Eritrea-Ethiopia: The Algiers agreement – A trap without exit
By Toommaa Imma *
March 11, 2007 — Essentially the UN is mandated to monitor the demilitarized frontiers erratically honored since the 2000 Algiers Agreement. Nevertheless, since the late 2005, tensions have escalated along the heavily militarized Ethiopia-Eritrea border due mainly to Eritrea’s imposition of new restraints on the UN-peacekeeping mission’s movements. The main cause for this stalemate along the disputed border frontiers lies initially on the fallacy fallouts of the previous procedures on how the 1993 Eritrean referendum was conducted solely in Eritrea on emergency grounds; and without formally conducting the actual border demarcation prior to the de facto Eritrean independence inauguration date. Consequently, therefore, the breakdown of the 2000 accord pertinent to: (a) respecting the cease-fire along the disputed Ethiopia-Eritrea border and (b) realizing the peace attainment processes has in tandem resulted in a rigid stalemate drawing the clouds of war between the two nations.
Today, seven years after the said accord was initiated, the frontiers still remain shaky and not yet demarcated officially. This un-demarcated border dispute is further energized and even more heated-up by Eritrea’s own choice to isolate itself from the rest of the Western world and to involve in regional disputes pertaining to: (1) supporting opposition groups to the incumbent regime in Ethiopia, (2) supporting the already crashed Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) of Somalia, (3) depriving Ethiopia’s access to the sea by openly leaving Ethiopia’s national security and comparative economic advantages at total risk ever since Eritrea gained its de facto independence in 1993 and (4) ignoring the cries of the Afar population’s fate that are divided between three states without their legitimate consent.
Although much has been written about why this disputed border demarcation matter is defunct, in this paper, without ado, I will go into the missing links in the Algiers Agreement as regards the unresolved critical themes and contend in three parts as to why it would appear to be against the interests of both regimes to have a final demarcation at this particular point in time.
Algiers Agreement’s Allegory
As it happens, the Algiers Agreement has taken away everything that is Ethiopian and given it entirely to Eritrea by supporting the Eritrean bid for its de facto 1993 independence. That’s why this Agreement remains irregular in which Eritrea gets everything it never had and Ethiopia loses everything it did have thus far due to the three outdated and inapplicable “colonial treaties of 1900, 1902, and 1908 that the Commission attempts to implement based on its own subjective interpretations of the matter. To the contrary, the legality of all facets of the Algiers Agreement has to be examined and suggested against the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. It is of note that no African borders have ever thus far been so determined by a 3rd party facilitated Agreement as what is being deliberated by the Algiers Agreement.
In my view, the Commission of the Algiers Agreement is wrong for trusting that it can resolve the 1998-2000 Ethiopia-Eritrea border dispute with a ‘take it or leave it approach’ due to its one-sided nature of the accord, and because of the fact that the two parties have not yet been able to reach at any likely palatable alternative solutions.
After nearly seven years of serious attempts made by all parties actively involved in the exercise to settle this controversial national matter, there are yet key issues unresolved; and key super-power nations and agencies including the USA, UK, the UN and AU along with the rest of the Western world community have now cast their doubts about the whole lot of the Algiers Agreement as a failed mission.
As young and yet not well settled regime, Eritrea’s negative diplomacy role towards the West and towards its neighbors by supporting Islamic fundamentalists and homegrown terrorists within the region has become offensive to and disadvantageous for the incumbent Eritrean regime.
In actual fact, in search of viable solutions, for Algiers Agreement to remain alive and to become actively a binding accord, there are yet core issues to be considered, included and resolved in connection to which Ethiopia did put a five-point plan forward; mainly by requesting for both parties to enter into dialog pertinent to particularities of demarcation to be made along the long frontiers.
Eritrean stakeholders have blatantly refused to have any of Ethiopia’s five-point plans arguing that the Border Commission has submitted its decision and that the five-point plan was only a political ploy to undo what the Commission had already done. To Afeworki’s regime the five-point plan was a subterfuge by the world powers who it says favor Ethiopia in the first place, and that the plan is still being used as a safety-valve for Meles Zenawi in relation to his own domestic needs in Ethiopia.
