On this day, 18 September, we mark 23 years since Eritrea’s government arrested the G11 reformists, eleven senior government officials who had called for democratic reforms, and shut down all independent newspapers in the country.
The G11 were eleven senior government officials, including former ministers, ambassadors, and military leaders, who in 2001 publicly called on President Isaias Afwerki to implement Eritrea’s ratified constitution, allow democratic reforms, and uphold the rule of law. On 18 September 2001, they were arrested without charge or trial and have been held incommunicado ever since. Several are believed to have died in detention, but their fate and whereabouts remain unknown.
On 18 September 2001, the Eritrean government shut down all independent media outlets, and in the following days and weeks, eighteen independent media journalists and editors were arrested, including Dawit Isaak, a Swedish-Eritrean journalist with dual nationality, who has been held incommunicado without charge or trial since 2001.
Since that fateful day in 2001, Eritrea has descended into a state of total dictatorship. The hope of Eritreans for democracy, rule of law, freedom, and development was brutally crushed. Independent media remains banned, civil society silenced, and political dissent criminalized.
Over 10,000 prisoners of conscience are believed to be held across more than 350 substandard detention facilities, including underground cells and metal shipping containers. Detainees are subjected to enforced disappearance, torture, and inhuman conditions, without charge, trial, or access to lawyers or families.
The following key decisions of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) made clear determinations:
Liesbeth Zegveld & Mussie Ephrem v. Eritrea (Communication No. 250/2002) Decided in 2003, this case concerned the detention of the G11 reformists. The Commission found Eritrea in violation of Articles 2, 6, 7(1), and 9(2) of the African Charter, ruled their detention unlawful, and urged their immediate release and compensation.
Article 19 v. Eritrea (Communication No. 275/2003) This case concerned the detention of eighteen journalists arrested in September 2001. The Commission held that Eritrea violated numerous provisions of the Charter, urged it to release them or bring them to a fair trial, lift the ban on private media, grant legal access, and provide compensation.
Dawit Isaak v. Eritrea (Communication No. 428/12) Decided in 2018, the Commission reaffirmed its earlier rulings and again urged Eritrea to release or try Dawit Isaak and his colleagues, lift the press ban, allow legal and family access, and provide compensation
In all three decisions, the victims were found innocent of any wrongdoing, and the Commission ordered that they be released and compensated. Eritrea has not complied with any of these binding decisions. There is no independent judiciary or effective local remedy in the country.
The UN Commission oof Inquiry on Human Rights in Eritrea’s 2016 report, likewise found that Eritrean authorities have committed crimes against humanity, including enslavement, imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, persecution, rape, and murder since 1991.
“Today, we remember the disappeared. We stand with their families and with the people of Eritrea in their struggle for justice, freedom, and dignity.”
In Eritrea, all fundamental rights are crushed and systematically violated, and every citizen lives under repression, fear, and suffering.
We call on the African Union, the United Nations, and the international community to:
- Demand the immediate and unconditional release of all prisoners of conscience in Eritrea.
- Hold Eritrean officials accountable for crimes against humanity and for defying the African Commission’s rulings.
- Urge the Eritrean government to implement the ratified 1997 Constitution and establish an independent judiciary and rule of law.
- Press the Eritrean government to end indefinite national service, forced conscription, and other forms of arbitrary detention and collective punishment.
Twenty-three years is too long. Silence is complicity.
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Human Rights Concern – Eritrea (HRCE)
