The SAWA Defence Training Center is a military academy in the Gash-Barka region of Eritrea. It is where the Eritrean Defence Forces (EDF) recruits, and national service conscripts are sent for basic military training. Since 2003, all local secondary school pupils have been required to attend their 12th grade at an institution proximate to the SAWA center in order ensure that they meet their mandatory national service obligations. [1] [2]
In August 2019, Human Rights Watch reported that the students have been fleeing from the country to avoid training at the Sawa camps, where they are subjected to systematic abuse, torture, harsh working conditions and punishments, and also paid insufficiently. [3] [4]
The Eritrean Defence Forces (EDF) are the combined military forces of Eritrea composed of three branches: Eritrean Army, Eritrean Air Force and Eritrean Navy. The Army is by far the largest, followed by the Air Force and Navy. The Commander-in-Chief of the EDF is the President of Eritrea. Their military role stems from Eritrea's strategic geographical location, located on the Red Sea with a foothold on the Bab-el-Mandeb strait.
The Somali Armed Forces are the military forces of the Federal Republic of Somalia. Headed by the president as commander-in-chief, they are constitutionally mandated to ensure the nation's sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity.
The Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC), formerly known as the School of the Americas, is a United States Department of Defense school located at Fort Moore in Columbus, Georgia, renamed in the 2001 National Defense Authorization Act.
Children in the military, including state armed forces, non-state armed groups, and other military organizations, may be trained for combat, assigned to support roles, such as cooks, porters/couriers, or messengers, or used for tactical advantage such as for human shields, or for political advantage in propaganda. Children have been recruited for participation in military operations and campaigns throughout history and in many cultures.
Isaias Afwerki is an Eritrean politician and partisan who has been the first and only president of Eritrea since 1993. 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).
The Special Task Force (STF) (Sinhala: විශේෂ කාර්ය බලකාය Visesha Karya Balakaya; Tamil: சிறப்பு அதிரடிப் படை) is the tier one police tactical unit of the Sri Lanka Police specialising in anti-irregular military, apprehension of armed and dangerous criminals, clandestine and covert operations, combat and patrolling in urban areas, counterterrorism and hostage rescue crisis managements, crowd control, executive protection, high-risk tactical law enforcement situations, indirect fire for support operations, irregular warfare, operating in difficult to access terrain, protecting high-level meeting areas, search and rescue people who are in distress or imminent danger from disaster, support crowd control and riot control, tactical special operations, and other tasks requiring special training. It was formed in 1983 not as a military force, but rather as a highly specialised armed police unit.
The Kopassus is an Indonesian Army (TNI-AD) special forces group that conducts special operations missions for the Indonesian government, such as direct action, unconventional warfare, sabotage, counter-insurgency, counter-terrorism, intelligence gathering and special reconnaissance (SR). Kopassus was founded by Alexander Evert Kawilarang and Mochammad Idjon Djanbi on 16 April 1952. It gained worldwide attention after several operations such as the Indonesian invasion of East Timor and the release of hostages from Garuda Indonesia Flight 206.
The beliefs and practices of Jehovah's Witnesses have engendered controversy throughout their history. Consequently, the denomination has been opposed by local governments, communities, and religious groups. Many Christian denominations consider the interpretations and doctrines of Jehovah's Witnesses heretical, and some professors of religion have classified the denomination as a cult.
The National Defence Academy (NDA) is the joint defence service training institute of the Indian Armed Forces. Here, cadets of the Indian Army, Indian Navy, and Indian Air Force train together before they go on to their respective service academies for further pre-commission training. The NDA is located in Khadakwasla, Pune, Maharashtra. It is the first tri-service academy in the world.
Human rights in Eritrea are viewed, as of the 2020s, by non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as Human Rights Watch as among the worst in the world, particularly with regards to freedom of the press. Eritrea is a one-party state in which national legislative elections have been repeatedly postponed, the judiciary is weak, and constitutional provisions protecting individual freedom have yet to be fully implemented. Some Western countries, particularly the United States, accuse the government of Eritrea of arbitrary arrest and detentions and of detaining an unknown number of people without charge for their political activism. Additionally, Eritrean citizens, both men and women, are forcibly conscripted into the military with an indefinite length of service and used as forced labour.
