ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: Isayas confident of eventual victory

Follow @{0}NAIROBI, 24 May 2000 (IRIN) - Making his first public appearance since the outbreak of the latest fighting on 12 May, Eritrean President Isayas Afewerki addressed a crowd of some 15,000 in central Asmara on Tuesday night with a speech to mark Independence Day, the Associated Press agency (AP) reported. Isayas said Eritrea was facing “difficult circumstances” that could worsen, but that it would prevail in the end. “There will be ups and downs, but Eritrea will win,” he said. Isayas denounced the Ethiopian leadership - former allies during Eritrea’s war for independence from the regime of Ethiopian dictator Colonel Mengistu Haile Mariam - as “a bloody gang”, and called for international condemnation of the invasion of Eritrea.