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Human Rights Violations in Eritrea By Ethio- Canadian 4 Peace 07-29-21 General Overview Eritrea is a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual society with at least nine recognized ethnic groups with 55% Tigraynians, the Tigre 30% Tigre and 4%. Saho. Some 98% of the Eritrean 6 million population belong to the major world religions. Majority of people are Christian (63%) followed by Moslems (36%). Eritrea’s government remains one of the world’s most repressive, subjecting its population to widespread forced labor and conscription, imposing restrictions on freedom of expression, opinion, and faith, and restricting independent scrutiny by international monitors. Eritrea remains a one-man dictatorship under President Isaias Afewerki, with no legislature, no independent civil society organizations or media outlets, and no independent judiciary. Elections have never been held in the country since it gained independence in 1993, and the government has never implemented the 1997 constitution guaranteeing civil rights and limiting executive power. The government that is panicky of its shadow has extended its policy of intimidation to the whole population: “Fear hangs over Eritrean people; both inside the country and among the diasporas. This is the product of ruthless repression that the regime has meted out…political prisoners, detention centres and labor camps which stretch across the country like a chain of islands. Some are former prisons, other converted stores and some even makeshift facilities, often shipping containers. Here prisoners languish for years at a time. Brutal treatment is routinely administrated and there is no recourse to any form of legal action. None of this detainee ever sees a court, let alone a defence lawyer.” (Plaut, M., 2016). In 2009, Prof. Kjetin Tronvoll engaged in an extensive research on Eritrea on behalf of the Oslo Centre for Peace and Human Rights. He estimated the number of political prisoners between 10,000 and 30,000 people and reported about widespread and systemic use of torture and extrajudicial killings, with "anyone" for "any or no reason", including children of 8 and seniors of over 80 plus sick people. Prof. Tronvoll called Eritrea the “Gulag Archipelago” and regrated that the country had "developed into one of the world's most totalitarian and human rights-abusing regimes" (http://worldcat.org/identities/lccn-no2011084492/) Situation has moved from bad to worse since 2009. The Eritrean Constitution The Eritrean Constitution, ratified by the Constituent Assembly on 23 May 1997, has guarantees basic rights. It was “the first constitution created by the Eritrean people themselves.” (Selassie, B.H., 2003, p. xi) In Chapter III on Fundamental Rights, Freedoms and Duties, Article 19 guarantees freedom of “Conscience, Religion, Expression of Opinion, Movement, Assembly and Organisation”. According to the Article 14.1, “All persons are equal under the law” and “No person may be discriminated against on account of race, ethnic origin, language, colour, gender, religion [highlighted here], disability, age, political view, or social or economic status or any other improper factors”. Any citizen claiming violation of a fundamental right guaranteed by the Constitution “may petition a competent court for redress” (Article 28.2). There are constitutional protections against arbitrary detention and unfair trial (Article 17) and against torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment (Article 16). Following are some provisions of the constitution:
· “Every person shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and belief” (Article 19.1) · “Every person shall have the freedom of speech and expression, including freedom of the press and other media” (Article 19.2) · “Every person shall have the freedom to practice any religion and to manifest such practice” (Article 19.4) · “All persons shall have the right to assemble and to demonstrate peaceably together with others” (Article 19.5) · “Every citizen shall have the right to form organizations for political, social, economic and cultural ends” (Article 19.6) In actual practice, the Eritrean constitution has never been implemented and There is no Constitutional Court to monitor its implementation. Violations are systematically perpetrated by the authorities with impunity and without any possibility of legal protection or judicial redress. The reason should be sought to the nature of the ruling clique in Eritrea. Totalitarian regimes, like that of Mr. Afwerki, survive due to their success in making public demagogy. While they boast for their wonderful legal provisions, they spare no time in trampling them. They justify their atrocities by pretending about having the best constitutional guarantees Personality Cult In April 1993, Mr. Afewerki was elected as the first President of the State of Eritrea by the National Assembly. February 1994, as part of its transformation into Eritrea's ruling political party, the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF) renamed itself as the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ) under the leadership of its former commander Isaias Afewerki. Since then, it has ruled the country with an iron fist, as the only permitted political party. Similar to his counterpart in North Korea, Mr. Kim Jong-un, Afwerki’s rule is marked by brutal suppression, fear, terror, chaos, and bloodshed. Both of them have personalized state power with their cruelest anti-human approaches and highly repressive politics. Both have spared no effort to impose their cult of personality on their poverty-stricken people. Both are busy extolling absolute devotion to infallible leaders, as an inseparable component