Exiled former Ethiopian strongman cites no regrets

The former Ethiopian military dictator, Mengistu Haile Mariam, said in an interview from his exile home in Zimbabwe on Tuesday that he would refuse to face trial or be judged for crimes committed under his rule by the present leadership of Ethiopia. His remarks were made in an interview with the Johannesburg daily, 'The Star'. It described him as an "angry and bitter man" who voiced "defiance" throughout the interview which was conducted in a boardroom at the offices of the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) in the Zimbabwe capital, Harare. Mengistu, who has lived in a heavily guarded Harare mansion since fleeing Ethiopia in 1991, was in the headlines earlier this month after Ethiopia sent a request for his extradition from South Africa, where he had gone for treatment. Amnesty International and other rights organisations stepped up the pressure saying Mengistu should stand trial for human rights violations and answer genocide allegations. But he returned to Zimbabwe just before the request was received. In the interview Mengistu, said his 17-year rule, marked by a period known as the "Red Terror" campaign of the late 1970s in which thousands are alleged to have died, came to end because his regime lost the support of the Soviet Union under the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev. "The Soviet Union under Mikhail Gorbachev was the worst enemy of our revolution," he said. He said he had not killed anyone personally, but gave orders in battle which resulted in the deaths of people. He insisted the "Red Terror" campaign was "a fight between two different social groups". Mengistu, the newspaper said, also denied killing his predecessor, the last Ethiopian emperor, Haile Selassie. In the version of events after Mengistu seized power, 'The Star' said Mengistu asked the emperor to sign authorisation for the repatriation of funds abroad. The emperor is said to have responded by spitting his face and telling him he did not speak to slaves. In a fit of rage, Mengistu was then alleged to have throttled him. Mengistu said: "He was 80 years-old and a very weak man. We tried our best to save him, but we could not keep him alive." He denied throttling the emperor. "We asked and begged him about the money. We told him, 'you are history and a father to the country. If you offer this money during this trying time you will be one of the people to be remembered for saving the country'." Mengistu said the emperor had told him he had passed the money on to his children, but that they said they had not been given any, and to this day, he has never found out whether Haile Selassie had money abroad. He said his legacy would be that he had pulled Ethiopia out of feudalism: "All I can say is that living for 17 years without rest from fighting, dealing with problem after problem, war after war, and crisis after crisis, every day and every hour was very difficult." Last week, in a bid to counter international pressure for harbouring Mengistu, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe disclosed that the American and Canadian governments had offered to help his government look after Mengistu. "Both the Americans and Canadians even offered to assist financially if we could not meet the expenses of looking after Mengistu," he said - a fact later acknowledged by the US embassy in Harare. Washington, it said, felt at the time a safe haven for Mengistu would prevent further bloodshed in Ethiopia.