Victimizing Eritrea, the US does it Again!
The latest US manifestation of its disregard to the rule of law was personified by its ambassador to the UN pushing yet another illegal and unjust UN sanction resolution against Eritrea for no justifiable reason. The sad thing is that it remains mind boggling on how a Super Power finds it amusing to want to do harm to a small and principled country. The result of such sanction action would harm first and foremost the hard working people of Eritrea regardless of what the motives behind it may have been. It is even sadder that the UNSC cowed in to this naked and blatant US aggression against the people and government of a UN member state!
Putting aside the entire mambo jumbo that the US Ambassador felt appropriate to gleefully place on the so called African initiative resolution, let’s just look at the main essence of the alleged “Causes” for the need of the ill-advised and ill-conceived sanction resolutions:
1) Eritrea’s “Continued support” of the fighters in Somalia. Of course, this is an old and tired lie that neither the US nor its shameful messengers could prove otherwise. The government of Eritrea has repeatedly asked for tangible evidence for the allegations. And no one came forward with any kind of evidence.
2) Eritrea’s role of destabilizing the countries in the region. Again, it is simply a regurgitated story concocted by Ethiopia and swallowed by the US, but of course with no credible proof either. As a matter of fact, it is Ethiopia that has openly announced of its intention to “Regime change” in Eritrea by supporting a bunch of opportunistic losers whose only interest is to usurp political power by the military aid of the sworn enemy of the Eritrean people. Moreover, the US is perfectly in bed with the Ethiopian regime that has refused to vacate sovereign Eritrean territories awarded to Eritrea by the international commission, which was mandated to demarcate the Eritrea- Ethiopia border under the 2000 Algiers Agreement in which the US is one of the signatories as a witness and guarantor.
3) The lack of progress of solving the border issue between Djibouti and Eritrea. I don’t know how on earth the US could justify being concerned about that issue any more than the people and government of Eritrea. But, the US knows perfectly well that the government of Qatar has been working to help solve the problem with the agreement of both the governments of Djibouti and Eritrea. So if the US feels there was a lack of progress on the border issue, then the reasonable thing to do would have been to consult with the mediators or facilitator instead of making it a convenient ploy for the imposition of sanction. Why is the need for expedited solution of the border issue with Djibouti, which is 3 years old, more important than the 12 year old border issue with Ethiopia?
4) And here is a conundrum of the US desperate moves: the alleged Eritrean plan to bomb the AU meetings in Addis Ababa that convened at the beginning of the year. Let alone for Eritrea to “Help plan” such an evil act, Eritrea had nothing to do with such bombings. In fact, as publicized by the Wikileaks, it was even suggested by Ms. Vicki Huddleston, the then US Emissary to Ethiopia, that the Ethiopian security forces may had planned and executed such dirty and cowardly tricks to blemish its opponents and Eritrea.
So, why does the US keep on repeating all the lies to place Eritrea in the worst possible limelight? Doesn’t the US ever learn that demonizing Eritrea and its leadership would never achieve whatever goal it is seeking to achieve! It only makes the US look silly in front of the whole wide world. After decades of attempting to block the Eritrean people’s right for independence, one would have thought, by now, that the US would finally play a constructive role in the region for a change, if not for moral high ground, to correct its tried and failed policies of the Horn region in general and Eritrea in particular.
Finally, although it did not pass under stiff opposition by some members of the United Nations Security Council, the US attempted to strangulate Eritrea by passing some irresponsible restriction on the following economic civilian targets:
5) Discourage and restrict international companies from doing normal business in Eritrea. Furthermore it would have placed some serious limitations on the inalienable right of the Eritrean people and government to conduct business in their booming mining enterprises. Luckily, at the end of the day, some sane minds prevailed and all the huffing and puffing of the US Ambassador came to naught.
6) Although levying of taxes on Diaspora nationals is widely practiced by a host of countries, including the US itself, another card in the making of the sanction would have placed some type of blocking mechanism of the 2% tax every Eritrean voluntarily pays to help his/her country and its people. On this one too, mercifully the rule of law prevailed over the rule of the jungle.
Paradoxically, at a time when the UN and other international organizations are praising the Eritrean government in its uphill effort to help the Eritrean economy to stand on its own without being dependent on aids and alms from other countries, it simply defies logic as to why the US would even think of such evil deeds against the hard working people of Eritrea. It really is perplexing since these kinds of arrogant and irresponsible actions are not worthy of the great nation.
Be as it may, however, the Eritrean people, while deeply saddened by the latest UN action, they are not deterred from their noteworthy pledge of never betraying their country and, I assure the Ambassador and her puppets that Eritrea will continue to defy any conspiracy hatched unfairly against her. As to the payment/collection of the non-issue 2% tax, I am and will gladly continue to pay whatever my people back home require. It is nobody’s business what I do with my money, not least of which when it is for Eritrea and Eritreans improvement of their economic lives! It is my decision and mine alone as to whether I support the government or not and it’s, once again, nobody’s business to meddle in the Eritrean affairs, especially when the government of President Isaias is very popular and strongly supported by the overwhelming majority of the Eritrean people.