of their totalitarian regimes. Both have carved one of the darkest chapters in the human rights history. The greed for power has become a part of Mr. Isaias Afwerki’s self-centred and intransigent character. According to an author, who is closely acquainted with him: “…belated attempts by his closest comrades to bring about some change in him ended in their imprisonment, as we all know. Isaias has made it clear that he will remain president as long as he can; until he is forced out. It can fairly be concluded that, like the proverbial tiger that will not change his spot, Isaias will not change his color – his chameleon like deceptive color, meaning his conduct.” (Selassie, B.H., 2020) Afwerki has openly and repeatedly expressed his scorn for "western-style" democracy. In a 2008 interview with Al Jazeera, for instance, he said that "Eritrea will wait three or four decades, maybe more, before it holds elections. Who knows?" (As quoted in Human Rights Council, 2016, p. 19) MilitarizationUnder the national service regulations of 23 October 1995, national service of six months’ military training and 12 months’ development service (such as labour on construction projects) is compulsory for all Eritreans, males and females, aged between 18 and 40 years, male and female. Despite international standard providing countries with compulsory military service to allow conscientious objection to military service for reasons of individual’s religion or conscience, there is no right to conscientious object to military service in Eritrea. Since 1998, everyone under the age of 50 is enlisted in national service. Everybody is considered a soldier in Eritrea. Conscription is carried out by local authorities mainly through "round-ups" (giffain the Tigrinya language), where police search houses, workplaces, streets and roadblocks to check identity documents. Conscripts go through a very tough military training and there are reports of severe torture, in the name of disciplinary reprimanding, by military commanders. Military service is indefinite. Some have served for decade without a prospect for release. Women have frequently experienced sexual and other kinds of servitude. Members of minority religious groups undergoing national service who have sought to practice their faith have been subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. With all practical purposes, Eritrea is an “African garrison state”. The regime has even extended its militarization to its international relationship. In 2011, for example, Ethiopia accused Eritrea of planting bombs at an African Union summit in Addis Ababa, which was later supported by a UN report. Data on military expenditures have never been released by the Eritrean government. In the absence of a national budget and data on military expenditures, there is no way to verify the figures to the international funding sources. There are, however, unofficial reports that in some years around 44% of the Gross National Products (GNP) was allocated to the military expenditures. There are also indications that the government has significant ‘off budget’ sources allocated to the military. (Global Investment and Business Centre, 2013, p. 44). Religious, political or human rights expression are watched at schools, colleges, playground and neighbourhood. Undesirable expression may lead to arrest and imprisonment in military camps Militarization of education Grade 11th students as well as students of higher education must perform up to three months of service under strict military control. Refusal is regarded mutiny, punishable by beating, detention and torture. Girls have reported gender-related persecutions. Dormitories are overcrowded with lack of sanitation. In September 2020, the government ignored its own restrictions on movement, its ban on public transport, and its school closures, by channeling thousands of school students to the infamous Sawa military camp where all secondary school students were required to complete their schooling and simultaneously undergo military training. No conscripts, including students, were released from Sawa during 2020, despite the risk of exposure to Covid-19. Militarization of education is a gross violation of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child due to separation of children from their families and forced them into a military environment. Freedom of Press Media is strictly controlled by state apparatus, reflecting the regimes war-mongering and chauvinistic propaganda. There no foreign correspondent in Eritrea. The Press Freedom Index ranked Eritrea at 180th in 2020, only ahead of North Korea and Turkmenistan. Eritrea is fourth in the world in terms of the imprisonment of journalists. Freedom of media has never improved since the brutal clampdown of independent media in 2001. Frequent request from Reporters Without Border for information about 11 disappeared journalists have always put down by the government. (https://rsf.org/en/eritrea?nl=ok) Abject Poverty The government militarization project has been continuing despite abject poverty in Eritrea. Out the population of around 6 million, more than 66 percent of the population lives below the poverty line, 64.64% in urban and 70.30% in rural areas. Over 3.15 million people live with less than $1 a day. (Odekon, M., 2015, p. 521) Around two-thirds of households suffer from food insecurity, with rural areas living in worse conditions. The prevalence of poverty in Eritrea is among the highest in the underdeveloped countries. Access to sanitation and clean water is unavailable to the majority of people. Despite the fact that two thirds of the population are dependent on international emergency food aid, the government imposes "extreme constraints" on humanitarian assistance