Ethiopia rebels declare cease-fire during UN visit

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Rebels in Ethiopia's volatile east declared a unilateral cease-fire so the United Nations can investigate their claims of human rights abuses in the region. The Ogaden National Liberation Front rebels, ethnic Somalis who have been fighting the government for more than a decade, said they will only defend themselves if attacked. "We want to give every hand to the UN mission so that the Ethiopian government does not find an excuse to interfere, so that they (the UN) can do a thorough investigation about what's happening in the Ogaden," Abdulrahman Mahdi, spokesman for the ONLF, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Sunday.