for respect of human rights and democratic governance as a caring world
and the Cotonou Agreement would expect it to be done.
The EU and the Commission are no doubt aware of the ever worsening political,
human rights and humanitarian condition in Eritrea under the repressive regime of
President Isaias Afeworki, which has proven to be one of the worst violators of
human rights and basic freedoms to its own people, on top of remaining as the
leading instigator of conflicts and armed hostilities in the Horn of Africa.
Dear Sir,
Today, Eritrea and its people are totally isolated from the outside world under
practices that remind one of Cambodia of the Khmer Rouge. You very well know, as
we do, that during the past 18 years ago, no national electoins were held in Eritrea,
and that the people have been denied the slightest participation in their everyday
political life. You know, as the rest of interested world does, that the constitution
drafted and ratified by the same regime over 12 years ago is still collecting dust in the
shelves of President Isaias Afeworki, and that no rule of law can be thought of in the
country. No government institutions exist in Eritrea ruled by one-man and his cohorts
in the ‘Presidential Office’. All liberties, including freedom of expression, freedom of
worship, even freedom of movement remain denied to the population.
Needless to say, the regime is ruling the country by brute force, with a security
apparatus that has become the most feared agency of its kind in Africa. Since 2001,
disappearance of dissidents has become an everyday occurrence in the country. The
known prisons are full of inmates who are denied the right of visit by relatives and the
ICRC. Among those languishing in prison for many years without a day at court are
the top ranking government officials arrested nearly a decade ago in addition to
thousands of young persons who were apprehended while trying to escape from the
suffocating political, economic and social situation. Many have died in prison because
of torture and maltreatment. Summary killings have also become daily occurrences,
and victims include under age children, some of them shot dead in front of their
parents in recent months.
Due to these excessive human rights abuses in Eritrea, the flight of young people to
the Sudan and Ethiopia has reached the rate of over 2,500 per month this year, most
of them youths below the age of 30.
Dear Sir,
We assume that everyone is aware of the fact that it is the repressiveness of the
regime, still holding over quarter of a million Eritreans in war trenches, and its wrong
economic policies that have brought the country to its knees. The prevailing
economic collapse is nowadays threatening the very survival of the population. This
year, Eritreans are facing starvation but the regime is trying to hide it. We have
reports of deaths in villages and towns because of the prevalent lack of food in the
country. The international community, which is not well represented in Eritrea, is
denied access to the country and has no knowledge of what is going on in Eritrea
outside Asmara, the capital.
We would thus wish to ask the esteemed EU and its executive arm, the European
Commission, to do the following as a matter of utmost urgency:
1. To stop granting support to the regime save for humanitarian assistance, and
the latter action only after ensuring that the Commission would supervise the
distribution of relief assistance to reach the hungry people
2. To give emergency relief assistance through UN agencies and international
NGOs to the increasing number of refugees, who now count over 300,000 in
the Sudan and Ethiopia
3. The European Commission to kindly study ways of helping the new and
young Eritrean refugee caseloads in the Horn of Africa not only with relief
assistance but to devise and finance vocational training and skill upgrading
projects through allocating for use by Eritrean refugees some of the resources
that could have gone to a normal government in Eritrea.
4. Eritrean refugee communities in European countries, the vast majority of them
distanced from the regime and its embassies, also require an urgent
humanitarian attention through EU-funded projects on variety of issues like
awareness education on human rights, democracy, and general public health.
