Ruling party explains arrests

Eritrea's ruling party, the Eritrean People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ), has explained why it arrested 11 members of the so-called G-15 reform group last week. In a statement posted on its Shaebia web site on Wednesday, the PFDJ said the G-15, all former senior members of the PFDJ, began plotting the removal of Eritrean President Isayas Aferwerki in May 2000 just as Eritrean armed forces were retreating in the face of a major Ethiopian offensive designed to end the two-year border war between the two countries. The G-15 move was, the statement said, "an act of betrayal", which could have been prosecuted at the time, but which the government chose instead to treat "as an inevitable aberration that crops up in times of difficulty". However, despite the leniency shown by the government, the reformists had persisted in "secret machinations", said the statement.

It was in May this year that the reformists agenda became public when they published an open letter critical of Isayas, in which they accused him of consistently refusing to allow collective leadership and failing to convene legislative bodies intended to regulate presidential powers. "It is obvious that our country is in a crisis," read the letter. "This crisis is the result of the weakness of the PFDJ and the government, and the invasion of our country by the enemy." All 15 dissenters were promptly sacked from the government, and last week 11 of them were arrested. Of the remaining four members, three are in the United States, while the fourth has recanted and rejoined the government.