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Amnesty International Report 2007
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ERITREA
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Head of
state and government: Issayas Afewerki
Death penalty: retentionist
International Criminal Court: signed
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Several thousand prisoners of
conscience were detained
incommunicado without charge or
trial. Some former government
leaders were held in a secret place
of detention. The whereabouts of
many political or religious
prisoners, including journalists,
were not known. Many were in effect
victims of enforced disappearance.
An army general remained held after
14 years, and three religious
prisoners were still held after 12
years. Many detainees were tortured.
Prison conditions, including being
held in underground cells or metal
shipping containers, amounted to
cruel, inhuman and degrading
treatment. Virtually no medical
treatment was provided.
Background
Two
thirds of the population were dependent
on international emergency food aid. The
government expelled several
international NGOs delivering
humanitarian assistance. Donors
continued emergency humanitarian
assistance but most had long suspended
development aid because of the
government's failure to implement both
the constitutional process of
democratization and international human
rights treaties it had ratified.
As in
previous years, human rights defenders
were not allowed to operate and
independent civil society organizations
and unregistered faith groups were
prohibited. The only political party
allowed was the ruling People's Front
for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ),
formerly the Eritrean People's
Liberation Front (EPLF). No dissent was
tolerated.
The UN
Security Council extended until January
2007 the UN Mission in Ethiopia and
Eritrea (UNMEE) but criticized the
stalemate in the negotiations over the
border. Eritrea continued to demand that
Ethiopia implement the International
Boundary Commission's judgement
following the 1998-2000 armed conflict
and refused any negotiation on border
demarcation. The UN Security Council
criticized Eritrea's increasing
restrictions on UNMEE's movements in the
temporary security zone it administers
on the Eritrean side of the border, and
the arrests of several UNMEE personnel
during 2006. It also criticized the
incommunicado detention without charge
or trial of an international UNMEE staff
member, held for some weeks on
reportedly false charges of trafficking.
The
government continued to host armed
Ethiopian and Sudanese opposition
groups. It sent military assistance and
weapons to the Union of Islamic Courts
in Somalia, according to a UN panel
monitoring violations of the Somalia
arms embargo. It faced the threat of
armed opposition from the Sudan-based
Eritrean Democratic Alliance, which
Ethiopia also supported.
Religious persecution
Minority
faith groups such as the Jehovah's
Witnesses and over 35 evangelical
Christian churches remained banned,
their places of worship shut down and
religious gatherings prohibited. Only
the four main faiths in Eritrea were
allowed to function - the Eritrean
Orthodox Church, the Catholic Church,
the Lutheran (Mekane Yesus) Church and
Islam. Dissenting groups within them
were also repressed as were those who
opposed government authority over them.
Patriarch Antonios, head of the Eritrean
Orthodox Church, was stripped of his
powers in mid-2005 and has been held
under house arrest since then for
protesting at the 2004 detention of
three Orthodox priests and secret prison
sentences imposed on them.
Dozens
of members of these banned churches were
arrested during the year for worshipping
at their homes, at weddings, or when
proclaiming their faith to others. They
were taken to police stations, security
prisons or army camps, and often
tortured or threatened to make them sign
a statement as a condition of release
that they would cease practising their
faith. They were held incommunicado and
illegally, without being brought before
a court or charged with any offence.
National service conscripts were also
punished if they practised their faith.
An
estimated 2,000 members of minority
evangelical churches, including some 20
pastors, remained in detention in harsh
conditions. They included children and
women. At least 237 people were arrested
during 2006, fewer than in 2005,
possibly because of the vigorous
international criticism of religious
persecution. Most prisoners were held in
remote army camps in underground cells
or metal shipping containers. None had
been allowed access to their families
since their arrest. The pastors were
mostly held together in Karchele
security prison in Asmara.
• Helen
Berhane, a well-known gospel singer in
the evangelical Rema Church, was
released in November after being
detained in Mai Serwa army camp where
she had been held since May 2004. The
previous month she had been taken to
hospital in Asmara in extremely poor
health after being tortured again.
Three
Jehovah's Witnesses remained held
incommunicado at Sawa military camp near
the Sudan border since 1994, when the
government stripped all Jehovah's
Witnesses of basic citizens' rights for
refusing to bear arms or perform
military service. Jehovah's Witnesses
were arrested during the year, bringing
to 27 the number held without charge or
trial.
