"Our belief was that the court would suppose they were journalists and that they would be released. this can be what the prime minister has said before," ministry spokesman Anders Jörle said. "It isn't truthful that they're sentenced since they're journalists on a journalistic mission."
"They are innocent and are convicted as a result of their journalistic work," said Tomas Olsson, the journalists' Swedish attorney. "We are terribly disappointed."
A court convicted Johan Persson and Martin Schibbye last week.
Swedish journalists jailed in Ethiopia
Ethiopian troops captured Persson and Schibbye in July throughout an exchange of gunfire with a rebel cluster within the Ogaden, a prohibited region along the nation's border with Somalia, in line with state media.
Ethiopian officers accused the journalists of being accomplices to terrorism when the govt. declared the Ogaden National Liberation Front a terrorist cluster in June.
Olsson said the 11-year sentence was very cheap doable one for the crimes they were convicted of.
"The prosecutor sought eighteen years imprisonment, thus if you check out it that approach, it's a positive factor that they got very cheap doable sentence," Olsson said. "But since they're innocent, they're terribly disappointed."
Schibbye and Persson have till January ten to come to a decision if they need to attractiveness -- a method that might take up to 2 years -- or if they need to hunt a pardon.
However, Olsson said, if they need to use for a pardon the 2 have to be compelled to admit the crimes, "and since they're not guilty then this can be not one thing they'd need to try and do."
Fredric Alm at the Sweden-based photojournalism agency Kontinent, that the 2 men work, said they "have a awfully exhausting call previous them" in considering whether or not to attractiveness or raise for a pardon, however that an 11-year sentence in an Ethiopian jail "could effectively be a death sentence for them."
Alm added: "The purpose of this verdict is to scare away all journalists from reporting within the Ogaden. however as journalists we've got to continue reporting from closed areas. it is a terribly unhappy day for press freedom. it is a terribly unhappy day however it did not come back as a surprise for us. It's still a political verdict; it isn't a true trial. it's the (Ethiopian) prime minister who has determined."
Persson and Schibbye were convicted on 2 counts: coming into the country illegally and providing help to a terrorist organization, in line with the Committee to shield Journalists (CPJ).
Press freedom teams say the 2 were embedded with the rebels whereas acting on a story concerning the region.
Journalists and aid employees are prohibited from coming into the Ogaden, where human rights organizations say human rights abuses against ethnic Somalis by rebels and Ethiopian troops are rampant.
"The Ethiopian army's answer to the rebels has been to viciously attack civilians within the Ogaden," said Georgette Ganon of Human Rights Watch. "These widespread and systematic atrocities quantity to crimes against humanity."
Reporters without borderlines criticized the court's call.
"What are the Ethiopian authorities hoping to achieve?" the international secretariat of the cluster asked. "To discourage anyone from visiting the Ogaden, as these 2 journalists did? To send a warning signal to the national and international media concerning the danger of receiving an extended jail sentence on a terrorism charge if they try any doubtless embarrassing investigative reporting?"
"Our place to begin is and remains that they need been within the country on a journalistic mission," Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said in an exceedingly statement last week. "They ought to be freed as soon as doable and be able to rejoin their families in Sweden."
But presiding decide Shemsu Sirgaga said the 2 "have not been able to prove that they didn't support terrorism."
"They have shown that they're esteemed journalists, however we tend to cannot conclude that somebody with a decent name doesn't have interaction in criminal acts," Sirgaga said.
Both journalists pleaded guilty to coming into the country illegally through Somalia while not accreditation, in line with the CPJ, that says Ethiopian officers deny media access while not government minders.
"We have documented violations of due method and also the politicization of their trial," the CPJ said, complaining that the govt. pronounced the 2 guilty even before the trial started.
Amnesty International immersed their unleash previous Tuesday's sentencing.
"There is nothing to recommend that the 2 men entered Ethiopia with any intention apart from conducting their legitimate work as journalists. the govt. chooses to interpret meeting with a terrorist organization as support of that cluster and so a terrorist act," said Claire Beston with the human rights cluster.
In a statement issued in September, Kontinent said that its journalists don't take sides or participate in any conflict and report underneath international rights relating to freedom of the press, that it believes ought to be upheld by any government.
The trial against the journalists became a fight for press freedom in Ethiopia, in line with international journalists' organizations. in an exceedingly letter sent to the United Nations, Reporters without borderlines accused Ethiopia of using its anti-terrorism law to reduce press freedom and penalize free speech.
"In the name of the fight against terrorism, the govt. muzzles dissident and important voices, so abusing human rights and basic freedoms," wrote the secretary general of Reporters without borderlines, Jean-Francois Julliard.