to its poor people. Refugees Eritrea’s tyrannical policies have forced thousands of Eritrean people into exile, with hundreds of children and youth escaping forced conscription. There has been a very large flow of Eritrean refugees to neighbouring countries, particularly Sudan, whose border is close to Sawa army camp. Some of them fled due to political, ethnic and religious persecution or refusal to perform compulsory national service. Their treatment as asylum seekers in countries such as Sudan or Kenya is often poor and many have tried to reach other countries. Around one hundred thousand Eritrean refugees live under constant risks and in dire conditions of life in refugee camps in Tigray (Ethiopia). Thousands more are scattered in five continents of the world. More than 1,800 Eritrean refugees cross the border into eastern Sudan every month (UNHCR, 2020). During the first three months of 2020, some 9,436 Eritreans escaped to Ethiopia alone, a third of whom were children. Due to its accord with Eritrean regime, the Ethiopian government restricted its protection for Eritrean asylum seekers n January 2020. Israeli government has also continued to refuse refugee claims of around 32,000 Eritrean and Sudanese asylum seekers. Crimes against Humanity According to the UN Human Council’s report, “Eritrean officials have committed the acts of enslavement, imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, reprisals as other inhumane acts, persecution, rape and murder. Enslavement has been committed on an on-going, large-scale and methodical basis since no later than 2002. Imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, reprisals as other inhumane acts, and persecution have been committed on an on-going large-scale and methodical manner since 1991. Rape has been committed since 1991, and murder has been committed in a methodical manner since 1991.” (Human Rights Council, p. 46) Apart from military enslavement that was explained before, other major categories of crimes against humanity are being perpetrated in Eritrea. Following are some of these heinous crimes: Massive Discriminations The ongoing persecution of people in Eritrea due to their faith is a component of the general human rights violations. The four main “officially recognized” religions are: 1) The Eritrean Orthodox Church: 2) Sunni sect of Islam: 3) The Eritrean Catholic Church; 4) Evangelical (Lutheran) Church of Eritrea. The Orthodox Church and Islam have been rooted in the region since the fourth and seventh centuries respectively. Religion is under the strict control of the government. Religious organizations are required to register with the authorities and provide details of their membership and assets, including foreign contacts and foreign funding, on an ongoing basis. They must also provide the government with personal information about their members. Eritreans affiliated with “unrecognized” faiths have faced torture and detention and have often been forced to renounce their religion. Jehovah’s Witnesses became a target of active repression in 1994, as a result of their opposition to military service when it was introduced, and their non-participation in the 1993 independence referendum. The presidential order of October 1994 has practically denied members of the Jehovah’s Witness community their fundamental basic civil, political, economic and social rights. If we consider citizenship as a right to enjoy rights, Afwerki revoked all their rights: rights to access to government services, schools, hospitals, to have official identity cards that is indispensable for entering into business, commercial transaction, owning properties, registering births, marriages and deaths, applying for internal travel permits, exit visas, passports, etc. Muslims have not been free from persecution. During the first few years after independence in 1991, hundreds of Muslims were arbitrarily detained, some “disappeared” and other were extra-judicially executed, on suspicion of being linked to armed Islamists or oppositional groups. The government is still suspicious of Muslims from the western areas bordering Sudan. In November 2019, 21 Muslims were arrested in Mendafera and Adi Quala, including a local imam; the whereabouts of many remains unknown. In its 2017 religious freedom report, the U.S. State Department mentioned Eritrea a Country of Particular Concern (CPC). There are suspected Christian groups who languish in jail for years. The government has supported suppression of religious minority in friendly countries. In July 2019, for example, Eritrea joined 37 countries defending China's treatment of Muslim minority of Uighurs in the Xinjiang province of China. The regime has spared no efforts in perpetuating the minority discriminations. The Italian Eritrean (concentrated in Asmara) and Ethiopian Tigrayans are generally deprived of Ethiopian citizenship. Another group that is under tremendous discrimination is the Kunamea Minority Group. (Belloni, M., 2019, p. 59)) The regime suppressed and massacred them in 2007 and have used all sorts of stigmatization techniques against them since then. There is a deliberate policy of denying their cultural rights. (Tronvoll, K & Mekonnen, D.R., 2014, pp. 144-163) Almost all members of Kunama and Afar minority groups are suspected of treason. Afwerki’s regime was engaged in their systemic killings, arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances and raping women during 1998-2001. There is a report about the arbitrary arrest and enforced disappearance of at least 52 Kunama civilians in late 2015, and the forcible eviction and relocation of Afar civilians in 2015 and 2016. (Human Rights Council, p. 72) There has recently been border closures in coastal Danakali region, predominantly