Judge Mohammed Omar of the tenth bench of the Federal High Court today sentenced Ezeden Mohammed, editor and publisher of Ethiopia’s
largest Islamic weekly, Hekima, to one year imprisonment.The court convicted Ezeden Mohammed, whose fourteen year span as an independent journalist is rare after the clampdown in 2005, for incitement in connection with a 2005 Guardian newspaper interview with PM Meles Zenawi.

Ezeden has been imprisoned since Monday morning until the judge considered the plea for monetary fine by the convicted journalist and
the stringent demand of the public prosecutor for the maximum prison sentence under Ethiopia’s old press less, which was recently replaced
by a much harsher new law.

Ezeden now joins two other journalists, Ismael Mohamed, editor of Ethiopia’s other Islamic newspaper, and Asrat Wedajo, editor of
Ethiopia’s once largest Oromo-centric newspaper, Seife Nebelbal, which was shut down by the government in 2005.

Chandigarh, Jan 31 (PTI) Ethiopian long distance runner Mashresha clocked an impressive 2 hours 10 minutes 51 seconds to clinch the inaugural Chandigarh Marathon title here today.

The winning time of the 42.1-km race was an improvement from the 2 hours 12 minutes 34 seconds clocked by Kenyan Denis Ndiso in the Mumbai Marathon on January 17.

Chandigarians came out in numbers to participate in the Marathon, which the city administration has decided to make an annual event.

Offering tough competition to the foreigners, the Indian athletes begged third positions in both the Full and Half Marathon races.

ADDIS ABABA — UN chief Ban Ki-Moon on Sunday criticised power-grabs in Africa in a speech to the continent's leaders as Libya's Moamer Kadhafi reluctantly handed over the presidency of the African Union to Malawi.

The build-up to the three-day AU summit in Addis Ababa had been dominated by the expectation that Kadhafi would try to extend his 12-month tenure as head of the 53-member body.

But soon after Ban issued his appeal at the summit's opening for leaders to stick to the rules, Kadhafi announced that an agreement had been reached for Malawi's President Bingu wa Mutharika to take the helm for the coming year.

"My brother president of the republic of Malawi will replace me and take over," Kadhafi said.

The veteran Libyan leader's presidency of the body has been marked by his efforts to promote his vision of a "United States of Africa" -- a project that has made little progress during his 12 months in charge.

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia - As Temesgen Afework decided to drop by his motherland after spending 12 of years abroad giving a unique opportunity for his fans in Addis Ababa to see the young artist in action once again. What better way could the young artist could have come up with as an entrance than to come out and have a play on the theatre stage? Currently preparing for his performance in the different cities of Ethiopia, Temesgen, has found the opportunity to act in Addis Ababa as a blessing; especially considering he does not do that on a full time basis any more.

“It is great to come back and act. The crowd was so nice and warm.” He told SSI Wednesday this week.

The theatre play that Temesgen acts in is entitled Diaspora and he states that even though the story is not his own, it is based on a true story. “We want to show the real picture of what is actually out there.” He explains the message. The theatre that is written by Temesgen’s long friend, Tewodros Legesse was staged in Addis Ababa a couple of times and has received a full house attendance. The crowd was sitting on the floor, for the house was full beyond its seating capacity at the Hager Fikir Theatre when it was staged on Tuesday this week for the second time. Diaspora’s actors coming for only a short while, has limited the staging time to only one month. In the one-month staging, Diaspora will be travelling to the different cities in Ethiopia.

OSAKA - Ethiopia's Amane Gobena pulled away from nearest challenger Marisa Barros of Portugal in the last four kilometres to win the Osaka international women's marathon on Sunday.

The 27-year-old Gobena picked up the pace after the 38km mark to leave Barros behind, crossing the finishing line in two hours 25 minutes 14 seconds.

"It was a very difficult and tough course. At the same time, it was very, very competitive. I'm very, very glad to win the race," said Gobena, who bettered her personal best time of 2:26:53.

It was her second career victory out of four starts.

The race was led by nine women including Sydney Olympic silver medallist and three-time Osaka champion Lidia Simon.

British aviation lawyers have launched their own investigation into last week's Ethiopian airliner crash and are examining similarities with another air disaster less than three years ago.

Ethiopian Airlines' flight 409 caught fire five minutes after take-off from Beirut on Monday and plummeted into the Mediterranean two miles off the Lebanese coast, killing all 89 passengers and crew, including two Britons.

The plane crashed in similar circumstances to a Kenya Airways plane that came down in Cameroon in May 2007 killing all 114 people on board.

In both cases the planes were Boeing 737-800s that crashed in bad weather, at night and shortly after take-off.

Aviation experts said that each crash could have been caused by a technical fault which combined with other factors.

James Healy-Pratt, an aviation lawyer with London-based Stewarts Law, said: "Based upon our research and investigation into the Kenya Airways crash, the aircraft's spoilers and/or altimeters may have been faulty."

Ethiopian music star Tewdros Kasahaun (fondly called Teddy Afro) has recently read number of poems that he has written while he was in Kaliti Prison.

