EU to send urgent diplomatic mission to Ethiopia, Eritrea

Dec 12, 2005 (BRUSSELS) — European Union foreign ministers agreed Monday to send an urgent EU diplomatic mission to Ethiopia and Eritrea aimed at cooling border tensions and averting a new war between the two East African nations.

Britain’s Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said there was “profound concern” in the EU over the rising tension between the two countries.

He said the EU would send a special mission Dec. 17, led by Britain’s minister for Africa, Lord David Triesman to visit both governments.

In a statement the EU foreign ministers called on both nations “to refrain from any threat or use of force against each other and to contribute to de-escalation.”

The EU ministers urged “immediate, concrete steps” by Ethiopia to demarcate a permanent border “without delay,” and denounced Eritrean demands that European and North American observers be withdrawn.

International concerns have been mounting in recent weeks that war could again erupt between the two African nations, which fought a 1998-2000 war for territory that claimed tens of thousands of lives and cost both countries — two of the world’s poorest — an estimated US$1 million a day.

Their competing territorial claims were never resolved and in recent months both countries have been massing troops near the border and Eritrea has been restricting the work of U.N. peacekeepers.

(AP/ST)