Eritrea: TRANSPORTATION AND TELECOMMUNICATIONS

Overview: Eritrea’s transportation network, severely damaged and largely dismantled during Eritrea’s war for independence and border conflict with Ethiopia, is rudimentary at best. Plans for significant redevelopment are underway, but the capital resources necessary to fund road and rail projects are not readily available.

Roads: The only fully paved road in Eritrea (and the busiest) is the 107-kilometer stretch connecting Massawa and Asmara. Asphalting of the 120-kilometer stretch of road between Barentu and Teseney is proceeding intermittently; the paving of the 580-kilometer coastal road connecting Massawa and Assab is also underway. In all, Eritrea has some 4,000 kilometers of roadways, of which the vast majority are unpaved. All roads into Ethiopia have been closed since the outbreak of the border dispute between the two nations in 1998.

Railroads: Eritrea’s sole railroad, the 306-kilometer line linking Akordat with Asmara and the port of Massawa, was built by Italian colonialists. It was shut down in 1976 because of the threat from Eritrean guerrilla forces and was largely destroyed in later fighting. Efforts to rebuild the Asmara-Massawa segment began in 1999 and were completed in early 2003. Plans call for extending the line to Bisha, 150 kilometers west of Asmara, where gold and copper mining is expected to begin. A project to link Eritrea’s rail lines to the Sudanese network at Kassala has been delayed by increased tensions with Khartoum.

Ports: A joint agreement between Eritrea and Ethiopia signed in 1993 called for the two nations to share facilities at the ports of Assab and Massawa. Prior to the 1998–2000 hostilities between the neighbors, tariffs and fees associated with port traffic were a significant source of income for Eritrea. During the border dispute, trade between the nations came to an abrupt halt, and Ethiopia launched air raids targeting the port of Massawa. Despite the 2000 cease-fire, trade activity with Ethiopia has not resumed. As of 2005, reconstruction of Massawa has taken place, and it remains the primary port in Eritrea. It is located some 107 kilometers to the northeast of Asmara. Facilities at Massawa include five five-ton cranes and five mobile cranes, eight forklifts, a covered storage area measuring 7,020 square meters, and open storage measuring 27,311 square meters. Although the port of Assab is the largest in Eritrea (with berths for six ocean-going vessels), activity there fell dramatically with the onset of hostilities with Ethiopia and has not recovered. The isolation of Assab (located some 580 kilometers southwest of Asmara) leaves it ill-suited to play a significant role in the Eritrean economy despite its size and on-site facilities, which include a cold storage warehouse, a grain storage warehouse, and a nearby oil refinery (unused since 1997). Eritrea, along with Yemen and Djibouti, controls the Bab el Mandeb seaway between the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, a point of immense strategic importance for the flow of trade, particularly of oil, between Asia and Europe.

Inland Waterways: Eritrea has no navigable waterways.

Civil Aviation and Airports: Eritrea has two airports with permanently surfaced runways—Asmara International and Assab. Asmara International, portions of which are designed for use by the military, has a 3,000-meter runway; Assab airport has a 3,500-meter runway. Unpaved runways are located in Massawa and Tessawa, both some 1,900 meters long. Many smaller landing strips exist throughout Eritrea as well. Eritrean Airlines, non-operational during the 1998–2000 conflict, is flying once again. Destinations include Nairobi, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, and Rome; its fleet is a single leased Boeing 767–300ER. Foreign flag carriers serving Asmara International include British Airways, Egyptair, Lufthansa, Saudi Arabian Airlines, Sudan Airways, and Yemen Airways. No U.S. flag carrier flew into Eritrea as of mid-2005.

Pipelines: None known.

Telecommunications: Telecommunications infrastructure in Eritrea is poorly developed and controlled by the government. Statistics are not widely available on all sectors, but it was estimated that in 2003–4 there were 38,100 main telephones lines, around 1,050 Internet hosts, and 9,500 Internet users. A 2000 estimate noted two AM and shortwave broadcast stations and no FM broadcast stations. Statistics on the number of televisions, radios, and computers in use in Eritrea are not available, but it is widely thought that rates of ownership of these items are very low. There are no reliable estimates available on the number of mobile cellular phones in use.

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