inhabited by Afar communities. The government has intercepted camels bringing basic foodstuff from Djibouti and Ethiopia for local Afar communities. Their boats have been confiscated and the Eritrean army has been involved in clearing local them off their land around Colluli since 2017. Eritrea has long criminalized consensual same-sex relationship. LGBT individuals “face legal and social discrimination due to the criminalization of homosexual conduct.” (Puddington, A., 2013, p. 241) The Eritrean 2015 penal code mandates imprisonment for five to seven years. Freedom of Movement Eritrean government has restricted freedom of movement of the citizens and has extended this to the military conscripts a former conscript told the Commission, “People cannot move as they want, they are just like prisoners.” (Human Rights Council, p. 53) Forced Labor Despite ratification of eight fundamental conventions of the International Labor Organization 2020, forced labor is rampant in Eritrea. Even young school children are not spared from this inhuman, abusive system. With hardly any attention to the quality of education, the government has forced unskilled youth to teach in schools. There is the extensive use of forced conscript labour in building roads, schools, clinics and office as well as in agriculture and civil services. Following is the testimony of a witness who was conscripted during 1998 to 2014: “After the [Ethiopian-Eritrean] war, I was not released although I asked for it many times. They said the war could start again at any time, you have to be on stand-by. I was sent to do agricultural work in Tsorona. The fields belong to my unit leader.” (Human Rights Council, p. 52) And here is the testimony of a conscript on a plantation in the mid-2000s: “Conditions [on the plantation] were harsh. The workers did not receive sufficient food. There were many diseases because of the poor nutrition and poor sanitation. Labourers were flogged and subjected to especially hard labour if they misbehaved, refused to work or disobeyed orders. Medical treatment is very basic and insufficient. Movement is severely restricted and commanders prevent conscripts from going anywhere even when they are sick. Workers are rarely allowed to go on leave. They are compelled to stay and work long hours.” (p. 53) February 2020, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Canadian mining company, Nevsun, charged with using conscript forced labor at its Bisha mine could be sued in Canada for human rights abuses in Eritrea. ImprisonmentImprisonment has always been used by Afwerki’s regime as a strategy of suppression. The prisoners of conscience include 11 former government ministers who were members of parliament and former EPLF leaders. They have been detained since September 2001 in a crackdown targeting people openly calling for democratic reforms and for the President’s resignation after the 1998-2000 war with Ethiopia. There have been continual fears for their safety as their whereabouts and conditions have not been disclosed by the government. They were publicly accused of treason but never charged. They include Haile Woldetensae, former Foreign Minister, Petros Solomon, former EPLF security head and later Foreign Minister, and Mahmoud Ahmed Sheriffo, former Vice-President. (Amnesty International, 2005, P. 19) The regime arrested scores of distinguished citizens, including government officials and journalists arrested in 2001, due to their calls for democratic reforms. Eritrean people are constantly fearful of imprisonment that is highly arbitrary without due process. People may be detained for trivial issues and languish in jails for years without trial and even knowing the reason for their imprisonment. According to a UN report: “… a witness who was detained in 2011 for asking his supervisor at a construction site why military conscript labourers had not been provided with safety equipment; the wife of a high-ranking member of the PFDJ remains in detention fourteen years after seeking a divorce from her husband; a tribal leader was detained in the past five years for asking why the Government was cutting down trees in his region.” (Human Rights Council, p. 60) Ms. Ciham Ali Abdu, the daughter of a former minister, was arrested at the age of fifteen and has been languishing in jail for more than seven years. The former minister of finance minister, Berhane Abrehe, was arrested in September 2018 and has remained incommunicado since then. The concept of habus corpus is alien to the Afwerki government. Prisoners’ whereabouts are not revealed to their dears and nears, sometimes learning about their fate following the return of their bodies. when a body is returned. Jails are overcrowded, suffocatingly hot in the daytime and freezing cold at night. There is lack of sanitation and scarcity of water. Children are detained with adults, and there is hardly any separate unit for women. Malnutrition and lack medical treatment are imposed on prisoners. Severity of torture and denial of medical treatment have led to death of some prisoners. Conditions in Wia and Gelalo military camps in eastern regions are specifically difficult due to intolerable desert heat. Thousand of political prisoners are held in indefinite and incommunicado detention with no charge or trial, some in secret detentions. Many people were “disappeared” following the independence, and many more have faced extra-judicially executions since then. Mr. Afwerki’s regime has shown no mercy for former EPLF veterans and members of the armed forces; civil servants, professionals and even asylum-seekers who are forcibly returned to Eritrea. (Amnesty International, 2005, p. 20) The condition of overcrowded jails has moved from bad to worse with the spread of