Unidentified thieves have robbed the office of the Addis Ababa based online media outlet, Ethiopian Insider (ES), its parent company, Haq media and communication company disclosed on Monday. The latest robbery is third such incident that happened to a media house in the last five months.
In a press statement Haq media and communication company disclosed Ethiopia Insider office was robbed during the time period between late Sunday and early Monday morning.
The statement said the ES safe-box was raided and valuable equipments including three new and modern digital cameras, five camera lenses, four laptops and one smartphone stolen.
The robbery was discovered by an Ethiopia Insider staff who had went to the office on Monday morning.
The Haq media and communication company statement didn’t accuse a specific entity of committing the robbery, but it indicated it has been under pressure from “powerful entities” and that it believes the robbery is a continuation of pressures ES and other non-state media outlets and civil society associations are encountering.
The statement mentioned similar robberies of the offices of another online media outlet, Ethio-251 and the non-governmental Ethiopia Human Rights Council (EHRCo) as indications there is an orchestrated campaign to weaken independent media and civil society.
In March, unidentified thieves completely robbed the offices of Ethio-251 media outlet.
Also in March, another online based media outlet, Yeneta-Tube was reportedly robbed of two of its modern office cameras allegedly by a staff member who still hasn’t been caught.
In addition to robberies, independent media outlets in Ethiopia are facing other types of pressures including arbitrary arrests, forced disappearances and physical assaults of media workers by government agents.
