By Charlie van Gelderen The constitutional rights Since September 1961, a small nation in the of the tritrean people were ignored.
Horn of Africa has been fighting a determined battle to free itself from colonial oppression. In 1956, Amharic, the official Ethiopian For two decades the people of Eritrea have been engaged in armed struggle against language became ficial language in Eritrea the OIEthiopia first against the forces of Haile Haile Selassie's Selassie and, since 1974, against the armies of began a systematic reign of: the Dergue. terror; the few remaining There would seem to have been a compact rights of the Eritreans were abrogated. between the capitalist press and the organs of the left to keep silent about this war - the Strike longest in the history of Africa.
The various ethnic nions of the Eritrean peo- Trade unions were groups which comprise the ple must receive considera- banned but continued people of modern Eritrea tion. Nevertheless the exist underground and in ilavc strategic interests of the 1958 organised a general history of struggle against in the sunker Ine ponce openca toreign invaders. Sea• basin and considera fire on the strikers, leaving conscinusness as a nation tons of security and world 500 dead or wounded. The within ¡clearly defined peace make it necessary die was cast frontiers became firmly that the country had to be In September 1961, the established during the linked ally, armed struggle began 1T2an colonial rule bet- Ethiopia.' under the leadership of the ween 1885 and the Second Almost from the start, Pritrean Liberation Front War. During the 'autonomy guaran- (ELF). A year war, the British repeatedly teed by the UN resolution November promised the eritreans in- annexed chured dependence in return for pian empire. A regime of with the tacit support of help against the Italians. the United Nations. The 46 votes cluding. Britain's the General Assembly of the United Nations resolved that Eritrea should 'constitute an autonomous 1011 federated Ethiopia'. Federal Among those who opposed the SOSwas the Soviet Union, wild demanded complete independence Eritrea in accordance TOE with the provisions of the UN Charter Ethiopia at that time, though formally independent, was fast becoming a client of US Denausa The wishes the Eritrean people had to make wav ior the interests of the United States. John Foster Dulles, Eisenhower's Secretary of State, did not mince his words:
the point of view of justice, the opi- ELF members - many of whom were not alive when the war for independence began.
Socialist Challénge "5 November 1981" 'Page 12 consulted. the conventional people of Eritrea were not (Eritrean Liberation Front), have carried out both guerilla warfare and siege and assault warfare, inflicting Fighters in the Eritrean Liberation Front, 25 per cent of activists are women.
massive defeats American-Israeli trained Ethiopian forces. the beginning, the struggle took the form Within ivo limited eas, revolutionary war.
EPLF has tried
generate DIU fighting ranks consist of women. a truly remark able achievement women have been subject to severe discrimination in the bast Laws which prohibited the ownership land women were abolished.
By the end of 1978, the EPLE controlled all the major roads in the coun try, and all the major cities the exception of Asmara, WaCI . SUI rounded and Massawa, which was under offensive siege. Most of the coun tryside except Dankalia and Barka Provinces was under their control.
All changed
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On 2 December 1950- by