Operation London Times

Dear Ethiopians:

I am sure you have all read the reports from Eritrea by the London Times newspaper correspondents Marie Colvin and Sam Kiley. Marie Colvin works for the Sunday Times while Sam Kiley is employed by the daily Times.

These two correspondents are in effect serving as propaganda mouthpieces for the EPLF. They report Eritrean statements as fact. They report the Eritrean versions of events as if they witnessed them when in fact they were miles away.

In this article I would like to ask all Ethiopians and others interested in fairness to contact the London Times. They have a feedback option on their menu. I have already contacted them and received an acknowledgement. I simply asked them politely to try to provide more balanced reporting and to stop reporting Eritrean propaganda as if it were fact.

Click here to go directly to the "Contact us" form at the London Times

To copy and paste the URL:

http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/resources/contactus1.n.html?2435554

The URL for the homepage is listed below. For the Sunday TImes, you must click on "Sunday" from the left hand menubar:

London Times - http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/Times/frontpage.html?2435554

Examples of their biased reports:

• Sam Kiley's fanciful account of the Zallambessa battle on June 10: All other reporters stated that the Eritreans stopped them at Senafe. Sam Kiley wrote as if he had witnessed the battle, yet it was clear that he also had not left Senafe.

  Meanwhile, reporters from the VOA and Washinton Post were on a ridge on the Ethiopian side overlooking Zallambessa in the distance. Their account of the battle was completely different, but it was later backed up with evidence.

  If you have read my article "Who has been doing the attacking?" you will also see more explanation of why Sam Kiley's article was not credible.

  Sam Kiley is clearly a cynical journalist who has decided to use the London Times to help his old friends in the EPLF.

• Marie Colvin's account of the battle at Burie (June 11). Obviously she wasn't there. Yet she unquestioningly reports the Eritrean version as if it were fact. This despite the presence of 90 Eritrean POWs in Assaita, and despite the analysis by diplomats that Eritrea had suffered a major defeat there.

  Marie Colvin's article from June 14 was also unprofessional and full of errors. I have written an article detailing these: Anatomy of a Biased and Misleading Correspondent Report.

Marie Colvin seems like a young and very naive individual. I don't blame her too much for swallowing the Eritrean propaganda. This could be a good learning experience for her if she could visit the Ethiopian side and see how she has been decieved by the Eritreans.

Ethiopians should contact the London Times and ask them politely to please carefully edit the reports from Sam Kiley and Marie Colvin. All we are asking for is fairness. Eritrean claims should be reported as Eritrean claims - not as fact. The reports from Sam Kiley and Marie Colvin should also be compared with reports from news agencies such as Reuters, BBC, VOA, the LA Times, and the Washington Post.

The major discrepancies between the London Times reports versus those of all other news agencies need to be explained.