Borkena
Toronto – Ethiopian Police have reportedly arrested a Canadian man and tortured him. Esubalew Birhanie, Ethiopian born Canadian, travelled to Ethiopia last August to visit family.
According to The Globe and Mail report, which cited Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) as a source, Ethiopian Police pulled him from an unspecified Toronto bound plane in October 2025 and arrested him.
Police sees Esubalew’s family visit to Ethiopia rather as a sort of mission to support the Fano movement in the Amhara region of Ethiopia, and he is facing “terrorism” charges. One of the evidence police referenced was his speech during a community meeting in Toronto.
In prison, he said he was severely tortured – something EHRC has investigated and confirmed. The nine page report is not publicly available but The Globe and Mail has confirmed it.
The Globe and Mail’s full story is available here
Borkena, Toronto based Ethiopian News portal, has been extensively covering human rights abuse in Ethiopia for a long time. Now, there is a Canadian story to it.
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The report by The Globe and Mail’s full story is not available for free. With my unwavering trust in the dear editors of this esteemed website, I take their word for the story to be true. Prisoners are defenseless and vulnerable when they are imprisoned. It is the responsibility of the jailers to make sure they are not mistreated and physically or emotionally abused. Ethiopia is a signatory of the international convention that protects prisoners including those who committed heinous crimes. This repugnant act should universally condemned be in the strongest terms possible.
Folks, I have been saying this all along for decades. I never expected everything to be hanky dandy with any regime that comes to power through either violent armed struggle or out of military outfit. That has been the case in the old country since 1974. Mengistu popped out of the military and overthrew the late Emperor and by the time he quenched his thirst for human blood, the entire young generation was gone with survivors left to live with lifelong physical and emotional scars. Those who overthrew him come out of the wilderness armed to the teeth. It did not take them a month to start gunning down peaceful demonstrators in the streets of Addis/Finfinnee and summarily executing political prisoners. When they were asked why they killed peaceful demonstrators, their answer was starkly shocking by telling the world that the Ethiopian people only understand the stick and not the carrots. You remember that? When I checked the background of the top leaders of the current leaders, it shows they had learned their ropes during their years in the military. That country is mortally poisoned with demonic mentality of commie’s philosophy that political power comes out of the barrels of the gun only. It is a specter that is gonna haunt that nation and its noble people for generation to come, I am afraid. It will take a miracle to change that. Eritrea, South Sudan, Sudan and Somalia have been a lost cause for generations now. The terror in those countries and Ethiopia has rendered those with needed intellectual horsepower with no tolerance and accommodation to stomach differing opinions. They are splintered in all directions. It is my way or the highway arrogance. That makes me feel helpless and I go down on my knees to beg The Good Lord to save that gem of humanity.
I’m inclined to amend my opinion about Somalia where I am seeing now a faint ray of hope for that country. Brother
President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud is doing a few things encouraging. He has inherited a mess unseen before and needs all the constructive assistance he can muster to bring Somalia to a country where it is stable, in peace with itself and its neighbors where no one will be above the law. All the best Brother!!!