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[Revelations]

"Only $5mil of $100mil raised for famine relief used to buy food. $95mil went to buy guns"

[Revelations]

Ethiopia famine aid 'spent on weapons'




Gebremedhin Araya (L) says he posed as a merchant, but was in fact a rebel


Millions of dollars in Western aid for victims of the Ethiopian famine of 1984-85 was siphoned off by rebels to buy weapons, a BBC investigation finds.

Former rebel leaders told the BBC that they posed as merchants in meetings with charity workers to get aid money.

They used the cash to fund attempts to overthrow the government of the time.

One rebel leader estimated $95m (£63m) - from Western governments and charities - was channelled into the rebel fight.

The CIA, in a 1985 assessment entitled Ethiopia: Political and Security Impact of the Drought, also alleged aid money was being misused.

Its report concluded: "Some funds that insurgent organisations are raising for relief operations, as a result of increased world publicity, are almost certainly being diverted for military purposes."

[Revelations]

Bob Geldof denies BBC claims that Live Aid money was used by Ethiopian rebels




Bob Geldof has angrily denied claims by the BBC that 95 percent of the money raised by Live Aid was seized and used by Ethiopia's Tigrayan People's Liberation Front (TPLF).

The Irishman said the BBC inspired him to establish Live Aid and said "it would be a f*****g tragedy" if people stopped donating money to charity because of allegations made by the BBC.

Geldof and his then wife Paula Yates were moved to tears after watching Michael Buerk's report on the Ethiopian famine, which aired on the BBC.

Geldof formed Band Aid after reading a note that Yates left on the fridge, which asked all visitors to the house to donate $10 to aid the victims of the famine.

In 1985, Geldof produced the Live Aid concert, which raised an estimated $246 million in aid for Ethiopia.

The BBC claims that two former senior commanders of the TPLF revealed that the majority of the money raised by Live Aid was robbed and used to buy weapons for the TPLF.

The current prime minister of Ethiopia, Mengistu Haile Mariam, is a former TPLF rebel leader.

Ethiopia is still receiving a substantial level of aid from western governments.


Geldof was having none of the BBC’s findings.

"If that percentage of money had been diverted, far more than a million people would have died. It’s possible that in one of the worst, longest-running conflicts on the continent some money was mislaid. But to suggest it was on this scale is just b******s," said the former lead singer of the Boomtown Rats..

[Revelations]