Eritrea’s ambassador to the European Union, Girma Asmerom, was conspicuously absent. The Europe External Policy Advisors’ moderator had assured everyone that the invite was sent.
In an interview published in the September/October issue of the Courier ACP, the ambassador claimed his country to be the most stable in the whole of Africa. But his seat remained empty at the Brussels conference for the promotion of peace and human rights in Eritrea.
The Eritrean nation’s short legacy of attrition and torture could no longer simply be ignored. And yet, polemics and controversy hovered among the participants. The presence of ambassadors from Sudan, Djibouti and, of course, Ethiopia stirred sentiments among the Eritrean freedom fighters, one former US ambassador to Eritrea, Human Rights Watch and numerous civil society organizations and academics.
Two envoys from the European Commission were also there, sitting and waiting for the inevitable barrage of questions on why they would give 120 million euros in aid from the European Development Fund to a regime that has held its population hostage for nearly two decades, to a regime that explicitly uses forced labor.
Eritrea ranks last in the Reporters Without Borders press freedom index, worse than North Korea. This was the mix, and the crossed stares of disbelief and astonishing comments felt all the more surreal. Sitting in the back was Tsedal Yohannes, her eyes swollen with tears. Her presence cut straight through the statements of policy, the rhetoric and the palpable anger.
Source: Allafrica
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