Prisoners of conscience and political
prisoners
Eleven
former government ministers and former
EPLF leaders remained in indefinite
secret detention without charge or trial
as prisoners of conscience following the
September 2001 crackdown on dissent.
Their whereabouts in detention had never
been disclosed by the government or
confirmed by other sources. There were
fears for their safety after new claims
in 2006 that General Ogba Abraha and
possibly others held secretly with them
had died in detention in the intervening
years through illness and denial of
adequate medical treatment. The
government did not reply to appeals to
clarify their fate or whereabouts or
allow independent access to them. They
had in effect become victims of enforced
disappearance. They included former
Vice-President Mahmoud Ahmed Sheriffo
and his former wife Aster Fissehatsion,
and former Foreign Ministers Haile
Woldetensae and Petros Solomon.
Hundreds
of other prisoners of conscience
arrested at the same time or later, who
were alleged to have opposed the
government, remained in detention
incommunicado and without charge or
trial. The whereabouts of many of them
were not known. Several asylum-seekers
forcibly returned from Malta in 2002 and
Libya in 2003 were still detained.
• Aster
Yohannes, Petros Solomon's wife and a
former PFDJ central committee member,
remained in incommunicado detention
since 2003 when she returned from the
USA to be with her children, whom she
has not been allowed to see.
Journalists
Nine
journalists working for the state media
were detained in November. One was
released but by the end of 2006 eight
continued to be held without charge or
trial in the capital, Asmara.
Ten
journalists working in the private media
arrested in the 2001 crackdown on
dissent and one working in the state
media arrested in 2002 were still
detained incommunicado without charge or
trial. Some were held in the Karchele
security prison in Asmara but the
whereabouts of the others were not
known. All private media remained banned
since 2001.
Military conscription
National
service, comprising military service and
development service such as
road-building and construction work,
remained compulsory and extended
indefinitely for all men aged between 18
and 40, although women were reportedly
allowed to leave at the age of 27.
Conscript reserve duties extended to the
age of 50 and former EPLF veterans were
also subject to recall. Some conscripts
were permitted to perform their service
in civilian government employment but
under military conditions.
The
internationally recognized right of
conscientious objection was denied. This
applied particularly to Jehovah's
Witnesses who refused military service
(though not development service) on
faith grounds.
The
authorities instituted harsh measures to
counter the widespread evasion of
military service and desertion by
thousands of conscripts. Police searches
and round-ups were carried out, and
hundreds of parents suspected of
involvement with their children's
evasion or desertion were detained, some
possibly indefinitely. They were
released only on payment of a large
financial bond for the missing conscript
to surrender.
Rule
of law
The few
functioning courts failed to protect the
constitutional rights not to be tortured
or arbitrarily detained. Special Courts
handed down prison sentences in secret
summary trials for corruption and
political offences where the accused had
no right to legal defence representation
or appeal. Secret administrative
security committees reportedly imposed
prison sentences without any semblance
of trial.
Military
courts were not functioning. Military
conscripts accused of a military offence
such as desertion, attempted desertion
or being absent without permission were
arbitrarily imprisoned or punished with
torture, or possibly executed in the
most serious cases, on the order of
their military commander.
Torture and ill-treatment
Suspected government opponents and
alleged supporters of exile opposition
groups were tortured in security or
military custody. Religious prisoners
were tortured to force them to abandon
their faith. Torture was also a
long-established punishment for civilian
prisoners held in army or security
custody and conscripts accused of
military offences. Methods included
being tied in painful positions for
hours or days, particularly that known
as "helicopter", and beatings.
Religious and political prisoners were
held in harsh conditions amounting to
cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.
Many were held in metal shipping
containers which were overcrowded,
lacked sanitary facilities and were
subject to extreme temperatures. Medical
treatment was virtually non-existent and
prisoners were only taken to hospital
when they were almost dying. General
Bitwoded Abraha, detained almost
continually since 1992 in Karchele
security prison in Asmara, suffered
mental illness for years due to poor
prison conditions but has received no
medical or psychiatric treatment. Aster
Yohannes was also in poor health in the
same prison without adequate medical
treatment.
Statements
•
Eritrea: Independence Day call for a
year of urgent human rights improvements
(AI Index: AFR 64/004/2006)
•
Eritrea: Five years on, members of
parliament and journalists remain in
secret detention without trial (AI
Index: AFR 64/009/2006)
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