Eritrea
Eritrea, 1993 to today. Draft, not yet reviewed
Eritrea, officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. Eritrea gained de facto independence in 1991 and de jure independence in 1993 after an independence referendum. The Eritrean–Ethiopian War lasted from 1998 to 2000 and claimed approximately 70,000 lives from both sides. A peace treaty between Eritrea and Ethiopia was signed on 9 July 2018.
Seat of power: Asmara
Rulers
Isaias Afwerki
President of Eritrea, 1991 to today
Isaias Afwerki has served as the president of Eritrea since its independence in 1993 and the chairman of the People's Front for Democracy and Justice since 1994. He led pro-independence forces to victory on 24 May 1991, ending the 30-year-old war for independence from Ethiopia. Western scholars and historians have long considered Isaias to be a totalitarian leader, with Eritrea's constitution remaining unenforced, electoral institutions effectively being nonexistent, and a policy of mass conscription.
Portrait of Isaias Afwerki: Quirinale (Francesco Ammendola and Paolo Giandotti), Attribution, file
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Culture
- Eritrea is a unitary one-party presidential republic and a de facto totalitarian dictatorship, in which national legislative and presidential elections have never been held.
- The country's human rights record is among the worst in the world. The Eritrean government has dismissed these allegations as politically motivated.
- In 2020, Eritrean troops intervened in the Tigray War on the side of the Ethiopian government. In April 2021, Eritrea confirmed its troops were fighting in Ethiopia.
- One of the most recognizable parts of Eritrean culture is the coffee ceremony. Coffee is offered when visiting friends, during festivities, or as a staple of daily life.
Picture
Asmara is the capital and most populous city of Eritrea, and it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2017.
Image: Tigernssnowy7, CC BY-SA 4.0, file
Sources
Text adapted from the Wikipedia articles listed as sources, CC BY-SA 4.0.