Category: News

Eritrea Won’t Shorten National Service Despite Migration Fears

(reuters.com, Edmund Blair, Feb 25, 2016) Eritrea is not prepared to stop forcing its youth into lengthy stretches of work as soldiers and civil servants, a conscription policy that is driving waves of refugees to make the perilous trip across the Sahara desert and Mediterranean Sea…

Nevsun in Eritrea: Dealing With a Dictator

(thefifthestate.com, Mark Kelley, Feb 12, 2016) When a small Vancouver mining company struck gold in a remote corner of Africa, it started with so much promise. In remote Eritrea, Nevsun built a mine that was generating $700 million in profits in its first four years of…

Court Rules in Favour of Mirjam van Reisen

(bellaafrica.com, Reinhardt Jacobsen, Feb 10, 2016) A Court in Amsterdam struck down Meseret Bahlbi lawsuit against Mirjam van Reisen, Dutch professor and human rights advocate. The judge found that she was not guilty of libel and slander and that the youth party of the Eritrean government…

Israel’s Unwanted African Migrants

 (BBC NEWS, Kathy Harcombe, 3 February 2016) For nearly a year Israel has been offering African migrants cash and the chance to go and live in what is supposed to be a safe haven in a third country – but the BBC has spoken to two…

Eritrean activist reflects on Malta’s dark hour in 2002

(Times of Malta, Philip Leone-Ganado, November 13, 2015) Elsa Chyrum had never visited Malta before this week, but still, the country holds deeply unhappy memories. In 2002, the Eritrean human rights activist was one of the protagonists in one of Malta’s darkest moments: when 220 Eritrean refugees were…