The Eritrean Gulag 2

 Sudanese Sightings in Eritrean’s Prisons

April 1st, 2004...

 At exactly 10 a.m., I found myself inside the headquarters of the Border Guards in Asmara, in the office of a man named Girmay Mezgegna, who held the rank of major in the Eritrean army and was the director of the office of General Tekle Mengistu.

At the same time, he was responsible for issuing travel and residence permits to Sudanese opposition members in Eritrea. Ironically, this man—with all his arrogance, pride, and overblown self-importance—had become the go-to authority on everything related to the Sudanese opposition in Asmara, coordinating with a man named Ibrahim Idris, director of the office of Amin Mohammed Saeed, the secretary-general of the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ).

This, in my opinion, represents the height of absurdity and mockery of the Sudanese opposition. It’s also the peak of self-disrespect for the opposition to allow people like these to manage their affairs and be considered advisors on complex issues such as the Sudanese cause.

If their leaders attempt to practice politics in their country with the same cunning style common in Sudanese dealings—where they can squeeze through a bottleneck and also know how to get out of it—the leaders of the PFDJ, on the other hand, insert themselves into the bottle but seal the cap behind them, then get stuck trying to figure out how to escape.

Anyway, I found myself standing in front of Girmay Mezgegna, or "Wedi Mezgegna" as he liked to call himself, at the same time that the Central Council of the Mohammed Ahmed Facilitation was about to hold its press conference, arranged by the PFDJ, with the intention of ensuring no disruptions following the failed coup attempt against the leadership of the coalition.

Despite knowing me well, Girmay asked for my name. When I responded, a sarcastic expression crossing my face, he demanded my residency permit for Asmara—which he had previously ordered to be issued for me. He then detained me in one of his office rooms until the following morning.

Around 4 p.m., I realized I hadn’t eaten since the previous evening, nor had I drunk any water since my detention. I spoke to one of the two guards watching over me, requesting a glass of water, but he ignored me. My stomach was growling loudly, but I decided to ignore it, summoning every bit of Sudanese stubbornness and pride so as not to appear weak before them. I searched my pockets but found little money, having been stripped of my wallet and its contents by Wedi Mezgegna, along with some personal papers. I was dressed only in trousers and a shirt, with a denim jacket to protect me from the cold and humidity, nothing more.

As time passed, and hunger and thirst intensified, I found myself cursing my friend Mengstab Stephanos, an Eritrean by birth and nationality. Could he and these people really be cut from the same cloth? I remembered Port Sudan and how I had met him in its alleyways, and how surprised I was to see him at my residence in Asmara six years later, after our last meeting in Port Sudan. He had been searching for me for two whole years after returning to Asmara (as he told me) until he finally found me. He welcomed me warmly, and I began visiting him at his home in the suburbs of Asmara, where I got to know his wife, his two gentle daughters, and his mother, who constantly encouraged him to host me after learning of our friendship.

I once mentioned in a conversation that relationships between peoples are governed by internal laws unique to them. No matter how much ruling regimes and political upheavals attempt to alter the makeup of these (socio-chemical) relationships, they fail. These laws did not arise due to temporary circumstances, nor were they born in a moment of negligence. Rather, they are the result of long-term interactions—economic, social, cultural, and ethnic—that have undergone their laboratory cycles, despite attempts to obstruct them during periods of political change.

One of the guards smiled at me kindly after successfully distracting his colleague. He handed me a plate containing some kisra and lentils, smiling cautiously. It was after 11 p.m., and movement within the three-story headquarters of General Tekle Mengistu had ceased. Yes... it was those internal laws at work, triumphing over and transcending the laws of power and authority. The meal, by all standards, was delicious, which I devoured quickly in the darkness of the room. I then gulped down a bottle of Coca-Cola, emptied of cola and filled with water, which tasted of chlorine. A pleasant numbness spread through my limbs, and despite the restraints on my right hand, which was tied to the chair, I drifted off into a sleep."

 

 April 2, 2004...

 A luxurious Japanese car—one of the Eritrean army's vehicles—opened its four doors, and one of the men ordered me to get in. When I climbed into the back seat, I found two people, one of whom I knew well. He was a first lieutenant known as "Wedi Asmara." They sat to my right and left, while a third sat beside the driver, each of them carrying a Kalashnikov rifle. Was I thinking of escaping, I wondered?

The car set off precisely at 8 a.m., driving through the streets of Asmara and heading south, which made me somewhat uneasy. I knew there were houses in that direction used as detention centers, much like other scattered houses in various parts of the city that were used by Eritrean intelligence. These places were well-known to many citizens and others. The most infamous was a strange-looking building behind September 1st Square, from which the screams of detainees could be heard late at night.

My suspicions were confirmed when the car stopped in front of a luxurious villa in the Space 2000 neighborhood. I was ordered to get out, with guards in front and behind me, carrying their weapons (under the blazing sun). How grand it felt to be transported in this lavish car and detained inside such an extravagant building! However, our stay there was brief. I don’t know what happened, but we quickly left, getting back into the same car and continuing in the same direction.

The car headed towards a suburb in the southwestern part of the city, stopping only outside a fenced area covered in barbed wire. In front of its gate was a small zinc room occupied by the gate guards. Inside the fence—which encircled more than four acres of land—there was a zinc shed that barely provided 16 square meters of shade (at noon) and nothing else. In the center of the area, a large Mercedes truck stood, waiting for people emerging from the underground. Some were already there, sitting in neat rows, holding their belongings like prisoners.

