Addis Ababa: - Richard Pankhurst, the son of the British women’s rights campaigner Sylvia Pankhurst who became one of the world’s leading experts on Ethiopian history and culture, has died aged 89.
He first came into contact with Ethiopia through his mother, a suffragette who also campaigned against the invasion of the Horn of Africa nation by Benito Mussolini’s fascist Italian troops in 1935.
He moved to Addis Ababa with her after World War II and started teaching at Addis Ababa University, going on to write more than 20 books and thousands of articles.
The British embassy said Pankhurst died on Thursday.
Ethiopia’s foreign ministry called him a “doyen of historians and scholars of Ethiopia”.
“Pankhurst was one of Ethiopia’s greatest friends during his long and productive life and his scholarship and understanding for Ethiopia will be sorely missed,” it said in a statement.
Ethiopian Wondwosen Gelan tweeted: “He was our history archive. We miss him so much.”