Airport security officers arrested Ms. Aster Yohannes, the wife of Mr. Petros Solomon, shortly after her plane landed at Asmara Airport on Thursday, December 11.  A veteran of the Eritrean People Liberation Front (EPLF), Aster was pursuing higher education in Phoenix, Arizona (USA) when her husband was arrested on September 18, 2001.

Their four children were left in the care of her mother and extended family. 

Sources inform Gedab News that Aster Yohannes had decided to return to Eritrea after the Office of the President had rejected her request to provide exit visa to her children and after she was reassured that no harm would come to her if she returned and was reunited with her children.

Her mother and children were waiting for her at the airport when security officers whisked her away without allowing her to see he children. Her whereabouts is still not known. Our source from Asmara indicated that there is a possibility that "she might be released soon after interrogation."

Petros Solomon, who has been in detention without charges for over two years, was a member of the “G-15,” a reform group within the ruling party, who publicly called on President Isaias Afwerki to be bound by the Eritrean Constitution.  He joined the EPLF in 1972 and held a variety of jobs including member of the front’s Military Committee and Commander of the Eastern Front as well as head of its intelligence service, “72.”  After Eritrea’s independence, he served as Minister of Defense as well as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Marine Resources.