A senior Eritrean government official has categorically denied the existence of religious repression in Eritrea, and has dismissed reports of the mass detentions of Christians as "hyperbole".
In an interview with an Italian writer published on the government website, Director of the Office of the President, Mr Yemane Gebremeskel, also described reports of mass arrests as "distorted and exaggerated" and stated that in Eritrea "people have never been prevented from their right to worship freely".
However, he later admitted to the "periodic arrests" of members of "new faiths" who "assemble illegally".
International human rights NGOs and local church sources currently report that over 2000 Christians are detained without charge or trial in Eritrea.
The most prominent is the ordained Patriarch of the Eritrean Orthodox Church (EOC), Eritrea's largest and oldest church, who was illegally deposed and indefinitely detained after objecting to government interference in church affairs and to the arrest of three priests from the EOC's renewal wing.
In his interview, Mr Gebremeskel portrayed Eritrea's Christian detainees as members of "small groups" that had emerged "in the past seven, eight years", and that had benefited from secret and undeclared foreign funds, opposed military services, and sown division within "traditional" faiths.
Gebremeskel also dismissed reports of mass clandestine migration from Eritrea as "exaggerated", Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) has said.
