We inevitably think of a memorial. Leafing through the fifty or so pages published last month on the Setit site , named after Asmara’s major newspaper which forcibly ceased to appear in September 2001, is like walking along the wall of a virtual monument: page after page follows one another. identity photographs, old and banal images, faces never seen for twenty years; short biographies, a job, a background; sometimes just a name and an approximate date of arrest, for lack of being able to find the families or relatives of the countless political detainees in this closed country in the Horn of Africa.

Since his New York exile, the former Eritrean journalist Ahmed Raji coordinated this publication based on data from NGOs, human rights associations, activists in exile, and families. He who was the friend of many of these disappeared from Eritrean prisons assumes a militant act in the face of ”  exceptional cruelty  “.

“  The government’s strategy is to simply throw these people in jail and forget about them ,” he explains. The prisoners are not even questioned! Some have been in prison for years, even decades, without knowing why they are being held. The guards who fled the country say that they are simply told: your role is to prevent them from escaping, period!  ”

Enforced disappearance is a common practice

Because enforced disappearance is a common practice in Eritrea. “  It turns out that this is an old tactic of the ruling party, the Popular Front for Democracy and Justice, the FPDJ, which during the national liberation struggle was called the Popular Front for the Liberation of ‘Eritrea, the EFLP, explains Ahmed Raji. We have data on disappearances in the bush, long before independence. But that would be another story, more work to be done.  ”

“Remembering is an act of defiance”

On the cover page of the document is a motto: “  Remembering is an act of defiance . This is the same message that Ahmed Raji hammers to justify this painstaking work. “  By making these people disappear, the intention of the government is to ensure that they are forgotten ,” he explains. The intention is to erase them from the collective memory of the people. And our goal is quite simply to prevent the regime from achieving that goal.  ”

The profiles of the missing are diverse. They are not only famous politicians or opponents, rebellious soldiers, but also ”  young and old, women and men, intellectuals, peasants or teachers,” says Ahmed Raji. A bit like a parallel Eritrea.  “. A host of faces and shattered destinies, he concludes, in the form of “a  mirror image of Eritrea.” But an Eritrea that would be underground.  ”