ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a brief historical background and a description of major events in Eritrea. It also provides basic political, economic, and social data arranged in the following categories: polity, economy, population, purchasing power parities, life expectancy, ethnic groups, capital, political rights, civil liberties, and status. The chapter discusses the progress and decline of political rights and civil liberties in Eritrea. Since 1993, Eritrea has engaged in hostilities with Sudan, Yemen, and in 1998, Ethiopia. It has also had strained relations with Djibouti. Created in February 1994 as a successor to the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF), the Popular Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ) maintains a dominance over the country's political and economic life that is unlikely to change in the near-to-medium-term future. In 1997 a new constitution authorizing "conditional" political pluralism with provisions for a multiparty system was adopted. Eritrea's political culture places priority on group interests over those of the individual.
