Ladies and Gentlemen:

The following text is a transcription of Mr. Michael Bocru’s spee= ch, which was delivered on September 22, 2007, in an event organized by Qalna Human Rights Organization to remember the sixth anniversary of the detention of independent press reporters in E= ritrea. The event had also witnessed the official inauguration of Qalna Eritrean Human Rights Group in Toronto.

We ap= ologize our readers for not posting Mr. Michael’s address in our website time= ly. The main theme of his speech was the challenges and resistance of Eritrean state media reporters.

“Good afternoon, Ladies and Gentlemen:

First of all, allow me to= express my gratitude for the chance you gave me to stand in front of you and address the situation of state reporters in Eritrea.

When we hear someone talk= ing about “state reporters”, the first image that comes to our mind= is a privileged journalist. But this is quite different in case of Eritrea, especially after the large government crackdown on the free press and the internal opposition of the ruling party in 2001.

With in the short time al= located to me, I will try to give you a brief report about the situation of press i= n Eritrea, with particular emphasis on the circumstances under which the state-owned reporters are working and the challenges they are facing. Mr. Aron has just presented a detailed situation of priva= te press in Eritrea, so I don’t need to repeat this topic.

Since September 2001 ther= e is no independent reporting in Eritrea at all. The Ministry of Information has taken total control of all media in= Eritrea, which allows heavily censored pro-government propaganda to be aired and pri= nted in the country. Until 1998 the state-reporters had a chance to some extent = to reflect their ideas, and comments regarding to social and economic problems= of the country. As to the political issues, some senior journalists, who were = EPLF’s reporters during the liberation struggle, tried to raise some critical questions in a modest fashion on live intervie= ws with high government officials. After the internal opposition of the ruling party in 2001, however, these individuals did not continue in their place. = Some of them were demoted while the rest were sent as ambassadors and secretarie= s of Eritrean missions abroad.

Since then the censorship= has grown to its maximum capacity. We can see the process that a news report has to p= ass before publishing - first the reporter is forced to apply self censorship; = then the story goes to the editor at the office. This editor is not also fully trusted. So the chain of censorship continues up to the ladder of the minis= ter of Information. As a result many of the reporters dwell in psychological conflict with in themselves because their professional ethics is compromise= d.

These pairs of incidents,= the removal of critical reporters and heavy censorship, couldn’t weaken the resistance of state-owned media reporters against the suppression of free p= ress. Despite the unbearable censorship, their resistance continued to grow stead= ily in a different form since 2006; which can be characterized as ‘resistance through defection’. From August – October 2006, seven state reporters defected because th= ey couldn’t endure the worsening political repression. I am one of these journalists. With in the limited time allotted to me, I don’t want to talk about the problems I personally faced as a reporter in the Eritrean Ministry of Information. It is suffice = to say that I was a senior reporter in the state media, who was slapped by the flames of the serious problems that my fellow reporters are currently facin= g.

Following the defection of several prominent journalists, which had particularly irked the government,= the biggest crackdown in the state-media took place in November 2006. At least = 10 journalists were detained during that month; some of them were reported to = be tortured.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

When I was assigned to ta= lk about the challenges of state-run media reporters, the first idea that came to my mind is to share you the following headline, which I took from a press stat= ement released by Reporters With out Borders in Novemb= er 2006. This expression can give you a general image about the situation of t= hese journalists in a nutshell.

The headline of the news release was as follows:= -

"Terror reigns again = among journalists in Eritr= ea." …..

As you read the above headline, definitely, the question ̵= 6;what is this terror?’ may ap= pear in your mind. During the November’s state media crackdown, there was a red van that used to co= me every morning or every other day to the building of the state media and too= k at least one reporter for questioning. Some of them returned after several hours and some others were kept = for weeks in a detention center. This action of Eritrean security forces terror= ized the reporters to the extent that they spend the whole day watching across t= he windows of their offices, to follow the arrival of the red van and the drea= dful incidents following it. &= nbsp;

The above headline was followed by a picture of President Issaias with an interesting caption. =

Eritrea: From the frying pan into the fire: Isaias Afwerki, seen he= re entering a November 15 COMESA conference in Djibout<= /span>, has now the unenviable record of throwing all independent and state-media journalists into prison. (AFP/Marco Longari) =

This picture was taken tw= o days after the state media crackdown. He is the major actor of such incidents in= the country. As you can see in the picture, he looked that he had been so busy a couple of days ago directing the drama of terrorizing reporters.

Let me go back to the R.S.F.’s report. The statement of the press fre= edom organization continues to mention its concerns about Eritrea saying……&= quot;The government controls its people by = means of lies, fear and violence, and does not tolerate anyone fleeing the countr= y. We hope this wave of arrests will not be greeted with international indifference like the last time. The international community must intercede= as a matter of urgency."

Most of the journalists a= rrested in the November’s crackdown are released. But they are being constant= ly supervised by state agents, who fear they might follow the example of those= who fled the country.

To your surprise, the government’s method of terrorizing journalists through arbitrary detention did not work. Even after November 2006, some reporters were arres= ted and nothing is known about their where about.

I am quoting the following paragraph from a recent statement of RSF. “One of the suspect journalists arrested at the end of last year, Paulos Kidane of the Amharic-language service of state-owned Eri-TV = and radio Dimtsi Hafash= (Voice of the Broad Masses), told Reporters Without Borders after his release = ;: "We were beaten and tortured in prison for refusing to give the passwo= rds to our e-mail accounts. In the end we cracked because the pain was too much.” Kidane died a few months later, in= June, while trying to flee on foot across the border into = Sudan.

Daniel Mussie of Radio Dimtsi Hafash has not been released since last November’s crackdown. Eyob Kessete, a journalist of Dimtsi Haf= ash, and Eri-TV editor Johnny H= isabu were arrested while trying to leave the country clandestinely across the bo= rder earlier this year and are still being held somewhere.”

Of the 18 Eritrean journa= lists in detention in Eritrea= , seven are from the state media.

I don’t want to pass without mentioning another problem that state-reporters are facing in Eritrea. When these reporters assigned to cover a high profile event, they are not allowed to question as to ‘what they are going to cover’ and ‘where they going for the assignment’ in advan= ce. As a result two journalists had became victims o= f the war in Somalia last year. These reporters had been dispatched to Mog= adishu by the Eritrean government, but later went on their own toward Kenya, reaching the border (no one knows whether their intention was to defect or not).

CPJ expressed its deep co= ncern about the whereabouts, legal status and health of Eritrean journalists Tesfalidet Kidane Tesfazghi and Saleh Idris Gama of Eritrean state broadcaster Eri-TV. According to CPJ, official statements and vid= eotape indicate that Ethiopian government has been holding them incommunicado after their arrests by Kenyan authorities late last year during fighting in Somalia.

Similar problem might hap= pen in the future if the international community can not understand the situation = of state-owned media reporters in Eritrea. The situation for all journalists = (be it independent or state media) in Eritrea is quite different from that of other countries. Therefore, Eritrean state media reporters deserve protection by international community. A lot of endangered reporters, who managed to flee their country, are still living in different refugee camps = neighboring countries seeking asylum.