Editorials
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Milano Hosts Lively Symposium on Current Situation in Eritrea By S. Habtezghi, Milano, Italia
Organized by the ‘Comitato Italiano per un Eritrea Democratica’, the public symposium was addressed by guest speakers as well as representatives of various Italian personalities, including trade union leaders, party members and great Italian journalists who followed up the Eritrean liberation struggle for many decades.
The symposium was opened by Mr. Marco Betti, chairman of the Italian Committee for a Democratic Eritrea, locally known by the Italian founders as ‘Mossob’ (to mean food for thought, unity of the Eritrean family in equality and prosperity). In his lengthy statement, Mr. Betti eloquently outlined the noble aims of the Eritrean liberation struggle for freedom, peace, prosperity, equality and justice in a democratic country but that all the great expectations were betrayed by the current regime. He said he and many of his colleagues in the meeting were Italian democrats who knew and supported the Eritrean people’s struggle for many years but that they are all disappointed today of what had happened in Eritrea during the past 14 years.
Mr. Betti concluded by announcing that a statement of the symposium will be read at the end of the meeting for adoption and signature by meeting participants. He then introduced three guest speakers who were: Mr. Woldeyesus Ammar, member of the Revolutionary Council of the ELF-RC, Mr. Mussie Ephrem, human rights activist who was recently named as member of the Central Council of the Eritrean Democratic Party, and Mr. Kidane Michael Hasama, Chairman of the Association of Eritrean Migrants in Italy.
The discussion session that followed the presentations also turned out to be highly fruitful with heated debate by various participants, among them a dozen members of the ruling dictatorial party. Old members of the EPLF expressed their deep disappointment with the failed pledges of their fighting front that were derailed by Isaias Afworki’s PFDJ and youth who arrived in Italy recently through the Sahara Desert told their plight and the ongoing suffering of the people under the regime. On the other hand, representatives of the regime expressed their frustrations and anger with loud shouts about “this talk of traitors” and accused the Italian solidarity committee members in the meeting of betrayal and charged the Italian journalists in the meeting as “messengers of lies”.
Dr. Massimo Alberizzi, and old friend of Eritrea and journalist with the biggest Italian daily, Corriere della Sera, faulted the defenders of the regime with concrete facts that he knew and angrily expressed how sad he was with pockets of Eritreans still clinging to the side of the dying regime which has abused the trust and loyalty of the Eritrean people. Mr. Rafaelle Masto of Radio Popolare also expressed regret that he could not obtain response to his visa request to Eritrea since early 2004 for the simple fact that he questioned over radio transmissions why Eritrean youth are forced to become refugees these years. “I would wish to go to Eritrea and see for myself what is going on but until then, all what I can think is that something is for sure wrong in that country”, Mr. Masto added.
Mr. Gianni Bombaci, responsible for the European department of the General Confederation of Italian Trade Unions (CGIL), Italy’s biggest workers’ organization, said he has been a supporter of the Eritrean cause for liberation but was unhappy by Eritrea’s failure to become a peaceful and democratic state. He said there was no reason for the regime abuse human rights and trample upon the civic rights of its people under the pretexts of border wars and tensions.
The syposium, conducted in English and Italian with some translations in Tigrinia, started at 21 hours ended after mid-night. On demand of participants, the three Eritrean panelists will convene a meeting exclusively for all members of the Eritrean Opposition at a hall located at Via Marcona 101 inside Milan city.
Resolutions and Recommendations The Symposium on Eritrea in Milan
Summary of the assessments and findings: The participants of the meeting on “Eritrea: betrayed hopes, blighted promises” which took place at Casa della Cultura in Milan on 2.12.2004, consider that in Eritrea:
On the strenght of these and many other considerations not mentioned here for the sake of brevity, and in light of the Resolution of the European Parliament of 19 November 2004 that condemns the violation of human rights by the Asmara regime, the signatories of this document:
Signed Milan 2 December 2004.
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During Thursday
night of 2 December 2004, a packed audience of approximately 200
Italians and Eritreans (60%) at Casa della Cultura in the Italian city
of Milan held a heated, lively and very successful discussion on the
situation in Eritrea presented under the title of: “Eritrea –
Betrayed Hopes and Blighted Promises”. 
Mr. Woldeyesus
Ammar and Mr. Mussie Ephrem made illuminating and moving presentations
depicting the blunders and vices of the dictatorial regime of PFDJ
headed by Isaias Afworki. Mr. W. Ammar listed all what went wrong in the
years pre- and post-liberation Eritrea like the denial to members of the
ELF in 1993 to participate in the referendum as members of a different
organization thus introducing the learning of ABC to participatory
politics. He concluded that Eritreans are today paying the price of what
went wrong since 1991. Mr. M. Ephrem presented the failed promises of
the liberation struggle, with particular examples of the second congress
of the EPLF of 1987 and the abuses on the human rights of the regime
during the past several years. Mr. Kidane Michael explained the
situation of Eritrean migrants in Italy with emphasis on the plight of
the recent exodus of youth who arrived in Italy after taking great risks
through the Sahara and the high seas.
The 2 December
symposium of the Italian Committee for a Democratic Eritrea (Mossob)
listed its assessment of the situation in Eritrea and adopted
resolutions condemning the regime in Asmara and calling on national and
international organizations to support Eritreans to come out of their
untold sufferings.