Panel again intercedes in Ethiopia-Eritrea impasse

April 4, 2006 (UNITED NATIONS) — The panel charged with marking out the disputed border between Eritrea and Ethiopia will meet again in London late this month to push for an end to a stalemate between the Horn of Africa nations that fought a bloody war from 1998 to 2000, diplomats said on Tuesday.

The international boundary commission, as part of a U.S. mediation effort, met with legal experts from both nations in London last month in hopes of convincing them to accept a resumption of the demarcation process.

The United Nations said afterward the two countries had agreed to resume laying out their shared frontier. But officials of both countries later made comments questioning that statement.

It was not yet known whether either country had agreed to send officials to London to participate in the new round of talks that U.N. diplomats said were set for April 28-29.

Eritrea won independence from Ethiopia in 1993 after a 30-year struggle but relations between the two remained tense and exploded into war in 1998, that cost some 70,000 lives.

As part of a peace agreement reached in 2000, both sides agreed the boundary panel’s 2002 ruling would be “final and binding.” But Ethiopia later rejected the decision and insisted on further talks.

An angry Eritrea then imposed restrictions on U.N. peacekeepers’ movements including a ban on helicopter flights over its territory, reducing U.N. capacity to monitor the 620-mile (1,000 km) border.

A U.N. force of about 3,350 troops and observers has maintained a buffer zone separating the two sides since the border war.

The U.N. mission’s mandate is due to expire April 15, and some members of the Security Council have called for the force to be scaled back if the peace process remains deadlocked.

But diplomats said on Tuesday the council was likely to extend the mandate for another month to let diplomatic efforts continue.

(Reuters)