The poems were mostly personal observations, reflections and meditations and have some prominent people as their subjects.

It was said that selection of the poems will appear in a book coming out soon.

The following Amharic poem that came out in today’s edition of Kumneger magazine criticizes some people who were trying to make a scandal out of the renowned writer Sebhat Gebregziabher’s marriage to a girl much younger than him.

Addis Ababa– First Lady Azeb Mesfin here on Saturday held talks with US Under Secretary of State, Maria Otero.

Azeb on the occasion expressed the wide range of activities being carried out by the government of Ethiopia to address problems of women.

She said the government is working to raise the school enrollment of girls, empower women as well as eliminate female genital mutilation (FGM) and women trafficking.

Otero on her part commended the positive results attained in addressing problems that affect girls’ success over the past four years.

She added her country is committed to support Ethiopia’s efforts to alleviate problems of women.

A group of 13 members from the Addis Ababa Ethiopia District attended the temple for their first time early in the month of December. The two families and two single adults traveled six hours to the Accra, Ghana Temple. The Church News reports that the district was formed Nov. 15, 2009. This group was the third to travel from Ethiopia to the temple last year.

A young woman in the group commented, “You who have a temple in your country are lucky! We traveled [a long way] to get here.” Despite the long distance—approximately 4,316 kilometers or 2,686 miles—the two young men who went on the trip said that they felt they were “at the right place at the right time.”

"Those who come from great distances, like Ethiopia, are thrilled with the temple experience," said Elder John Bingham, a public affairs missionary serving in the Africa West Area, in ane-mail to the Church News. "The beauty of the temple building, the sacredness of the ordinances, and in particular, the sacred promise of the sealing ordinance—to be a family forever—is overwhelming to them."

Dozens of African heads of state and government are gathering in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa for a summit that could decide the future course of continental politics. Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi is encountering fierce opposition as he tries to retain the AU chairmanship.

The handshakes were polite but frosty Saturday as a golden-robed Moammar Gadhafi strolled into a pre-summit meeting at AU headquarters. The eccentric Libyan leader has caused a stir within the continental organization this week with an aggressive campaign to be re-elected to a second one-year term as its chairman.

The vote is scheduled for Sunday.

By tradition, the chairmanship rotates annually among Africa's five regions, and this year it is southern Africa's turn. The southern African bloc has unanimously selected Malawi's President Bingu wa Mutharika as its candidate for the post.

But Mr. Gadhafi has said he wants another term to complete the transformation of the AU bureaucracy into a powerful African Authority. But many AU heavyweight countries oppose rapid continental integration. They favor a go-slow approach that could take decades.

An Ethiopian opposition group says the international community is ignoring the plight of its jailed leader, who is listed by an arm of the United Nations Human Rights Council as a victim of arbitrary detention.

Ethiopia's Unity for Democracy and Justice Party (UDJ) held a candlelight vigil Thursday to mark the 13th month of their leader Birtukan Mideksa's imprisonment.

Birtukan, a 35-year-old lawyer and former judge, was among opposition politicians jailed for life in connection with violent protests that followed the disputed 2005 national elections. She and the others were later freed, but Birtukan was returned to jail and ordered to serve out her life sentence after denying she had asked for a pardon.

The Working Group of Arbitrary Detentions, an arm of the United Nations Human Rights Council, this month included Birtukan on a world wide list of those being arbitrarily detained.

Serbia Urged Ethiopia to Deny Visas to Kosovo Delegation for AU meetingA Kosovo foreign ministry delegation couldn't attend the African Union council session in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia because the delegation members were denied entry visas, according to reports from the Serbian embassy. Kosovo's foreign ministry has dismissed the claims as untrue.

Fonet news agency reported that it learned from the Serbian embassy in Addis Ababa that the decision not to issue visas to the Kosovo delegation came after Serbia’s intervention.

Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic reportedly thanked his Ethiopian counterpart Seyoum Mesfin on this principled gesture.

Kosovo's Foreign Ministry has dismissed the report as untrue. Albana Beqiraj, a spokesperson for the ministry, told Balkan Insight that there was no invitation sent to the ministry for the event and that Kosovo officials did not apply for visas to Ethiopia.

An official of the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) says the party is working with opposition parties to ensure the upcoming general election scheduled for May this year is free and fair.

Sekou Toure said international observers have been invited to monitor the vote.

“We have internationally accepted code of conduct or laws for the political party activities and these laws are internationally accepted. International observers will be here, they (have) already been invited to observe our election. And the people of Ethiopia in different ways have already elected their public observers for the elections,” he said.

The upcoming vote scheduled for May this year will be Ethiopia’s first since the 2005 disputed election in which about 200 opposition partisans were reportedly killed by the police.

Toure said the election will strengthen Ethiopia’s democracy.

“We are trying to work with the opposition political parties to make sure that everything is done according to the law. And we are really hopeful to work together and make it democratic and finally the whole process will be good. The playing ground will be level for every political party and finally, it will be credible,” Toure said.