07/05/2024
: Commission ‘forced to quit’ investigation into Bate Urgessa's assassination after gathering witness testimonies implicating security forces
's witness statements revealed a chilling detail of accounts, including testimonies that after Bate left the Pension he was staying in at approximately 5:30 PM on same night he was shot and killed, a vehicle pulled into the same Pension’s compound, and four security personnel “armed with weapons”, wearing security uniforms commonly called ‘Ranger’, [military camouflage] and “red bonnet” dismounted the vehicle with “two officials” who appeared to be accompanied by the security personnel. A total of six people rented bedrooms in the same Pension, the letter chronicles.
Unlike other days, around 5:45 PM on the same day, the security forces of the city started “preventing the movement of three-wheeled vehicles (Bajajs) and pedestrians.”
On the same night, at a location outside the city where Bate’s lifeless body was found, one camouflage-painted, double-cabin pick-up vehicle “sped and exited the main road” and stopped without turning off its lights at around 12: 00 midnight, according to EHRC’s accounts gathered from eyewitnesses. Four men wearing ‘Ranger’ uniforms, red bonnets, and armed with weapons got out of the vehicle, dragged one person from the back of the vehicle, shot the person repeatedly, and left, the letter revealed. On the morning of 10 April Bate’s body was found with his hand “tied behind his back, shot in the head, chest, and abdomen areas.”
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