Isaias Afwerki
President

(pronounced "uh-ZAY-us aff-WER-kee")

"Men make history, and we have made an independent Eritrea."

The State of Eritrea, a former province of Ethiopia, voted its own independence from that country in April 1993 in a United Nations (UN) sponsored election. That election ended 30 years of civil war in the new nation, which borders on the Red Sea in the east, the Sudan in the west and north, and Ethiopia and the Red Sea in the south. Eritrea covers an area of 121,320 sq km (46,842 sq mi) and has a population estimated at 4,465,651 in 2002. Eritrea's land varies dramatically between highlands above 2,134 m (7,000 ft) and its surrounding lowlands, which descend to sea level on the Red Sea coast in the east and the arid Sudan border in the west and north. Between the capital city, Asmara, and the Red Sea port at Massawa, the...