An Ethiopian-born American who worked as a US government contractor has pleaded guilty to handing classified intelligence to Ethiopian officials, some of which was later used in military operations during Ethiopia's civil war, according to The Star, Kenya.
Abraham Teklu Lemma, 54, admitted sharing dozens of classified documents and photographs with senior Ethiopian officials over a period of more than two years, the US Department of Justice said. He entered the plea to a charge of conspiring to transmit national defence information to a foreign government.
US Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro said Lemma had broken his oath, let down his colleagues and harmed his country, adding that he had put American national security at risk. He faces a maximum of 22 years in prison under the plea agreement, with sentencing set for next April.
Why it matters
The case offers a rare public account of how American intelligence reached Ethiopian authorities during a war that killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced millions. According to The Star, Kenya, the disclosures show that material supplied by a single contractor fed into a conflict marked by widespread allegations of atrocities, including massacres, sexual violence and attacks on civilians.
The war began in November 2020, when Ethiopian federal forces and their allies fought fighters from the northern Tigray region. A peace agreement in November 2022 ended the main fighting, though tensions and insecurity have continued.
A contractor with wide access
Lemma held contracting roles at the State Department, the Justice Department and the National Reconnaissance Office, the agency that runs US intelligence satellites, the paper reported. Prosecutors said he worked with senior figures in Ethiopia's political, military and intelligence establishments between 2021 and his arrest in August 2023.
According to the reporting, he took classified material out of secure government buildings without authorisation, at times writing sensitive details by hand and carrying the notes out with him. He also used his job as an IT administrator to pull electronic intelligence files.
Much of what he passed on concerned the armed conflict in Ethiopia, prosecutors said. The material included satellite imagery and information on military activity, which he sent to Ethiopian officials through encrypted messages. The FBI said Ethiopian officials went on to use the intelligence in military operations, and prosecutors said Lemma hoped it would help Ethiopia's military locate and kill paramilitary fighters.
John Eisenberg, the US assistant attorney general for national security, said Lemma had betrayed the United States to an extraordinary degree, according to The Star, Kenya.
Messages and a December 2021 exchange
Court papers cited in the reporting include a message Lemma sent to an Ethiopian official in December 2021, in which he said the fighters had to be finished off for good or there would never be peace in Ethiopia. Later the same day he passed on more intelligence and asked the official to send drones.
In another exchange, the official asked Lemma to keep helping, and he replied in the affirmative. He was arrested in Maryland in August 2023 after an investigation into how he handled classified intelligence. At that time, prosecutors alleged he had stripped security markings from intelligence reports and given information to a foreign intelligence official.
Pirro said Lemma had misused his access to some of America's most sensitive intelligence and that he would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Sentencing is scheduled for April, when the court will decide how much of the 22-year maximum Lemma serves.