Education in Eritrea is officially compulsory between 7 and 16 years of age. Important goals of Eritrea's educational policy are to provide basic education in each of Eritrea's mother tongues as well as to produce a society that is equipped with the necessary skills to function with a culture of self-reliance in the modern economy. The education infrastructure is currently inadequate to meet these needs.
The Eritrean Air Force (ERAF) is the air service branch of the Eritrean Defence Forces.
The Eritrean Army is the main branch of the Eritrean Defence Forces and is one of the largest armies in Africa. The main role of the army in Eritrea is defense from external aggressors, border security, and developing national cohesion. Historically, the predecessor of the Eritrean Army, the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF), played a major role in establishing and defending the country's independence from Ethiopia in 1991 during the Eritrean War of Independence. Since then, the army has continued to be involved in low-level border conflicts with Ethiopia and several other neighbors, including Djibouti and Yemen, with the most notable one being the Ethiopian-Eritrean War from 1998 until 2000, which ended in a partial Ethiopian military victory and Eritrean boundary line victory. It is widely regarded as one of the largest armies in Africa, despite the country having a smaller population than most of its neighbors with around 250,000 to 300,000 personnel due to mandatory national service. Conscription became open ended since the war with Ethiopia and no demobilization has taken place. Eritrea has one of the largest tank fleets in the world, with an estimate of 1756 tanks.
The Eritrean Civil Wars were two conflicts that were fought between competing organizations for the liberation of Eritrea.
Eritrea, officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa region of Eastern Africa, with its capital and largest city being Asmara. It is bordered by Ethiopia in the south, Sudan in the west, and Djibouti in the southeast. The northeastern and eastern parts of Eritrea have an extensive coastline along the Red Sea. The nation has a total area of approximately 117,600 km2 (45,406 sq mi), and includes the Dahlak Archipelago and several of the Hanish Islands.
In 2017, the U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons designated Eritrea as "Tier 3" in accordance with the Trafficking in Persons Report tier system. Tier 3 countries are described as those whose governments do not fully comply with the minimum standards set by the Trafficking Victims Protection Act and are not making significant efforts to do so. In 2010 the U.S. Department of State reported:
Eiraeiro is a secret prison in Eritrea. Most sources give the location of Eiraeiro as being situated near the village of Gahtelay, in the Northern Red Sea Region. However, in an article in the Guardian, Eiraeiro is cited as being located approximately 10 miles from the capital, Asmara.
The Xinjiang internment camps, officially called vocational education and training centers by the government of China, are internment camps operated by the government of Xinjiang and the Chinese Communist Party Provincial Standing Committee. Human Rights Watch says that they have been used to indoctrinate Uyghurs and other Muslims since 2017 as part of a "people's war on terror", a policy announced in 2014. Thirty-seven countries have expressed support for China's government for "counter-terrorism and deradicalization measures", including countries such as Russia, Saudi Arabia, Cuba, and Venezuela; meanwhile 22 or 43 countries, depending on source, have called on China to respect the human rights of the Uyghur community, including countries such as Canada, Germany, Turkey and Japan. Xinjiang internment camps have been described as "the most extreme example of China's inhumane policies against Uighurs". The camps have been criticized by the subcommittee of the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development for persecution of Uyghurs in China, including mistreatment, rape, torture, and genocide.
In the late hours of 7 January 2022, the Ethiopian Air Force (ETAF) carried out an airstrike on a camp for internally displaced persons (IDP) set up in Dedebit Elementary School, located in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia. Between 56 and 59 people were killed in the attack, and at least 30 others were left injured.
Conscription in Eritrea requires every able bodied man and woman to serve, ostensibly, for 18 months. In this time, they receive six months of military training and the rest of their time is spent working on national reconstruction projects. This program allegedly aims to compensate for Eritrea's lack of capital and to reduce dependence on foreign aid. This is outlined in both the Constitution of Eritrea, as well as Proclamation 82 issued by the National Assembly in October 1995. However, the period of enrollment may be extended during times of national crisis, and in practice, the typical period of national service is considerably longer than the minimum. Since the 1990s, conscription has been effectively open-ended; this draft policy has been likened to "slavery" and has earned international condemnation.
15°41′56.00″N36°58′25.32″E / 15.6988889°N 36.9737000°E
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