Authorities in Somalia over the weekend arrested and deported a former commander of Ethiopia’s notorious Jail Ogaden, located in the eastern Somali regional state.
Hassan Ismail Ibrahim, also known as Hassan Dhere, was arrested in neighbouring Somalia in a town where he had been hiding, following a tip-off.
Hassan had been on the run since August 2018 when federal forces were deployed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to depose long-serving Somali regional state president Abdi Illey.
Jail Ogaden is a facility where thousands of prisoners were tortured, and abused according to Human Rights Watch investigations through rape, sleep deprivation, and physical assault. Ethiopia closed the facility last year with the promise to transform it into a museum.
Campaigners say inmates were routinely tortured at “Jail Ogaden”, which he ran in Ethiopia’s Somali region.
Many prisoners were accused of being linked to the separatist group the Ogaden National Liberation Front.
But that group signed a peace deal with the government in October, following the appointment of Abiy Ahmed as prime minister.
Former leader of the state, Abdi Mohamoud Illey is currently in federal custody facing criminal charges after he was deposed.
The authorities closed the prison last year and announced plans to make it into a museum.
The new president of Ethiopia’s Somali region, Mustafa Omer, told Al Jazeera news in April that he was chasing the people who allowed the torture.
