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From: Eritrean-SMART US Media Center (mediacenter_us@eritrean-smart.org)
Date: Wed Jul 20 2011 - 22:48:15 EDT
OEA Statement
Released July 17, 2011
Royce’s ill-advised campaign against a young African nation continues
The Organization of Eritrean Americans (OEA) once again expresses profound
dismay by Republican Congressman Ed Royce’s continued ill-advised campaign
against the young African nation of Eritrea based on groundless charges
fabricated, orchestrated and pushed by the Red Sea nation’s traditional
enemy to the south, Ethiopia.
Speaking at a hearing on Somalia sponsored by two House Foreign Affairs
subcommittees—subcommittee on Africa, Global Health and Human Rights, and
the subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade--on July 7,
2011, Congressman Royce repeated all the baseless charges he has been
throwing at Eritrea for several years now in a misguided attempt to have
this African nation designed as a state sponsor of terrorism.
In fact, this has come to look like a summer ritual. In June 2009, he
introduced an amendment to a Houses bill seeking such a designation;
however, the United States House of Representatives overwhelmingly
rejected the effort. Then last summer, he sent a letter to US Secretary
of State Hilary Clinton in yet another attempt to tar Eritrea with such a
label, claiming Eritrea supported insurgents in Somalia.
We would like to think that the Congressman is uninformed or misinformed
about the facts on the ground in the Horn of Africa in general and Eritrea
in particular. Otherwise, it is preposterous to try to link Eritrea to
terrorism. For example, last year he continued to advance his campaign at
a time when the world, from the UN Secretary General on down, was
commending Eritrea’s peaceful efforts in the region; he continued his
decade-old effort to tar this young African nation which is trying to
recover from 40-years of war with Ethiopia. Last year, Eritrea and
Djibouti signed a peace agreement negotiated by the Government of Qatar to
resolve their border dispute. Other organizations praising Eritrea’s
actions to bring about stability in the region were the European Union and
the African Union.
Congressman Royce is probably uninformed about the critical role Eritrea
has been playing to help stabilize the situation in Darfur, Sudan. Just
this week, as a result of Eritrea’s effort, the Sudanese Government and
Movement for Freedom and Justice of Darfur signed an agreement in Doha.
Eritrea was highly commended for its efforts in bringing the two sides
together and its overall contributions in trying to stabilize the troubled
Horn of Africa region of Africa.
In general, his is a campaign that fails to distinguish between those who
fight against terrorism and those who sponsor or support it. This young
African nation has been fighting terrorism since long before September 11,
2001—since the mid 1990s when bin Laden set up shop in neighboring Sudan.
Eritrea was in fact his first target. It is still fighting against two of
al Qaeda’s cells that bin Laden created in the 1990s—the Eritrean Jihad
Movement and the Eritrean Islamic Salvation Movement—that Ethiopia has
been coddling as part of the so-called alliance it finances and trains to
destabilize Eritrea.
Again, we urge Mr. Royce to travel to the region to see for himself the
complex issues that define this volatile part of Africa and, most
importantly, to devise ways to bring about peace in this strategic region
at the southern flank of the Middle East. The OEA, which has been
diligently working to build US-Eritrea relations, welcomes the
opportunity to work with Mr. Royce to further enhance the friendship of
the two nations and thereby bring peace and stability for the Horn of
Africa region.
A sound US policy for the Horn of Africa requires a thorough understanding
of the complexity of the issues that define the crises that engulf the
region. The OEA believes that a short-sighted policy for the Horn is
likely to jeopardize long-term U.S. interests in the region, and even the
rest of the continent.
Organization of Eritrean Americans (OEA)
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