IT IS extraordinary how effective a news blackout can be. For the past six months, a hidden civil war has been raging inside Ethiopia. Thousands have been slaughtered. Starvation, rape, and execution have been deployed as weapons of war. A million people have been displaced from their homes. Tens of thousands are refugees in neighbouring Sudan (News, 5 February, 1 January). Some 5.2 million people are going hungry. All this out of sight of the international media.