Birtukan Mideksa Released

By Gubae Gundarta

According to Ethiopian Radio and Television Agency (ERTA), Birtukan has been released on the basis her plea for pardon.

She has been freed after the scrutiny of her petition by the Board of Pardon and the approval thereof by the President of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, HE Ato Girma Wolde Giorgis today October 6, 2010.

In her letter dated 15 September 2010 and addressed to the Prime Minster, she was said to have stated how she had been sent to prison with other leaders of CUD for illegally acts against the government and later pardoned upon similar happenstance. Therein, the report said, she also expressed that she did give her audience wrong information about her status and told them that she did not apply for anything like that. Also stated in the letter was the fact that she did not heed the repeated admonitions of the government when she was asked to admit that she was exonerated because she had applied for an official pardon along with her fellow convicts.

The ERTA News also indicated that Birtukan said she would never be engaged in any act of the ilk and would only look after her little daughter and her aging mother.

Upon sanctioning the proposal forwarded by the board the president was quoted as saying the move was an eminent one in terms of ensuring and showing that the Ethiopian government has been tolerant and that rule of law prevails in the country.

NewsDire Staff Writer