The human rights situation in Eritrea had shown no sign of improvement since the country made peace with Ethiopia in July 2018, the United Nations special rapporteur on Eritrea, Daniela Kravetz, said on 2 July 2019, Al Jazeera reported. “The dividends of peace are not yet benefiting ordinary Eritreans, nor are there any signs to suggest they will,” she said.
“Eritrean authorities remain unwilling to tolerate any expression of dissent,” Kravetz said, adding that “hundreds continue to flee the country every month.” Eritrea’s representative at the United Nations called her report “unacceptable” and said “the overriding objective of [her] mandate was to vilify, isolate and destabilise” his country.
Kravetz said she had received “troubling” reports of Christians, including women and children, being arrested at prayer gatherings in and around Asmara, and of five Orthodox priests detained at the Debre Bizen monastery. In mid-June, she said, the authorities “seized all health facilities managed by the Catholic Church in the country,” 21 clinics and health centers that served rural communities, citing a 1995 rule that bars religious bodies from development work. The move came weeks after the Catholic Church called for dialogue and reforms to stop people leaving.
Muslims were also imprisoned, she said, citing the case of Said Mohammed, a man in his 30s who died on 13 June from “mistreatment in prison and lack of proper medical attention.” She said open-ended military service “remains one of the main drivers of migration from Eritrea” and urged the government to limit it to 18 months.
President Isaias Afwerki has ruled Eritrea since 1993. Hundreds of thousands of Eritreans have fled in recent years, many crossing the Mediterranean to Europe.
Sources: Al Jazeera