Isaias Afwerki is an Eritrean politician and partisan who has been the president of Eritrea since shortly after he led the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF) to victory on 24 May 1991, ending the 30-year-old war for independence from Ethiopia.
In addition to being president, Isaias has been the chairman of Eritrea's sole legal political party, the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ). As Eritrea has never had a functioning constitution, no elections, no legislature and no published budget, Isaias has been the sole power in the country, controlling its judiciary and military. Hence, scholars and historians have long considered him to be a dictator, described his regime as totalitarian, by way of forced conscription; the United Nations and Amnesty International cited him for human rights violations. In 2022, Reporters Without Borders ranked Eritrea, under the government of Isaias, last out of 180 countries in its Press Freedom Index. In 2023 Eritrea ranked 174th out of 180 countries on the Press Freedom Index.
Isaias in 2024
President Isaias with U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, December 2002
The Bank of Eritrea in 2005
Voice of America's Peter Clottey interviews Isaias in New York, 2011
Eritrean War of Independence
The Eritrean War of Independence was a war for independence which Eritrean independence fighters waged against successive Ethiopian governments from 1 September 1961 to 24 May 1991.
Destroyed BTR-60s as well as a destroyed AML armored car in a Tank graveyard near Asmara.
The War memorial square in Massawa, Eritrea.
T-54 tank-turned-Eritrean war monument in Nefasit
Wider view of the Asmara tank graveyard.