| International community urged to address Eritrean detention policies |
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On the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the imprisonment of several writers, journalists and politicians in Eritrea, the European Union (EU) and the European Parliament (EP) have called on Eritrean President Isaias Afewerki to end his arbitrary detention policies against potential government opponents. Human-rights activists welcomed the strongly worded statements but pointed to the EU’s continuous lack of addressing the situation of Eritrean citizens, especially refugees. In its resolution of 14 September, the EP points to the “manifest lack of cooperation from the Eritrean authorities, despite repeated appeals by the European Union and international human rights organizations” and calls on the Eritrean regime to release those prisoners unconditionally - an appeal also made by EU High Representative Catherine Ashton on behalf of the EU. As an important provider of development aid and assistance to Eritrea, the EU should ensure that those funds do “not benefit the Government of Eritrea but is targeted strictly at the needs of the Eritrean people”, the EP stressed. The statements are to be welcomed but lack an important aspect, believes Professor Mirjam van Reisen, Director of Europe External Policy Advisors (EEPA) and member of the coordinating committee of Social Watch. “The European Union must recognise that Eritrean refugees are fleeing a fascist state. The European Union must allow their entry as asylum-seekers and must direct its aid resources to support the refugees in the entire North African region,” she said. Although held under “most dire circumstances” and risking their lives by crossing borders into neighbour countries, such as Ethiopia that issued an Eritrean shoot to kill policy, the international community continues to not recognise those people as refugees, van Reisen stressed. “An Eritrean today has no place to go and nowhere to hide”. Ten years after the detention of several newspaper editors, journalists as well as ministers and former generals, the international community seems to still not being aware of “the scale of the tragedy suffered by the Eritrean people”, warned Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Jean-François Julliard. “A complete absence of freedom of expression, constant surveillance of journalists, harassment of their families, enforced disappearances and secret detention in inhuman conditions” are omnipresent in a country that has been ranked last in the Reporters Without Borders international press freedom index for the past four years in a row, Julliard pointed out. One of the imprisoned journalists is Swedish-Eritrean writer Dawit Isaak whose brother has been continuously calling on the Eritrean regime to provide information on his whereabouts, without any success. In a speech held last week, the president of the European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek, expressed his hope “that Dawit Isaak is alive. That he will be free. That he will rejoin his family. That we will not have to observe another anniversary as this one.” Declaration by the High Representative Catherine Ashton on behalf of the European Union on political prisoners in Eritrea on the 10th anniversary of their detention: Council of the European Union (pdf) European Parliament resolution: European Parliament (pdf) Read more on this issue here: DigitalJournal.com Sources:  |
