The Horn of Africa is one of the most volatile places on Earth with recalcitrant Eritrea and militant Somalia considered diehard “spoilers” in a region marred with perennial conflicts and starvation.
Ten million people are hungry in the Horn of Africa and scores are dying every day; the worst drought- and famine-hit are people in areas controlled by Al Qaeda and Al Shabab, which Eritrea is accused of supporting. Staggering numbers of emaciated Somali women and children are flocking into make-shift feeding centers in neighboring Kenya and Ethiopia, which are themselves in need of food aid, along with Uganda and Djibouti.
There is a total North Korea-style of news blackout on the food situation in Eritrea, which is also a drought-prone country. The U.N. estimates that up to 75 percent of the Eritrean population is malnourished, caused by outdated communist-oriented economic and agricultural policies. Eritrean refugees entering the Sudan and Ethiopia speak of a nightmarish distribution system of meager food rations in the country.
Early this month, leaders of the frontline states confronting Somalia and Eritrea met in Addis Ababa not to discuss the plight of the famine and drought stricken millions, but to deal with the threat Eritrea is purportedly posing to the peace and security of the region. The frontline states, which are also members of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) believe Eritrea is still channeling arms and funds to terrorists and extremists fighting to topple the AU/UN backed government in Mogadishu.
Moreover, the African Union and the U.S. are worried by new developments of reported stepped up cooperation and coordination of activities between Al Shabab in Somalia and the Al Qaeda branch in Yemen.
While President Isaias Afewerki was wrapping up another state visit to Qatar on July 4, 2011 — the 4th trip in about a year — his IGAD counterparts from Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Somalia and Djibouti were drawing a communiqué urging the U.N. Security Council to slap a second round of harsher sanctions on Eritrea and linking it to the activities of the dreaded Al Qaeda and Al Shabab in Somalia.
The proposed sanctions will target revenues from Eritrea’s lucrative mining sector and will also ban the transfer of funds from government supporters in the Diaspora. Eritreans hoped money from mining would make their country one of the fastest growing economies in the world. Now the future is uncertain and the people can only blame President Isaias Afewerki’s archaic totalitarian rule.
But President Afewerki does not seem worried. The Eritrean leader did not bother to go to Addis Ababa on July 4 to face his government’s accusers and refute the destabilization charges at the IGAD heads of state conference, if he believed he was clean. He could have asked for a change of venue if he did not want to be in the Ethiopian capital.
Afewerki also refused to attend the ordinary African Union Summit in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea from June 28 – to July 1, 2011 where he could have defended his country’s interests.
Lack of proactive engagement is seen as indicative of the defenseless Eritrean position. It has merely been denying IGAD’s claim through reactive press releases coupled by massive mobilization of its Diaspora supporters to campaign against the sanctions. Proponents of the Eritrean government are acting out of what they believe is their patriotic obligation albeit without questioning the government’s laughable diplomatic performances over the years.
Afewerki’s irrational policies have turned the entire continent against his country. He seems to look at African Union and IGAD heads of state as a mindless bunch of opportunists and subservient tools of Ethiopian or US hidden agendas. It should not be surprising, especially to government supporters and opponents alike, why Africa is very disdainful and utterly unsympathetic to Eritrea’s legitimate yearning for a demarcated border with Ethiopia.
The U.N. Security Council is to start reviewing the need for additional sanctions on Friday. The Council’s determination will likely favor the position of IGAD as a regional organization whose member states say they are living under constant Al Qaeda and Al Shabab threats for supporting the Somali Government. President Omar Hassan Al Bashir of Sudan and Somali President Sheikh Ahmed want Eritrea punished. The other aggrieved frontline countries, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Djibouti, have large ethnic Somali populations within their boundaries where it is feared that Al Shabab could easily infiltrate and cause harm.
Summing up the concern of the 6-nation IGAD organization in the Ethiopian capital last week, Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki underscored what he described as the “destabilization activities in the region, associated with Eritrea,” adding: “This is a matter of serious concern and it is my hope that this Summit will focus some attention on it in view of the need for collective security and sustainable peace.”
Another IGAD member, Uganda, with over 7,000 of its peace keeping troops now in Somalia, also wants to see a weakened Isaias Afewerki in retaliation for Al Shabab’s bloody attack in Kampala last year killing 74 people. The attackers were allegedly trained in Eritrea.
The Security Council is likely to endorse IGAD’s decision for more sanctions on Eritrea on top of those imposed in December 2009 enforcing armed embargo, freezing assets of officials, and restricting their travel abroad. The question remains how tough and effective the new measures will be in disciplining and stopping Eritrea from allegedly undermining U.N. efforts to pacify Somalia.
Hopefully this time, the U.N. Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea will present to the public a convincing report on why the new measures against Eritrea are necessary. In the meantime, Eritrea can begin to show its willingness and ability to obey international laws by recognizing the U.N. and A.U. supported Somali government and by denouncing Al Shabab.
There is no guarantee this will stop the Security Council from imposing additional sanctions soon. But such a move may influence any idea of a possible third round of sanctions a year or two from now unless Eritrea drastically changes course.
Abraha is a CIA agent and he is agame,he
is a mouse from the wasted land
Micahel Abraha is a US and Ethiopian government funded mouth piece (read: agent). He is described as a journalist in the footnote however, his article is a self serving “personal opinion”, op-ed. He is also an Ethopian of Tigrean origin and not an Eritrean.
