17 Sep 2007: ISS Today: Ethiopia and Eritrea: Bordering on Disaster

17 Sep 2007: Ethiopia and Eritrea: Bordering on Disaster

 

On 6 and 7 September 2007 the Eritrea and Ethiopia Boundary Commission, established in terms of the Algiers Peace Agreement of 2000 between those two countries, met in the Hague in an attempt to move forwards with the emplacement of pillars to demarcate the boundary as determined by the Delimitation Decision of 13 April 2002. The meeting broke up without securing the agreement of the parties to proceed with the physical implementation of a decision to which both governments had given their prior consent on the assumption that the arbitration ruling would be in their favour. In the light of the continued refusal of the parties to come to the necessary agreement to set in motion the marking of the border, to give secure access to the border zone, or to meet their financial obligations, the Commission gave notice that at the end of November the boundary automatically would stand as demarcated on the Commission’s maps, and the Commission would suspend its activities.

 

This turn of events was not unexpected, in that neither the Ethiopian nor Eritrean governments were likely to yield on diplomatic and political positions they had adopted since the outcome of the arbitration, in Eritrea’s favour, became known five years ago. That result had been a serious blow to the government of Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, for it had awarded the small town of Badme to the Eritreans. Badme had been at the centre of the border skirmishes that led to the full-scale war of 1998-2000 and had been accorded almost mythic status once the Eritrean attempts to seize it had been beaten back and Ethiopia had gained the upper hand on the field of battle. The award of Badme to Eritrea was construed as casting some doubt about the legal rights and wrongs of a conflict in which Asmara was widely seen as the aggressor. It also rendered the bloody sacrifices of the war, in which fatalities were possibly around the 100,000 mark, more than usually futile.

 

Meles government baulked at accepting the Commission’s decision and attempted to question it, but was frustrated in this by the terms of the mediation to which he had consented, and by his prior agreement to abide by the findings. The Eritrean government obviously had no intention of opening negotiations that might cost them Badme, lost in battle only to be regained in the courts, but this was what Meles proposed, with some support from the UN and other international players.

 

The Eritrean government was extremely vexed by the failure of the international community to press Ethiopia to comply with its undertakings regarding the border award, and particularly by the United States, which had also been a witness to the Algiers Accord of 2000. The interim peace agreement of June 2000, recognising Ethiopia’s military advantage, had created a 25-km wide demilitarised Temporary Security Zone (TSZ), which fell entirely on the Eritrean side of the border. Eritrea’s military redeployment in certain parts of the TSZ, and the restrictions it placed on the operations of the UN observation force, may have reflected its displeasure with what seemed an international partiality towards Addis, but it also gave the latter an excuse to obstruct the implementation of the Commission’s findings.

 

Over the past two years both sides have deployed forces at key points along the border in a manner that could easily lead to an outbreak of hostilities should misjudgements be made, even by the troops in the front line. Accusations have been traded between the capitals of provocations intended to reignite a conflict, which on any economic or military makes no sense. On the contrary, both countries need to reduce their military spending if they are to have any chance of emerging from poverty.

 

Yet there are other imperatives at work here. Eritrea’s autocratic regime needs to maintain a war psychosis and to continue to suppress any demand for the opening of political space. This is a nation in arms, led by a president, Isaias Afewerki, who apparently will go to any lengths to pressure Ethiopia on the border issue, even to a point at which he places his own regime’s survival, if not Eritrea’s continued existence, at risk.

 

Prior to the recent Boundary Commission meeting, the Eritrean government indicated officially that it would comply with demands that it withdraw from the TSZ and resume cooperation with the UN monitors and observers, if the Ethiopian government would make an unequivocal and unconditional commitment to abide by the boundary decision. Yet Meles is eager to avoid having to do anything of the sort, except in principle. Here again the key is not Badme itself, but its symbolic significance and the prime minister’s own domestic political position.

 

There are a large number of Ethiopians who still regard his concession of independence to Eritrea in 1993 as little short of treason. His refusal to press home Ethiopia’s military advantage in 2000 or, at the least, to secure an outlet to the Red Sea, has reinforced this sentiment. Any move to appease Eritrea is firmly opposed not only by his parliamentary opponents but by strong elements within the ruling alliance; a new Tigrayan party has now also been formed advocating a policy towards Eritrea that would amount to the dissolution of that militant state.  

 

Ethiopian prime minister Meles Zenawi has constantly harped upon the role Eritrea’s maverick regime plays in fomenting trouble in the Horn, and has been supported by controversial UN reports on arms flows to Islamist forces in Somalia and others. Ethiopia’s intervention in Somalia at the end of last year had at least as much to do with countering Eritrea’s meddling on that front as with fears of an Islamist dominated government in Mogadishu. At present, and in gratitude for Meles’s support in the Global War on Terror, the US administration refuses to add to the pressure on Ethiopia to comply with its commitments on the border issue. Yet the longer this situation persists, and the further its ramifications spread throughout the other conflicts in the region, the greater the chance of another violent clash that will led again to tens of thousands of deaths. In short, there are linkages forming between various local theatres of conflict that are deeply worrying.

 

Asmara is now host to a growing, though disparate, coalition of oppositional forces, including the Somali Islamist militias, dissident parliamentarians including the ex-Speaker of the TFG parliament and its deposed deputy premier, and civil society elements of the numerous Somali diaspora. These forces have now formed a front for the liberation of Somalia from the Ethiopian invaders.

 

Yet the Ethiopian forces are reluctant to withdraw from Somalia until some credible peace-keeping force is deployed to replace them, which seems less and less likely. The African Union mission still consists only of the Ugandan contingent, which does its best to maintain a low profile. Promises that the arrival of Burundian reinforcements is imminent are unconvincing and, even if true, would do little to stabilise the situation.

 

Eritrea and the Somali Islamist forces are also implicated in the growing conflicting the Ogadeni region of Ethiopia. Here the reaction of the Ethiopian government has been to launch a counter-insurgency campaign that has drawn condemnation from some international human rights groups, already outraged by the Ethiopians’ devastating use of artillery and air power to combat the armed dissidents in Mogadishu.

 

At this juncture the intervention of the US Undersecretary of State for Africa, Jendayi Frazer, has not been helpful. She has failed to curb the Ethiopian government and has lent it implicit support in its disputes with Eritrea by threatening to have the latter declared a rogue state and supporter of terrorism. She has also hinted broadly at the need for regime change in Asmara. It seems unlikely that this approach will strengthen the hands of those counselling caution and seeking diplomatic solutions. 

 

Richard Cornwell, African Security Analysis Programme, ISS Tshwane (Prertoria)