MER Article Women's Organizations in Ethiopia One of the more positive political themes that the exiled students brought back from their studies was a special emphasis on the need for the emancipation of women. A Women’s Committee operated within POMOA. As late as 1977, official state documents were stressing the double oppression of women, as Maxine Molyneux • 1 min read
MER Article Mengistu and the Standing Committee By the end of 1979, Mengistu Haile-Mariam, “the Chairman,” was being projected through the official media in a strong authoritarian light. He derived from his earlier years an exceptional acquaintance with the regional diversity of Ethiopia. Born in an Oromo area between 1940 and 1942, of mixed Amha Fred Halliday • 2 min read
MER Article Ethiopia's Revolution from Above With hindsight it is possible to see in the course of the Ethiopian revolution a process of radicalization and post-revolutionary consolidation through which the Provisional Military Administration Committee (PMAC, or the Derg) established a stable new order on the ruins of the old. The direction of Maxine Molyneux, Fred Halliday • 32 min read
MER Article War Crisis Escalates Political developments in Africa have lately slipped out of the headlines, but the confrontations brewing there could dwarf earlier conflicts in both military fury and political complexity. The US-backed regimes in Somalia and Sudan each face the possibility of sudden coups d’etat or civil wars. The Dan Connell • 6 min read
MER Article From the Editors (June 1982) It is nearly three years since we devoted an issue to the Horn of Africa. As Dan Connell notes in his introductory overview, the dizzying geopolitical realignments of the regimes there only make more dangerous the internal, structural crises of national unity, political repression and overwhelming m The Editors • 3 min read
MER Article From the Editors (May 1982) Professor Menachem Milson, the Israeli “Arabist” who heads the West Bank occupation forces, compares the intensity and seriousness of the recent unrest there with the war of 1948. The Begin government, determined to root out all assertions of Palestinian nationalism, is trying to destroy those insti The Editors • 3 min read
MER Article Letter To the Editors: I would like to give a correct version of the interview I had with Fred Halliday in March 1980, published in MERIP Reports 98 (July-August 1981). Our conversation was not recorded. Halliday occasionally took notes, and errors and inaccuracies have therefore crept into the interview a (Author not identified) • 2 min read
MER Article "The Only Serious Obstacle Is Khomeini Himself" I conducted this interview with Manuchehr Hezarkani after his departure from Iran in October 1981. He is a medical doctor trained in France, and has been among the founders of three important Iranian political forces: the Confederation of Iranian Students, which led the opposition in Europe to the S (Author not identified) • 4 min read
MER Article "We Are Living Between Two Tides" Shokrallah Paknejad, one of the most prominent and far-sighted of modern Iranian socialists, was executed in Evin prison, Tehran, during December 1981. Although his death was not officially announced, his family was given a number for his grave in the cemetery of Behesht-e Zahra, and the prison auth (Author not identified) • 6 min read
MER Article "All the People Who Are Opposed to Our Solution Must Die" Sadeq Khalkhali is the representative from Qom in the Majles. Although not himself a leading element in the Islamic Republican Party, he has a small following among the extreme right-wing clergy. He wielded considerable influence within the regime, particularly in its formative period, and consisten (Author not identified) • 3 min read
MER Article "We Started to Feel Cold Sweat on Our Brows" Ali Reza Nobari studied mathematics in France and was finishing a Ph.D. in operations research at Stanford University in California when the Iranian revolution occurred. He helped to fund the newspaper Enqelab-e Islami and served as governor of Iran's Central Bank during Bani-Sadr’s presidency. Eric (Author not identified) • 12 min read
MER Article "The Americans Played a Disgusting Role" Shahpour Bakhtiar served as prime minister in the last weeks of the Shah’s regime. Since escaping from Iran after February 1979 he has been living in exile. Fred Halliday spoke with him in Paris in August 1981. Mr. Bakhtiar, what is your estimation of the current strength of the Iranian regime? (Author not identified) • 12 min read