I read this article title “The Horn: Will More Sanctions Douse Eritrea Powderkeg” on this so called an investigative magazine. However I’m disappointed that you printed inaccurate information about Eritrea. I’m disappointment that you gave a Michael Abraham , the author, whom known to be anti Eritrean and work indirectly for the Ethiopian government an opportunity to slam my country Eritrea in your magazine. WE all knows that if you are doing an investigative work on OJ Simpson, you don’t send detective mark Furman to be the reporter. For the same token, Mr. Abraham is not the reporter or the person who will investigate the truth in behalf of the reader. If you investigate his previous articles it will explain Abraham bias against Eritrea. In the pretext of journalism, he is using your magazine to be use as propaganda machine for Ethiopian government to punish another black country-Eritrea . He claimed that Eritrea should be punishing for supporting Somalia insurgents. How can Eritrea a small country under a U.N sanction already, and has no borders with Somalia accuse of supporting Somalia. And if the IGAD members realy want to enforced peace in Somalia why they don’t ask the UN a total blockade on Somalia, not Eritrea. But the truth of the matter is that Ethiopia and its master America do not want total blockade on Somalia because that will exposed who really the regional destabilizer is. Eritrea despite the sanction will continue to show impressive developments. And unlike token development in Ethiopia where year after year the government in Addis stages false 9% growth, while every year you beg for food, In Eritrea the development is real and proven by the Economist. How can a country that is under sanction continues to show 17% economic growth is what driven the enemies to panic and take extreme measures.
to all eritrean enemies, the example of Libya has shown us that the patriotic Libyan due to their determination are close to defeating a so called NATO, a combined forces of 13 countries, In the same example Eritrean will prevail for what ever ethiopian and its masters advanturism.
Michael Abraha could have something against Eritrea, but what he wrote now is correct. I believe there should be more sanctions, even though I myself live in Asmara.
This “journalist” admits that the Monitoring Group’s previous report was not convincing (unable to substantiate its allegations), betraying his neutrality as a “journalist”m instead of calling for the lifting of the sanctions, he wants them to now present “evidence” that they didn’t have before…funny chap.
Eritrea is a sovereign nation and is not obligated by law or by principle to blindly follow others into a dark tunnel.I don’t see other countries being sanctioned for not recognizing the State of Israel, others for not recognizing Serbia and others fro not recognizing Kosovo, so why ask Eritrea to relinquish her sovereign rights which are protected under the UN Charter…
More sanctions to the tyrant please. Mater of fact as an Eritrean I accept any actions against our oppressors in Asmara!!! Finish all evil dictators!!!
Yeah I too support all efforts and actions that sanction this bloody tyrant Isaias Afwerki and his bootlickers too.
It is long over due that Isaias and his bootlickers get to taste their own medicine!
Is that the best you can do defending your Dictator Isaias Afecherki??
I mean Agame, CIA, Meles, Ethiopia, not Eritrean, blah blah… Is not good argument.
Your arguments are always pure hubris, meaning extreme pride or arrogance(inferiority complex).
indicating a loss of contact with reality.
The Ethiopian author Michael Abraha is a very funny character indeed. In his previous article he urged his genocidal leader Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia to withdraw his mercenary troops out of Eritrean territories they are illegally occupying, in order to force the government of Eritrea demobilize its army which will create a high rate of unemployment among the youth to trigger a Tunisian or an Egyptian-style of revolution in Eritrea.
I found that very hilarious, but coming from an Ethiopian author with HUGE inferiority complex towards Eritreans I was not surprised at all. I think you should dedicate your time worrying about how the next shipment of AID will get delivered in your country Ethiopia who is facing an epic famine of the 1984 proportion.
Mr Michael Abraha, FEED YOUR ETHIOPIAN PEOPLE !!!
We are the world… we are the children….
Too bad Michael Jackson is not around to feed your starving people this time.
An Ethiopian clown begging the world to sanction Eritrean citizens and the state. Then these fake facebook profiled Ethiopian agames rushed in here like cockroaches to support this lunatic Ethiopian warmonger.
Eritreans know the game, use an Ethiopian to write fake information about Eritrea, allow the Ethiopian to claim he is Eritrean to fool ignorant readers, then have random facebook fake accounts to support his own message. Clean, rinse, and repeat….a month from now, you’ll do the same thing…give it up, we love our country, we love being ERITREAN, we love our GOVERNMENT who fought for decades to bring independence for our people.
Go back to bashing your Ethiopian kin of Saleh Johar. Both of you are from Tigray, yet none of you speak of your starving nation called Ethiopia.
Hiiii Ethiopians untill you don`t give up being servants of USA your pain will never end, as you know we are Eritreans what ever tricks you try with your masters USA,NATO,ISRAEL, you are going to repeat your past history, we will give you what you deserve! better to leave being slaves all your time! your punisher Tserona
Let’s hope this sanction will cripple the monster in eritrea who has been creating havoc with all its neighbors for too long. Unlike, what his bloody maggots commenting here, such as the witch Sophia Tesfemariam above, who are barking just to cover their crimes, the eritrean people are already sanctioned by the monster in asmera and are languishing in the worst human suffering that the world ever seen. With more than half of the eritrean population now living in refugee camps around the world, the misery and damage caused by this dictator and his bloody supporters is unspeakable.
But the Libyan revolution be my witnesses, eritrea will be free soon not by the blood thirsty maggots like Sophia tesfamariam, but by the oppressed, abused, and tortured eritrean people who is waiting for the right moment.
I OPPOSED THE U.S SANCTION OVER ERI
WE ERI’S R NOT WORRIED ABT THAT WE FAGHT AGAINST BESIDE OUR GOVT.. TO AMERICA AND IT’S FABLOUSE FULOOK