Christians urge UN to maintain human rights highlight on Eritrea

Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) has joined 30 human rights organisations in calling for the UN Human Rights Council to increase the mandate of the Special Rapporteur for human rights in Eritrea.

The mandate was prolonged last yr and, in line with a letter signed by CSW, there was no fundamental change within the country since then.

It is believed that greater than 10,000 individuals are being held in arbitrary detention. Eleven have been held incommunicado for nearly 1 / 4 of a century after calling for democratic reforms.

Claire Denman, UN Officer for CSW, said, “That the federal government of Eritrea continues to go to great lengths to stop scrutiny of its human rights record is evidence of the positive impact of the work of the mandate of the special rapporteur.

“Without a continued highlight on the country, the regime can be further emboldened to commit gross violations, including crimes against humanity, with impunity, and the victims of those violations can be abandoned and unheard.”

In 2016 a UN Commission of Inquiry into human rights within the country found “reasonable grounds to consider” that crimes against humanity had been committed since 1991. The report said that Eritrean officials had been, and continued to be, involved in “enslavement, imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, other inhumane acts, persecution, rape, and murder”.

The letter calling for the UN to increase the mandate notes that since 2020 there was no progress in reaching certain standards across the rule of law, civil liberties, women’s rights and other key areas.

This, the letter argues, is a results of deliberate policy slightly than mere unlucky circumstances: “In a context during which Eritrea refuses to meaningfully cooperate with the Council and its mechanisms, and considering that the reason for serious violations within the country is political in nature, slightly than merely attributable to an absence of capability or resources, the supply of technical assistance and capacity-building would presently be neither efficient nor adequate to deal with the country’s challenges.”

Ms Denman added, “We urge Member States to not be misled by the Eritrean government’s efforts to color a false picture of progress, and to as a substitute support a powerful resolution that extends the mandate of the special rapporteur, assisting the mandate holder each time requested.”