Covid-19. Families are prevented from delivering food to their detained members. vital food parcels and sanitary products their families would have provided. The government has disregarded frequent request by international human rights activists to release unlawfully detainees in response to the pandemic. Torture Torture is used as an individual or collective punishment for the acts of others. A witness, for example, testified that “while in prison he met an 87-year-old woman who was detained because her son had fled the country. She was held for seven months and died a month after her release.” (p. 69) Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have reported notorious technique of torture in Eritrean jails and detention centre. Interrogators tie the prisoners up for a long time in a position named “helicopter” or in other positions. They are beaten severely by a trained group of military personnel or detained in solitary and suffocating dungeons. They use metal shipping containers to keep prisoners at Sawa army camp, Mai Serwa, Adi Abeto, Nakura prison on the Dahlak Kebir island, and other military camps. Following is the testimony of an eyewitness about the notorious techniques of torture in Eritrean jails: “Torture includes beating with whips, plastic tubes and electric sticks, standing [outside] on a very hot sunny day at noon, tying the hands and feet like the figure of eight, tying the hands and feet backwards, tying to trees, forcing the head down into a container with very cold water, beating the soles of the feet and the palms. In addition, the interrogator is allowed to use whatever fantasy comes to his mind…” (Human Rights Council, p. 66) Torture is being perpetrated by the so-called “trainers” against military conscripts. Following is the testimony of a trainer who escaped 2012: “We were told if you don’t apply pressure, they won’t do what you say. In one incident a trainer … tied up two people and left them in a tent. He tied them so tightly that we heard them screaming. Later, one was dead and the other’s hands were crippled. (P. 54) Torture in Eritrea has disproportionally been perpetrated against women. Perpetrators of torture and other heinous crimes of international nature enjoy total impunity. Torture is being systematically used against political prisoners and imprisoned religious minorities in an attempt to force them abandon their faith. Rape and Sexual Servitude There are reports about rape and sexual servitude by enforcement officials as a technique of torture and repression. (https://www.tbsnews.net/thoughts/eritrea-why-it-called-north-korea-africa-251047) According to a UN report: \ “… rape ‑ including as a form of torture – is predominantly inflicted on women. In addition to the physical injuries and other possible consequences such as loss of reproductive abilities, unwanted pregnancy and/or transmission of sexually transmitted disease such as HIV, ‘the mental pain and suffering inflicted on victims of rape and other forms of sexual violence is often long-lasting due, inter alia, to subsequent stigmatisation and isolation”. (Human Rights Council, p. 66) Eritrean women and girls are forcibly subjected to domestic servitude in military training camps and army. The high-ranking officers select girls personally and subject them to sexual enslavement. (p. 56) Enforced Disappearances The crime of enforced disappearances have been committed by the government since May 1991, against former fighters of the Eritrean Liberation Front, detained in 1992; Jehovah’s Witnesses detained in 1994; Muslim teachers in Keren detained in 1994; members of the Afar ethnic group, detained in 1998-1999; the G-15 political critics and journalists detained in 2001; Muslims detained for protesting the appointment of a Mufti in 2007; Djiboutian prisoners of war detained in 2008, and protesters at Forto, detained in 2013. Disappearance is being perpetrated against women who are “disproportionately at risk of sexual violence” and “are sometimes detained in isolation for months or years.” (p. 64) Murder and Extermination Intentional state-sponsored individual and mass extrajudicial executions have been perpetrated by the government since May 1991. This sordid anti-human weapon is used against disabled war veterans in July 1994 at Nefasit, around 150 Muslims at Keshet in June 1997, conscripts at Adi Abeito prison camp in 2004, and a mass killing at Wi’a training camp in 2006. The government’s order of shoot-to-kill Eritreans who attempt to cross borders is still in place. Conclusion
For the last 30 years, Mr. Afewerki has continued hypocritically to utilize Ethiopian hostilities in justifying his totalitarian rule. Yet, neither the July 2018 accord with the Ethiopian prime minister, Mr. Abiy Ahmed nor the December 2020 Algiers Peace Agreement between Ethiopia and Eritrea have relaxed his structural tyranny. On the contrary, he has committed war crimes and crimes against humanity along with the Ethiopian government in Tigray region. The occupying Eritrean forces have been involved massacre of civilian population, the crime of rape and killing and forcibly returning Eritrean refugees from refugee camps in Tigray. Despite being a State Party to some international human rights instruments, Eritrean government has hardly accepted human rights recommendations by UN bodies. It was an irony of our epoch that, Eritrea was elected as a member of the UN Human Rights Council for a two-year term (2019-20) in October 2018. With all intents and purposes, Eritrea is threatening peace and security of the family of nations and the very basic principles of African charter. Both the UN and AU should make the following interventions, before becomes too late:
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