10 December 2025
On International Human Rights Day, Human Rights Concern – Eritrea (HRCE) welcomes the release of 13 detainees who had been held for nearly 18 years without charge, trial, or access to legal representation. Their release marks a rare moment of relief for families who have endured fear and uncertainty for almost two decades.
The release of these individuals, among them former police officers, professionals, and at least one former Olympic athlete, is a reminder of the extraordinary resilience of Eritreans who have endured prolonged arbitrary detention under some of the harshest conditions in the world.
The 13 individuals were imprisoned in Mai Serwa prison, located approximately 9 km northwest of Asmara, Eritrea’s capital. Throughout their detention, many of them suffered solitary confinement and conditions amounting to torture, including imprisonment in metal shipping containers, where temperatures fluctuate between extreme heat and bitter cold.
While we recognise their long-delayed freedom, Eritrea’s broader human rights crisis remains unchanged.
Over 10,000 prisoners of conscience still held across more than 300 detention facilities
Eritrea continues to incarcerate over 10,000 prisoners of conscience, including political dissidents, journalists, religious minorities, conscripts, students, and ordinary citizens. These individuals are held in over 300 formal and informal prisons, many of which operate in complete secrecy.
Conditions inside these facilities are notoriously inhumane. Detainees are held:
- In solitary confinement for months or years;
- In underground cells and desert camps;
- In metal shipping containers, similar to those used at Mai Serwa, where extreme temperatures have caused deaths from heat, suffocation, and untreated illness;
- In overcrowded and substandard facilities.
Among those still missing or long-term detained are:
- Bitweded Abraha, held without trial for more than 34 years;
- The G-11, senior government officials imprisoned since 2001 for calling for democratic reform;
- Dozens of journalists arrested during the 2001 crackdown on the independent press;
- Hundreds of individuals targeted for religious beliefs or perceived political dissent.
International Human Rights Day: A call to end arbitrary detention in Eritrea
As the world commemorates International Human Rights Day, HRCE calls on the Government of Eritrea to:
- Immediately and unconditionally release all prisoners of conscience;
- Disclose the whereabouts and condition of disappeared detainees, including the G-11;
- End the use of solitary confinement, metal shipping containers, and overcrowded substandard facilities as detention sites;
- Grant access to independent monitors, families, and legal representatives;
- Undertake meaningful reforms, including ending indefinite national service and restoring basic freedoms.
We further urge the African Union, United Nations, European Union, United States, and global partners to intensify pressure on Eritrea to end its widespread, systematic human rights violations and to establish accountability mechanisms for past and ongoing abuses.
A step forward — but far from justice
The release of 13 prisoners after 18 years of incommunicado detention should be a first step toward change, not an isolated gesture. Thousands remain behind bars, suffering in silence within a vast system designed to punish, isolate, and break the human spirit.
On this International Human Rights Day, we honour the resilience of those who have survived Eritrea’s prisons and reaffirm our commitment to freedom, dignity, and justice for every Eritrean still detained, including those enduring the darkness of solitary confinement, the suffocating heat of metal shipping containers in prisons such as Mai Serwa, and the overcrowded, substandard conditions found in more than 300 detention facilities across the country.
Their freedom is long overdue.——–
Human Rights Concern – Eritrea (HRCE)
eritrea.facts@gmail.com+44 7958 005 637
Martin Plaut 