I began working on Ethiopian conflict issues first with the Ethiopian and Eritrean communities in North America. In partnership with an Ethiopian pastor we gathered about 70 Ethiopian and Eritrean Christians from 6 cities in the U.S. and Canada for a reconciliation retreat in Detroit while the war was still going on between their countries.
That launched a series of reconciliation conferences in Toronto, Washington, D.C. and Columbus, Ohio, which included prayer vigils at the Ethiopian and Eritrean embassies in Washington urging the two countries to come to a negotiated settlement of their conflict.
Then in 2005 I was invited by the Evangelical Churches Fellowship of Ethiopia, the national
ecumenical organization, to facilitate conflict transformation trainings in Addis Ababa. That training opened up new relationships with the Ethiopian Baptists, and further invitations to conduct trainings with the Baptists as well as with the ECFE. One of the major conflict foci was inter-religious relationships, equipping church leaders to be creatively involved in building positive relationships across lines of religious division.Addis Kidan Baptist Church:
http://ethiopianaddiskidan.org/
For BBC’s country background information:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/country_profiles/1072164.stm
