to the front and took direct control. According to Gebru Tareke, he ordered those suspected of leading the mutiny "bayoneted as cowardly and counterrevolutionary elements", then had the soldiers regrouped and ordered to recapture Jijiga in simultaneous attacks from the west and north. The Ethiopians recaptured the city on 5 September, but Jijiga remained within range of the Somali artillery, which shelled the city the whole night long. The next day the Somalis counterattacked, "considerably strengthened and ever more determined", and before he could be encircled inside the city, Mengistu fled back to Adew on the 7th where he boarded a plane back to Addis Ababa. The Somalis broke through Ethiopian lines, recapturing Jijiga on 12 September, and managing to overrun Ethiopian positions past the Marda Pass.^[14]

In early 1986, under Mengistu's direction, Ethiopia adopted a constitution modelled after that of the Soviet Union and saw the establishment of the Marxist-Leninist Worker's Party of Ethiopia (WPE), now the country's ruling party. On 10 September 1987, Mengistu became a civilian president under a new constitution, and the country was renamed the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Those members of the Derg who still survived all retired from the military and as civilians made up the Central Committee of the Politbureau of the WPE.

Mengistu made seven visits to the former Soviet Union between 1977 and 1984, as well as other visits to his political allies Cuba, Libya, South Yemen, and Mozambique. From 1983 to 1984 Mengistu served as head of the Organization of African Unity.

However, government's military position gradually weakened. First came the Battle of Afabet in March 1988, which was a humiliating defeat at the hands of the Eritrean People's Liberation Front, with 15,000 casualties and the loss of a great deal of equipment. This was followed up less than a year later by another crushing defeat at Shire, with over 20,000 men either killed or captured and the loss of even more equipment. Then on 16 May, while Mengistu had left for a four-day state visit to East Germany, senior military officials attempted a coup and the Minister of Defense, Haile Giyorgis Habte Mariam was killed; Mengistu returned within 24 hours and nine generals, including the air force commander and the army Chief of Staff, died as the coup was crushed.^[15]

Asylum in Zimbabwe

In May 1991, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) forces advanced on Addis Ababa from all sides, and Mengistu fled the country with 50 family and Derg members. He was granted asylum in Zimbabwe as an official guest of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe. Mengistu left behind almost the entire membership of the original Derg and the WPE leadership, precluding their escape; in fact, one officer was caught twice while trying to escape from Addis Ababa.^{[citation needed]} Almost all were promptly arrested and put on trial upon the assumption of power by the EPRDF. Mengistu has claimed that the takeover of his country resulted from the policies of Mikhail Gorbachev, who in his view allowed the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the termination of its aid to Ethiopia.

An assassination attempt against Mengistu occurred on 4 November 1995, while he out walking with his wife, Wubananchi Bishaw, near his home in the Gunhill suburb of Harare. While Mengistu was unharmed, his alleged attacker, Solomon Haile Ghebre Michael, an Eritrean, was shot and arrested by Mengistu's bodyguards.^[16] He was later tried for this assassination attempt, pleading not guilty in a Zimbabwean court on 8 July 1996.^[17] The Eritrean Ambassador to South Africa, Tsegaye Tesfa Tsion, flew to Harare to attend the trial.^[16] He was sentenced to ten years in prison, while his accomplice Abraham Goletom Joseph, who had been arrested in a police raid, was sentenced to five years. They said that they had been tortured under Mengistu, and on appeal their sentences were reduced to two years each due to "mitigatory circumstances".^[18] The Ethiopian ambassador to Zimbabwe, Fantahun Haile Michael, said his government was not involved in the assassination attempt, and that he heard about the incident from the media.^[16]

Mengistu still resides in Zimbabwe, despite the Ethiopian government's desire that he be extradited. He is said to live in luxurious circumstances, and it is claimed that he advises Mugabe on security matters; according to one report, he proposed the idea of clearing slums, which was implemented as Operation Murambatsvina in 2005, and chaired meetings at which the operation was planned. State Security Minister Didymus Mutasa strongly denied that Mengistu was involved in Operation Murambatsvina in any way, saying that Mengistu "does not interfere at all with the affairs of our country. We also do not allow him to interfere with his country from Zimbabwe."^[18]

Genocide trial and conviction

Mengistu was tried in an Ethiopian court, in absentia, for his role in the killing of nearly 2,000 people during the Red Terror. Mengistu's charge sheet and evidence list was 8,000 pages long. The evidence against him included signed execution orders, videos of torture sessions and personal testimonies.^[19]

The trial began in 1994 and ended in 2006. Mengistu was found guilty as charged on 12 December 2006, and was sentenced to life in prison in January 2007.^[20] It should be noted that Ethiopia defines genocide as intent to wipe out political and not just ethnic groups.^[21] In addition to the genocide conviction, he was also found guilty of imprisonment, illegal homicide and illegal confiscation of property.^[2]

Some experts believe hundreds of thousands of university students, intellectuals and politicians (including Emperor Haile Selassie) were killed during Mengistu's rule.^[19] Amnesty International estimates that a total of half a million people were killed during the Red Terror of 1977 and 1978^[22]^[23]^[24] Human Rights Watch describes the Red Terror as "one of the most systematic uses of mass murder by a state ever witnessed in Africa."^[19] During his reign it was not uncommon to see students, suspected government critics or rebel sympathisers hanging from lampposts each morning. Mengistu himself is alleged to have murdered opponents by garroting or shooting them, saying that he was leading by example.^[25]

