I emphasize the fact that the Website is dedicated totally to serve the great people of Ethiopia. It is open to all, and all are invited to share their views in articles, essays, poems, cartoons et cetera. Even though there is no censorship on themes and central ideas, for the sake of continued discourse, individual contributors of articles, essays et cetera are urged to use proper judgment in their works and refrain from false accusations and �unnecessary roughness.� Moreover, people should take notice of the fact that the Website is goal-oriented and partisan, thus the editorial focus is on the following two important objectives:1) To strengthen Ethiopian nationalism through humanism, and

2) To foster, promote, and defend the Sovereignty and Territorial Integrity of Ethiopia.

Ethiopians have withstood tremendous social and political upheavals in the last fifty years. Any other people in the world without our type of long history and strong faith would have collapsed and their institutions would have disintegrated had they been faced with a fraction of what we Ethiopians have to endure. Ethiopians survived numerous devastating famines, rabid military regimes, and the camouflaged onslaught of the Governments of Arab Countries (Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria et cetera). The Arab governments� subversive financing, military training, and sanctuary giving to treasonous individuals finally fractured the country with one administrative part ceding illegally with the help of the leaders of the present Ethiopian Government by force of arms calling itself an independent nation.

In the aftermath of such complex process involving armed �liberation� movements, and in the guise of liberating the nation from the vice like clutches of a tyrannical and brutal military regime, in 1991 mistakes were made in allowing a subversive group lead by a treasonous leader and made up of nihilistic individuals, who harbored the unjustified hate of their own mother country, to lead the country into the ground. Among other several Ethiopians, I have tried in the last ten years to inform, explain, teach and encourage Ethiopians from all walks of life to get rid of Meles Zenawi�s government because it is the main source of our difficulties. The current border demarcation that is threatening Ethiopia with alienation of its historic coastal territories of the Afar region and the Red Sea territorial waters with all the islands is one of the greatest and most difficult challenges to all Ethiopians. The task of defending Ethiopia and Ethiopian territorial integrity has become extremely difficult because of the policy of the current Ethiopian government and its leader Meles Zenawi who is bent on destroying Ethiopia and on surrendering away Ethiopian territories to neighboring Countries.

In the pursuit of that effort, I have written numerous articles and essays posted in some of Ethiopian owned websites. I am an ardent believer and practitioner of human rights, especially I believe in the rights of the individual to formulate freely his/her ideas, to express freely his/her opinion on any subject, and to seek truth freely without fear of persecution or prosecution. Ethiopian nationalism and Ethiopianness can only be reinforced and enriched through the free exchange of ideas. This Website is dedicated to that end. Even though the Website has a distinct editorial voice, it is also a vehicle for a higher calling in preserving and safeguarding the right of any Ethiopian to express his/her views without fear of any form of censorship. No nation can be built on falsehood and propaganda. If it is thus structured, beware! We seek �the truth,� and �the truth� is our strength.

Tecola W. Hagos, Editor

Washington DC

November, 2003