This was the infamous Eritrean intelligence prison known as "Track B," located next to a workshop for maintaining armoured vehicles belonging to the Eritrean army and a site for radio and wireless broadcasting equipment on the outskirts of the Goshit suburb. To the naked eye, it appeared as nothing more than flat land with a few structures. But beneath the surface, large underground chambers housed hundreds of detainees—soldiers and Eritrean civilians alike. Alongside these chambers were solitary confinement cells and torture rooms. Accompanying these conditions were diseases like tuberculosis, skin ulcers, typhoid, and rheumatism, while lice thrived despite the detainees' anemia and malnutrition.

I knew "Trackbi" well because I had visited it in the past, searching for an Eritrean friend who had been detained there by the authorities. He had spent about three months underground, emerging temporarily disfigured before regaining his health. His only crime had been his gentle nature and love for his country, albeit not in the manner of the People's Front. Would I meet the same fate?

Since it was common knowledge that intelligence-run prisons were underground, a Sudanese acquaintance who had been thrown into an Eritrean-run prison once told me, "Thank God this prison was built by the Ethiopian authorities; otherwise, we would have spent our entire sentence underground." I had put "Eritrean police" in quotation marks because, in Eritrea, there is no police force in the conventional sense. There is no Ministry of Interior, no laws regulating police work, and no judiciary. Eritrea, under the rule of the People's Front for Democracy and Justice, remains a lawless state with no criminal or civil codes to govern any aspect of life. Everything is subject to personal whims and arbitrary decisions. There is no legal recourse for citizens or non-citizens facing injustice; one simply has to swallow their bitterness and leave it to fate.

The head of my guard unit ordered me out of the car and walked over to speak with another man standing near the Mercedes truck, holding a stack of papers. He handed him an envelope. The luxurious car left with its passengers, leaving me alone next to this man, awaiting further instructions. I didn’t have to wait long before he ordered me to climb onto the back of the truck, where four armed Eritrean soldiers sat, equipped with grenades and Kalashnikov magazines strapped around their waists. As I struggled to climb into the truck, I was shocked to see over a hundred people crammed into the metal floor, chained together. A voice from the ground below called out names of those remaining, who climbed up one by one to be added to the chain.

I found myself squashed among this massive group in such a small space that it was barely possible to sit. I thought to myself, "Maybe they are Ethiopians." But I later discovered that all of them were Eritreans from the army. The Mercedes set off after 10 a.m., and despite their ordeal and the tattered clothes they wore, my fellow captives managed weak smiles.

I whispered to the man chained next to me—after glancing at the guards standing at the four corners above us—"Are you Ethiopian?" He seemed to resent my question, giving me a wary look. When he learned that I was Sudanese, he was surprised, and news of my nationality spread quickly. Heads craned from afar, scrutinizing this Sudanese figure and their eyes questioning why I was among them. This opened the door to many conversations, which we engaged in despite the hardships of the journey and the occasional but subdued attempts by the guards to suppress us, sometimes with violence.

Many of those sitting on the truck had participated in Eritrea’s independence struggle, and they were the most resentful of what had become of their country and deeply regretful of their current circumstances. The rest were young men who had been forcibly conscripted into mandatory service after all attempts to escape had failed. They found themselves fighting in a new war, different from the liberation war—this one fought on all fronts.

Mahmoud Nour, an Afar man from the region bordering Ethiopia and Djibouti, near the port city of Assab, told me, "The People's Front has dragged us into meaningless wars, and now our sons in Dankalia are fleeing across the border to Ethiopia, even though the effects of the war are still felt in the region."

It’s ironic that many Eritrean citizens are fleeing across the border in large numbers to Ethiopia and Sudan or crossing the Red Sea to Yemen (a topic for another day).

Despite the Eritrean people’s unique liberation struggle, in which the People's Front for the Liberation of Eritrea (later the People’s Front for Democracy and Justice) played a major role, the Front quickly faced its own limitations after coming to power. After sidelining other Eritrean political organizations during the liberation struggle in well-known military battles, it was confronted with a weak cadre unable to manage the state. At the same time, it closed all doors and windows to capable cadres who could have contributed to building the foundations for development and political progress after independence. The reasons for this were subjective, reflecting the short-sightedness typical of many ruling parties in developing countries. Once they come to power, they abandon the principles and slogans they once held dear, clinging to power and committing numerous mistakes against themselves, their country, and others.

I began fidgeting from the heat of the truck's metal floor and the scorching sun overhead, when Yonas, sitting in front of me, pointed out that the truck was heading west. By the time the clock passed 3 p.m., the truck stopped on the outskirts of the town of Hagas. The leader of the guard unit asked me if I had any money to buy food. I said no. I looked around to see many people pulling out money to buy a meal to sustain them, as this was a personal responsibility, not the responsibility of the detaining authority. Once again, the internal laws of the people were at work, away from the laws of oppression and tyranny.

The truck continued on its way after about an hour, reaching the outskirts of the town of Haikota, where we were ordered to disembark and were handed over to a fenced detention camp run by the local intelligence. One of the men told me that this was a waiting area, and we would leave in the morning. Meanwhile, some of the detainees were led off on foot to another location—where to? They were being taken to an unknown length of punishment underground in the Haikota region.