Rights watchdog urges Eritrea to release ‘prisoners of conscience’
NAIROBI, May 19 (AFP) — Amnesty International (AI) on Wednesday urged Eritrea to free all political prisoners and take steps to improve its human rights record, ahead of its 11th independence anniversary next week.
“Since the crackdown two-and-a-half years ago on peaceful dissent and calls for democratic reform, torture, arbitrary detentions, ‘disappearences’ and ill-treatment of political prisoners have become entretched in Eritrea,” said an AI statement announcing the release of a report entitled “Eritrea: You Have No Right to Ask.”
The statement called on Asmara “to release all prisoners of conscience, take steps to eradicate the use of torture, bring all prisoners within a proper system of impartial justice and humane treatment in custody” as well as extending the freedom of press, expression and religion.
In October 2001, the government detained 11 former government officials and eight journalists it accused of plotting to oust President Issaias Afeworki. Eight private newspapers were also closed down.
Eritrea, Africa’s youngest state and one of its smallest, which has been ruled by Afeworki since its official inception in 1993, has been subject to a blistering litany of condemnation from various organisations.
The US State Department’s human rights report for 2002, for example, notes that the government “continued to commit serious abuses” and that presidential elections have never been held in the one-party state.
“The government’s refusal to openness and accountability about its human rights practices is contrary to human rights safeguards in the Eritrean constitution and laws and the international human rights treaties Eritrea has ratified,” the AI statement added.
“None of the prisoners (of conscience) has been charged with any offence or presented in court. They have not been seen by their families … and the authorities have refused to say where they are detained or how they are treated. Thousands of other political detainees are also virtually ‘disappeared’,” it said.
AI also urged the international community to provide full protection to refugees escaping compulsory military service, torture, religious persecution, repression of peaceful political dissent as well as suspicion of support for armed opposition groups.