Tifanos [Isaias Afwerki] had an interview with his media.  Although he was occasionally laughing and tried to make it seem that he was in a good position, his overall tone was that of a man who was trying to cool off his frustration on the defeat of ICU.

The interview was not like all previous ones which are advertised for long time before airing.  It seems that it was organized as soon as Teweel [Isaias] realized his side was losing.  He was very impatient with any question that had to do with Eritrea, even when the interviewer, Paulos Netabay of Hadas Ertra asked repeated questions, he did not want to talk about the mine exploration, or even the so-called psychological warfare against Eritrea. He did not want to talk about Eritrea at all! Instead, the talk was on Darfur, Somalia and US policy.

There is more disillusionment in Eritrea, this time because of the developments in Somalia.  It is some kind of post-war disillusion.   Leave it to Teweel to side with the Losers and make us feel as if we lost a war!   Nobody seriously believes that there were 2000 Eritreans in Somalia, as the UN and Meles said, but there is still a sense that we lost the war.  This is because all the groups that the PFDJ was cheering for in its tiresome media, all lost and Meles appears victorious and is gathering the fruits of his victory in Ethiopia. This definitely has a negative impact on Issayas. As a result, he made an interview, no a monologue, lambasting the Woyane and America. He is now saying this is the beginning of the War, and the Woyane are in a hopeless quagmire.

There is hopelessness every where.  I met someone who told me a sad story.  His son, a graduate of Kiloma [military academy], is assigned to the outskirts of Asmara and he had a conversation with him for the first time since was sent for training.  The father said, �He looked like karbon hagay (summer charcoal) and he is thinner than skeleton.� It turns out that the Kiloma trainees were eating korosho that had been in storage since Salsay Werar. [Third Offensive, May 2000.] It was horrible, he told me. He continued by saying that they were �washing the korosho first so that it�s staleness is removed."

When the Saudis reported that two Eritreans had piloted a helicopter and asked for asylum in Jezan, and this news was not denied by Tifanos, people started saying that this must mean that we lost two helicopters!  This man told me that there were two helicopters and six people defected to Saudi Arabia. I told him that what I heard is only one helicopter and two guys. He insisted that there were two, in the first there were two and in the second there were four guys. They defected separately he said.

Maybe it is the new year, and people are waking up to realization that they will spend one more year with PFDJ?  I don�t know how we will do it!