Tigray Herald፡December 11,2024 (Mekele)
Written by Fitihi ni hizbi
There are several similarities between these dictators! One of them betrayal!!!
Al-Hamada began taking part in the anti-government protests in 2011, which swept the region during the Arab Spring at the time. He was arrested for the first time in April of that year, before being arrested again later in December.
He was apprehended again by regime forces in 2012 alongside two of his nephews, for smuggling baby formula to a Damascus suburb – which was then under siege following the outbreak of the civil war.
Hamada endured repeated physical and sexual assaults during his detention in multiple prisons, including being suspended from his wrists. He was forced to confess to crimes he did not commit.
He was released in 2014 and returned briefly to his hometown before seeking asylum in the Netherlands after Deir az-Zour fell to the Islamic State group.
In 2020, al-Hamada returned to Syria from Germany after being “promised” amnesty by the Syrian regime. Hamada was immediately faced with arbitrary arrest upon his return, was forcibly disappeared and unheard of since.
Mazen al-Hamada was reportedly found dead in the Assad regime’s most notorious torture prison of Saydnaya on Monday, days after the fall of the Baathist regime and the release of detainees in jails.
👉Aster Yohannes is the wife of Petros Solomon, a former Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Maritime Resources. She had been studying in the USA at the time of her husband’s arrest as part of the G15, which was a group of prominent Eritrean politicians known within the ruling party as the G-15 or Group of 15. She returned to Eritrea after graduation to be with her children after the Eritrean government denied her permission to bring her children to the USA to be with her. She knew there was a risk that she would be arrested but had reportedly received a guarantee of her safety from the government. However, she was arrested upon arrival at Asmara International airport in December 2003. Aster Yohannes has not been charged with a crime or brought before any court. Nor has she been permitted visits from her lawyer, children or any other relatives. With the authorities refusing to reveal information about her fate or whereabouts, she remains subjected to enforced disappearance.
