Credit: wikipedia public domain /  Ilhan Abdullahi Omar,  (D)   Congressional Representative from Minnesota.

By Gary Raynaldo    DIPLOMATIC  TIMES

Rep. Ilhan Omar, Democrat of Minnesota, joined the first U.S. Congressional visit to Horn of Africa nation Eritrea in 14 years last week.  Charge d’Affaires Natalie E. Brown welcomed the Congressional  delegation  led by Congresswoman Karen Bass, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations.  She was joined by freshmen Congress members Joe Neguse  (D-Colorado)  and Omar. They met with Eritrean officials, members of the diplomatic community and young Eritreans, as well as toured the sites of Asmara.

Credit: USembassy.gov /    COM Natalie E. Brown, Rep. Ilhan Omar, MOI. Yemane Ghebremeskel, Rep. Karen Bass and Rep. Joe Neguse  in Asmara,  the capital city of Eritrea, Mar. 4, 2019. 

Washington Seeks Closer Ties With Eritrea After Historic Peace Agreement with Ethiopia  Last  Year

Credit: Wikipedia / Ethiopia Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Eritrea President Isaias Afewerki sign  Joint Declaration of Peace and Friendship between the two Horn of Africa nations on 9 July 2018 in the Eritrean capital city Asmara.

The President of Eritrea Isaias Afewerki, and the Prime Minister of Ethiopia Abiy Ahmed, signed a historic joint Declaration of Peace and Friendship July 9, 2018 ending the 20-year conflict between their two states. The United Nations Security Council  last November lifted a range of international sanctions imposed against Eritrea nearly a decade ago.  The summit between Eritrean President Afewerki and Ethiopian Prime Minister Ahmed in the Eritrean capital, Asmara, on July 9 marked the first time that the neighbors’ heads of state have met in nearly two decades. Two weeks later, Ethiopia appointed an ambassador to Eritrea for the first time in 20 years. Eritrean President Afwerki then reopened his country’s embassy in Ethiopia.   Next, Ethiopian Airlines flights resumed commercial services to link Asmara and Addis Ababa  after two decades. Once a province of Ethiopia, Eritrea voted to leave in 1993 after a bloody, decades-long independence struggle. Ethiopia and Eritrea expelled each others’ envoys at the start of a 1998-2000 border war that killed nearly 1000,000 people. Relations remained frozen after Ethiopia declined to accept a 2002 United Nations-backed border demarcation, leading to years of conflict between the two countries.

credit: erusembassy.gov /   U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Tibor Nagy visited Eritrea with President Isaias Afwerki, government ministers, and other officials December 3-5, 2018.  Meetings focused on developments in the region and ways to strengthen U.S.-Eritrean relation.

According to Congresswoman Bass,  the goal of the visit was to support regional peace and security in the Horn of Africa and to encourage countries to place human rights at the center of the reforms.  “It was important our first Congressional Delegation trip of this Congress be to the Horn of Africa because of the change the region is going through following the historic peace agreement between Ethiopia and Eritrea that ended 20 years of conflict,”  Bass said in a statement following the historic visit .

Congresswoman Omar, the Somali-American congresswoman from Minneapolis, has been in the headlines lately for calling out “Israel’s influence” on US foreign policy and for her grilling of Donald Trump’s Venezuela envoy,  Elliot Abrams, during a foreign committee meeting. 

“I was impressed with the regional thaw in East Africa after Eritrea and Ethiopia made peace. As a member of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, my focus has been on peace and human rights and shifting our focus on humanitarian aid to developmental aid. It was a great honor to join Chairwoman Bass for the first official CODEL to the Horn of Africa. America has been supportive of Prime Minister Abiy’s reform agenda, and I believe we must use this opportunity to foster prosperity in the region and make investments that will fundamentally transform our relationship with the region.”

Congressional Rep.  Omar,  D-Minn said, after the visit. 

Concerns Over  Eritrea’s Dire Human Rights Record And Repression Despite Historic Peace Agreement.

“Despite these changes, there was no sign of Eritrea ending its severe repression of basic rights. For two decades, President Isaias Afewerki used the absence of peace with Ethiopia to justify authoritarianism. Forced conscription into “national service” was prolonged indefinitely despite a decree limiting service to 18 months. Political opponents—anyone who questions Isaias’ rule—are jailed infinitely without trial, often incommunicado.  Independent media is prohibited, and journalists imprisoned.

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH 

“Two week before the Eritrea-Ethiopia declaration, the United Nations Human Rights Council lamented the government’s “systematic, widespread and gross human rights violations” committed “in a climate of generalized impunity.”  Among the abuses were “arbitrary detention, enforced disappearances, torture and sexual violence and forced labor,” as described in the latest report of the council’s special rapporteur on Eritrea. Symptomatic of the government’s approach to critics was its foreign minister’s diatribe that the rapporteur was “morally bankrupt” and “willfully distort[ed] reality” to further a “wicked agenda.”

Human Rights Watch

Amnesty International Called On U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Tibor Nagy To Press Eritrea Government On Dire Human Rights Record, in recent visit.

What Is Next For Ethiopia And Eritrea Now That  Relations Have Been Restored?

“It is not entirely clear what it means right now. Events have unfolded at breakneck speed, and it appears that many of the details have yet to be determined. What the leaders of both Eritrea and Ethiopia have jointly stated is that a full normalization of relations will occur, and in the short term that will involve opening the border, giving Ethiopia access to the ports, reopening the embassies that have been shuttered since 1998, and resuming flights between the capitals. People will apparently be able to cross the border at will—and no mention has been made of any tariffs on goods,”   Bronwyn Bruton, director of programs and studies and deputy director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center.