In the course of making Undercover in Africa’s Secret State, I learned that there’s mandatory national service inside the country from the age of 18. Eritrea can be called Africa’s North Korea because what other system can you compare it with? During my research, I started to build contacts with people who were in the Eritrean refugee community in Ethiopia, and connections with people inside Eritrea. Inside Eritrea the government controls all the information access, so people are terrified. That’s the only piece of information Hanna had in 20 years.

Source: The North Africa Journal June 15, 2021 06:00 UTC