ASMARA • Eritrea, where the private media was shut down in 2001, is the “largest jailer of journalists” in Africa, a press freedom group said yesterday.
The Vienna-based International Press Institute (IPI) called for pressure to be put on the Eritrean government to “release the imprisoned journalists whose only transgression was to have expressed their opinions.”
“Based on information provided to IPI, Eritrea is the largest jailer of journalists in Africa,” the statement claimed, without providing figures.
The arrests are a “tragedy not only for press freedom and freedom of expression in Eritrea, but also for the wider Horn of Africa,” the statement added. International rights groups and Western governments, notably the United States, regularly accuse Eritrea, a one-party state, of being one of the world’s most restrictive countries for the press.
Eritrean officials, who were not immediately available for comment, regularly dismiss such reports, accusing critics of lacking information to support their allegations.
In an interview posted on a government website, Yemane Gebremeskel, the director of Eritrean President Issaias Afeworki’s office, rejected the allegations made by media watchdogs. “I do not think we need a bill of health from bodies of dubious credibility,” Yemane said.
Yemane added that while “a free press is essential for a healthy society,” the country’s press was closed down due to foreign interference.
Eritrea is rated the world’s third-worst country in press freedom by the Paris-based media watchdog Reporters Without Borders, bettering only Turkmenistan and North Korea.