106 Derg officials were accused of genocide during the trials, but only 36 of them were present in the court. Several former members of the Derg have been sentenced to death.^[26]

After Mengistu's conviction in December 2006, the Zimbabwean government said that he still enjoyed asylum and would not be extradited. A Zimbabwean government spokesman explained this by saying that "Mengistu and his government played a key and commendable role during our struggle for independence". According to the spokesman, Mengistu assisted his country's guerrillas during their liberation war by providing training and arms, and after the war he had provided training for Zimbabwean air force pilots; the spokesman said that "not many countries have shown such commitment to us".^[27]

Following an appeal on 26 May 2008, Mengistu was sentenced to death in absentia by Ethiopia's High Court, overturning his previous sentence of life imprisonment. Eighteen of his most senior aides also received a death sentence. It is not clear if a change in government in Zimbabwe will result in his extradition.^[28]

References

^ ^a ^b "Profile: Mengistu Haile Mariam". BBC News Online. 12 December 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6171927.stm. Retrieved 2006-12-13. . Other accounts state 21 May 1941[1], 27 May 1941
^ ^a ^b "Mengistu found guilty of genocide". BBC News. 12 December 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6171429.stm.
^ "Profile: Mengistu Haile Mariam". BBC News Online. 12 December 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6251095.stm. Retrieved 2007-01-11.
^ ^a ^b Dr. Paulos Milkia, "Mengistu Haile Mariam: The Profile of a Dictator", reprinted from the February 1994 Ethiopian Review (accessed 30 July 2009)
^ ^a ^b Paul B. Henze, Layers of Time (New York: Palgrave, 2000), p. 290 n. 13. In Mengistu's last interview, he mentioned that he knew Kebede Tesemma, but denied a blood relationship.
^ Bahru Zewde, A History of Modern Ethiopia, second edition (London: James Currey, 2001), p. 249
^ ^a ^b Edmund J. Keller, Revolutionary Ethiopia (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988), p. 185.
^ Jeffrey Gettleman, 'Ethiopian court convicts Mengistu Haile Mariam of genocide', International Herald Tribune, 12 December 2006. Paul Henze, however, states this accusation as a fact (Layers of Time, p. 188).
^ Indian Ocean Newsletter publication, 1985 "Ethiopia: Political Power & the Military"
^ Henze, Layers of Time, p. 302.
^ A Country Study: Ethiopia (US Library of Congress)
^ Ethiopian Dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam Human Rights Watch, 1999
^ Stephane Courtois, et al. The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression. Harvard University Press, 1999. pg. 691
^ Gebru Tareke, "The Ethiopia-Somalia War of 1977 Revisited", International Journal of African Historical Studies, 2000 (33, #3), pp. 635ff at p. 648. (accessed 10 August 2009)
^ "Ethiopia Fizzled Coup", Time 29 May 1989 (accessed 30 July 2009)
^ ^a ^b ^c "Report: Mengistu Survives Assassination Attempt", Ethiopian Review, Vol. 5, Issue 12 (31 December 1995), p. 14 (accessed 15 August 2009)
^ The Washington Times, 11 July 1996, page A10.
^ ^a ^b "Mengistu 'brains behind Zim clean-up'", ZimDaily (Mail & Guardian Online), 20 February 2006.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Ethiopian Dictator Sentenced to Prison" by Les Neuhaus, The Associated Press, 11 January 2007
^ Mengistu is handed life sentence BBC, 11 January 2007
^ Ethiopian leader guilty of genocide TVNZ, Dec 13, 2006
^ The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the Third World by Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, pg 457
^ US admits helping Mengistu escape BBC, 22 December 1999
^ Talk of the Devil: Encounters with Seven Dictators by Riccardo Orizio, pg 151
^ Guilty of genocide: the leader who unleashed a 'Red Terror' on Africa by Jonathan Clayton, The Times Online, 13 December 2006
^ "Court sentences Major Melaku Tefera to death", Ethiopian Reporter
^ "Zimbabwe hails Mengistu's role in liberation", AFP (IOL), 13 December 2006.
^ Court Sentences Mengistu to Death BBC, 26 May 2008.

External links

"Mengistu defends Red Terror", BBC News, 28 December 1999.
"A U.S. Strategy to Foster Human Rights in Ethiopia", by Michael Johns, Heritage Foundation Backgrounder # 692, 23 February 1989.
"Ethiopian Dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam", Human Rights Watch, 29 November 1999.

v • d • e Heads of State of Ethiopia since 1889

Solomonic dynasty (1889-1936), Emperors	Menelik II · Iyasu V · Zewditu I · Haile Selassie I

Italian Occupation (1936-1941)	Victor Emmanuel III

Solomonic dynasty (1941-1974), Emperor	Haile Selassie I

Derg (1974-1987), Chairmen	Aman† · Mengistu† · Tafari† · Mengistu†

People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (1987-1991), Presidents	Mengistu · Tesfaye†*

Ethiopia (since 1991), Presidents	Meles* · Negasso · Girma

*acting †military

Chairpersons of the Organization of African Unity and the African Union (AU)

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Persondata
NAME	Mengistu Haile Mariam
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Former dictator of Ethiopia
DATE OF BIRTH	1937
PLACE OF BIRTH	"Wollamo Sefer", Holetta
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH

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Mengistu Haile Mariam

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