While a huge part of the Ethiopian Diaspora is known to have an uncompromising animosity towards the EPRDF-led government, their friends at home say they would rather take an objective view of the current political situation and agree on what is fundamental to Ethiopia.

Close to 35 returnees from the Diaspora gathered at the Sheraton Addis' Semien Hall, on Thursday, December 1, 2005, to make their voice heard against what they called a campaign waged by Ethiopians in the Diaspora who have appealed to the European Union, the U.S. and other donor countries to stop aid, loans, debt relief and lobby to stop people from travelling to Ethiopia.

They have created a committee of eight to advance their cause, comprising Mulugeta Tesfakiros, Mimi Sebehatu, Genenew Assefa, Biruk Buzuayehu, Biruk Fekade, Solomon Tadesse, Anteneh Tirusew and Daniel Tedesse; the last three will function as a caucus in North America.

" This has negatively contributed to other Ethiopians who wish to come to and invest in their home country," said Solomon Tadesse, a resident of Seattle for 35 years and honorary consulate general of Ethiopia in the United States.

Solomon is one of the two organizers and co-chair of the meeting, together with Mulugeta Tesfakiros. They say they were compelled to organize such a meeting at the Sheraton to hammer out issues that despite differences along political lines, Ethiopians should not fight over what is best for the country.

Following the third national elections held in May 2005, a series of demonstrations have been taking place in the United States and different European countries questioning the fairness and legitimacy of the electoral results. Demonstrations were also held against measures that the Ethiopian Government took against CUD leaders, claming that they were behind the street insurrections that occurred on July 7 and November 1 and 2, 2005, of this year.

Those campaigning in the Diaspora against the current government allege that the U.S. and other European governments should not give aid, loans and debt relief to Ethiopia on the grounds that it does not represent the majority of the Ethiopian people and has committed "a series of human rights violations of its citizens".

The campaigns are being carried out by public demonstrations on major streets in western capitals, the exchange of letters via websites and petitions. The campaign has also expanded to try and discourage Ethiopians abroad from travelling to the country.

The support group of the CUD, for instance, wrote a protest letter to the World Bank President, Paul Wolfwitze, in November 2005, to which he responded by saying the Bank shared their concerns following the killings in Addis Abeba and other towns. The World Bank is one of the largest donors to Ethiopia, covering almost half of the 1.3 billion dollars annual aid to Ethiopia.

" Urging donors to cut aid to Ethiopia can only hurt the average Ethiopian," said one of the returnee participants, who lived in the United States for over 10 years. "And we want to show the world that there is peace in this country where people can come and invest."

Most of the participants in the returnees' meeting were businesspeople who run their own companies in Addis, although a few of them are due to return. They returned to invest in the country and claim that the campaign to stop aid and loans to Ethiopia could affect their businesses in general and the majority of poor Ethiopians in particular. Many of the returnees deal with companies abroad, and fear that crises fuelled by sanctions could affect the way they do business.

The meeting has unanimously passed a resolution that states that the campaign against aid to Ethiopia is harmful to the country, the people and to the returnees themselves. They also opposed and expressed their concern against the effort to discourage travel to Ethiopia and called upon Ethiopians in the Diaspora to refrain from disseminating a distorted picture of peace and stability of the country.

" We call on our brothers and sisters in the Diaspora to desist from such a negative and counterproductive campaign," says the press release they issued the following day.

Not everyone of them was on the same wavelength in spite of the unanimous decision in passing the resolution. It differed from those who challenged, in the meeting, the administration they said violates the constitution while breaching it itself, to those who told Fortune that they were not fully aware of the nature of the meeting when invited.

" We were literally coaxed into agreeing on the resolution," said a participant who said he had thought the meeting was called to discuss the problems the returnee community is facing during this time of crises. "If this is what they wanted, we were not in a position to go against it."