Group focuses attention on terrible injustices being perpetrated in Eritrea

WINNIPEG – A seminar was held at Convocation Hall of the University of Winnipeg recently commemorating 20 years of detention of Eritrean prisoners of conscience.

The Eritrean-Canadian Human Rights Group of Manitoba sought to bring the many human rights violations being perpetrated on their home country to the attention of Winnipeggers.

A capacity audience filled the hall, including many Eritreans, but also many others, from the student and broader population.

The seminar was sponsored by the University of Winnipeg Global College, The Canadian Museum for Human Rights, The Menno Simmons College of University of Winnipeg, Amnesty International, the Manitoba Interfaith Immigration Council, CKUW Radio at the University of Winnipeg, and The League for Human Rights of B’nai Brith Canada.

The story of B’nai Brith’s involvement with the Eritreans is an interesting one.

Almost a year ago, a pro-government group meeting at the Masonic Temple included Sophia Tesfamariam, who was quoted as saying, “We got to be like Jews but don’t be evil like them; don’t blow up people; don’t do things that are evil, absolutely that is our job,” (http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/firebrand-speaker-triggers-ban-bid-122381158.html).

This was brought to B’nai Brith’s attention by a group of Eritrean refugees who recorded the speech. Since then, a dialogue has opened between B’nai Brith and the refugees and the local office became aware of the dire situation in Eritrea that has been virtually ignored by the international media.

The Eritrean-Canadian Human rights Group in Manitoba focuses its attention on the terrible injustices and human rights violations being perpetrated in their home country.

The group was founded in 2009 and advocates for the protection of human rights and democratic governance.

Since Sept. 18, 2001, the present Eritrean regime began its massive crackdown, much like the Stalinist purges of the Soviet Union. Victims have included high-level government officials including ministers, religious leaders, elders, journalists and other dissidents. The private press has been shut down. The regime officially embarked on the road to tyranny. Some 10 years later, the whereabouts of these victims are unknown. They have simply disappeared. In fact, according to Human Rights Watch, Eritrea is becoming a “giant prison” due to its government’s policies of mass detention, torture and prolonged military conscription and due to state repression, Eritreans also constitute one of the largest number of asylum seekers in the world, with those fleeing risking death or collective punishment against their families.

Belle Millo, co-chair of B’nai Brith’s (Midwest Region) Jewish-Christian Roundtable, served as host and moderator for the evening. Alan Yusim, B’nai Brith’s western regional director, read David Matas’s much appreciated opening remarks (Matas, well-known human rights advocate and senior counsel to B’nai Brith, had to be in Montreal):

“If we know nothing about Eritrea, we better learn and learn fast. The abuses Eritrea wreaks on its citizens run the risk of affecting us all. Human rights oppression is a spreading indelible stain. It never stops with today’s victims. Unless today’s victims are defended, we run the risk of becoming tomorrow’s victims.”

Two video persentations were shown – one showing an interview of current President Isaias Afwerki claiming, among other things, that there was no shortage of food in his country but rather that food shortages existed in the US and Europe. The second was a moving Skype conversation with a 14-year-old Eritrean girl who has not seen or heard from her parents in 12 years. Living in Boston, her family sought to protect her from the truth, and she discovered that they had been arrested by googling their names a few years ago.

Professor Mussie Tesfagiorgis, of the U of W history department, introduced keynote speaker, Dan Connell, one of the preeminent Western experts on Eritrea.

Connell began with a short history of the country. He followed this with a slideshow of his many visits to the country, beginning in 1976 and ending when President Afwerki invited him to leave in 2001.

A question-and-answer period followed Connell’s talk.

Yusim closed again with Matas’s words:

“Human rights belong to individuals, not states.  Leave human rights to states and human rights will wither. Individuals must assert human rights to keep those rights alive. Crimes against humanity are crimes against us all. When crimes against humanity are committed, we are all victims. We must not be silent in the face of our own victimization, when part of our human family suffers from grave abuses.”

{jcomments off}