Your Excellency,
May I congratulate you on your appointment as US Ambassador to the United Nations, and wish you success and accomplishment in your important role.
I write to you on behalf of Human Rights Concern – Eritrea, as the US holds the presidency at the Security Council this month and the Human Rights situation in Eritrea is worsening.
You will also be aware that the UN Commission of Inquiry into the human rights situation in Eritrea concluded its 2016 report with the statement that it had “reasonable grounds to believe that crimes against humanity, namely, enslavement, imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, other inhumane acts, persecution, rape and murder, have been committed in Eritrea since 1991”. It also recommended that “the Security Council refer the situation in Eritrea to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court for consideration…to prosecute or extradite any individual suspected of international crimes present on their territory”.
No action has been taken by the UN General Assembly in response to the request to submit the report of the Commission of Inquiry to relevant organs of the United Nations (such as the Security Council) for consideration and appropriate action. Nor has any action been taken by the Security Council on the recommendation of the Commission of Inquiry that Eritrea should be referred to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court for investigation of crimes against humanity.
Nothing has changed in Eritrea since the 2016 report of the Commission of Inquiry. The regime of Isaias Afewerki continues to commit the human rights violations identified by the Commission of Inquiry. None of these abuses have ended.
Indeed, the Eritrean people are suffering more than ever since severe lockdown measures were instituted to control Covid-19. The country is paralysed, and all productive activity has been stopped by a total ban on travel, even for work. The people are literally starving, yet no assistance is available from the authorities.
Instead, the country’s meagre resources are being squandered in costly military action. President Afewerki has now involved his country in a full-scale war in the Tigray region of Ethiopia. Many thousands of Eritrean troops, mechanised divisions, infantry and commando units, entered Tigray in early November 2020, and since then they have been fighting on all fronts alongside Ethiopian federal soldiers and allied forces.
The UN Commission of Inquiry identified crimes against humanity being committed within Eritrea in 2016. In 2021, the Eritrean regime is engaged in committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Tigray.
Civilians in different parts of Tigray have reported mass looting of property by Eritrean military, who have been seen slaughtering livestock and burning crops and factories. Amnesty international and Human Rights Watch have since published reports on extrajudicial executions of civilians, indiscriminate shelling and bombing, widespread looting and damage of public and private property, including hospitals. Eye-witnesses report Eritrean forces raping and “killing civilians, randomly shooting young people and murdering Tigrayan boys (some as young as 7-years-old)”. One witness counted 70 bodies of civilian Tigrayans slaughtered by the Eritrean military. These actions undoubtedly qualify as war crimes.
In 2020, the Tigray region hosted nearly 100,000 refugees, almost all of them from Eritrea. Eritrean soldiers have entered the refugee camps and shot dead several refugees. Over 20,000 refugees from Hitsats and Shimelba camps in Tigray have been abducted at gunpoint by Eritrean forces and forcibly returned to Eritrea. These actions undoubtedly qualify as grave crimes against humanity.
It is for these reasons that we are writing to you most urgently today. The world needs to know of the abuses being committed in both Eritrea and Tigray by the regime in Eritrea. It is vital that these war crimes are brought to the attention of all member states of the United Nations as a matter of urgency.
May we kindly request that the US as the current holder of the presidency moves urgently to place the criminal actions of the Eritrean government on the Security Council’s agenda, as originally recommended by the Commission of Inquiry?
Respectfully yours,
Elizabeth Chyrum
Director
Human Rights Concern – Eritrea (HRCE)
