Europe must allow Eritrean asylum-seekers

Eritrean refugees in a demonstration
(Photo: EEPA)

Sources: IDN-InDepthNewsEEPA

The European Union (EU) and the European Parliament censured the Eritrean President Isaias Afewerki for sending independent journalists and "thousands of Eritreans" to jail, and urged the African Union to exert pressure on the government to free prisoners. “Europe finally condemns Eritrea; but does it do anything to support the Eritreans?” asked Professor Mirjam van Reisen, founder and director of Brussels-based Europe External Policy Advisors (EEPA).

While welcoming the Brussels declarations, van Reisen, a professor at Tilburg University in the Netherlands, said that the bloc had failed to "articulate what Europe’s responsibility is in order to give a home to Eritrean refugees".

"The European Union must recognise that Eritrean refugees are fleeing a fascist state. The European Union must allow their entry as asylum-seekers and must direct its aid resources to support the refugees in the entire North African region," wrote van Reisen, a member of the coordinating committee of Social Watch, in a statement.

The total allocation (2009-2013) foreseen for Eritrea to address the country's priorities amounts to €122 million for the period 2009 to 2013. An additional €7.26 million is set aside for unforeseen needs, noted journalist Jaya Ramachandran in a report for In Depth News (IDN).

Van Reisen’s statement reads as follows:

The end of a love-affair between Europe and Eritrea: what next?

The European Union adopted this week a position on Eritrea, the country strategically located on the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway from Europe to the East.

In this resolution the European Union deplored the Human Rights situation in the country and the continuous imprisonment of journalist Dawit Isaac, alongside many other political prisoners.

It is significant that a Member of the European Parliament, Louis Michel, voted in favour of the resolution, given that it strongly critiques the policy that Michel himself, when he was Commissioner of the European Commission, put in place.

This policy was hoping that aid would convince the Eritrean government to do concessions on human rights and the release of the prisoners. While then Commissioner Louis Michel provided the aid, the Eritrean government released not one political prisoner and nor did it improve its repressive regime. It is an illustration of the reality that manipulating the use of aid for foreign strategic purposes does not work.

The resolution urges the EU to stop providing aid to the Eritrean government but to support Eritreans.

These Eritreans are no longer in Eritrea which has become an open air prison.

Where do we find Eritreans?

There are many refugees held under most dire circumstances chained by human traffickers in the Sinai desert. There are refugees today on hunger strike in Yemen and tear-gassed by the Yemeni police while the UNHCR is not recognising them as refugees. There are Eritreans who have crossed to Ethiopia, despite an Eritrean shoot to kill policy at the border. There are Eritreans stuck in Sudan and Egypt, while the Sudanese and Egyptian governments refuse to give them travel papers and arrange their deportation back to Eritrea - against their will. There are Eritreans hiding in Tripoli, and Eritreans surviving in atrocious conditions in Israel. An Eritrean today has no place to go and nowhere to hide.

While the resolution is welcome, it failed to articulate what Europe’s responsibility is in order to give a home to these refugees.

The European Union must recognise that Eritrean refugees are fleeing a fascist state. The European Union must allow their entry as asylum-seekers and must direct its aid resources to support the refugees in the entire North African region.

Europe finally condemns Eritrea; but does it do anything to support the Eritreans?

Louis Michel asks today that the aid he approved for the Eritrean government is stopped. Will he also argue that the European Union must support the refugees that have fled the country in the meantime and have nowhere to go?

Prof. Mirjam van Reisen, Tilburg University 16 September 2011