Regardless of what Meles and the EPRDF regime had previously championed not only in the fight against the Derg military regime but also in facilitating and advocating for the 1993 Eritrean independence and Eritrean interests at the cost of offending its own regime’s interests and those of the 80 million population of Ethiopia; in return, it received neither admiration for nor respect from Afeworki and his EPLF-regime. Even this time, Eritrea is not about to reward Meles by accepting his five-point plan for the peace accord; nor is it ready to enable Ethiopia regain and maintain its traditional access to the sea through the Assab Port. Consequently, the accord can be regarded as defunct, and null and void.
That means, if lasting peace is expected to be brokered between the two sisterly nations, lost opportunities and sources of constant tensions must be dismantled and dealt with once and for all. In particular, discontents consistently coming to the fore by concerned Ethiopians must be given priority as their opinions are neither second thought nor interpretations by external agents. These are first hand thoughts with deep sited concerns of one’s own nation. In the eyes of the overwhelming majority of Ethiopians, the Meles Zenawi’s regime took its own premature, hasty and presumptuous thoughts to the Algiers meeting without much deliberation was done by Ethiopian stakeholders on the deal especially concerning substantial national factors as the ones mentioned herein and thus far. In actual fact, Ethiopia’s access to the sea and the fate of the 2 million Afar populations should have been exhaustively examined in preparation for likely negotiations during the meetings in Algiers. Consequently Ethiopians remain disappointed with the whole process of the Agreement attempted thus far.
To one’s dismay, ever since its 1993 de facto independence, as a recently graduated nation, Eritrea has had no stability or peace; it remains in turmoil either with itself (as regards internal administration and intervention for socio-economic development) or with its neighbors (pertaining to due cooperation and mutual coexistence). Rather, by carrying its feud culture forward from EPLF’s past-time as a guerilla fighter during the 1970s, Afeworki’s EPLF regime still remains rebellious and engages itself in different fighting both left and right with its neighbors including Ethiopia, Yemen, and Sudan claiming territorial adjustments to be made for its newly independent Eritrean state. In fact the Eritrean regime has had over a two years protracted war (1998-2000) with Ethiopia over the border dispute and got even involved in the conflict in Somalia (in late 2006) with the aim to carryout a proxy war against its archenemy Ethiopia.
As regards Ethiopia’s rightful, legitimate and traditional access to the sea and the unjustly divided communities all along the disputed border frontiers and particularly that of the Afar population, the delegation at the Algiers Agreement was simply playing its card of pragmatism, of a hasty estimate that Ethiopians can make less trouble over the whole issue than the Eritrean counterparts. To the contrary, attempting to keep Ethiopia landlocked since 1993 the Commission participants have exerted negative implications on Ethiopia and on its geopolitical and economic security for no justifiable reasons other than providing a good will gesture on the part of EPRDF. It was actually a mistaken and poorly planned accord that still attempts to keep Ethiopia in a trap without any provision for its legitimate exit to the sea. For this reason, realizing the Algiers Agreement becomes gravely wrong as it fails to address the hitherto mentioned most primary and deep-seated Ethiopian security issues and geopolitical interests; indeed it obstructs to naively keep none-consulted and unconcluded agreements alive.
All along I was actually expecting to read a sensible clause where the Algiers Accord would actually protect the interests and the safe exit of Ethiopia to the sea but in vain. Indeed, the port issue pertaining to Ethiopia’s national security and its economic comparative advantages remains mute and yet crucial. We should not forget that Ethiopia is a founding and prospective member of both the UN and the AU, with its strong standing armed forces necessary to maintain the regional security and public safety. Hence if this accord is to be concluded after such long delays will Ethiopia becomes the first exception to that rule? This quarry has yet to get its due response.
As it stands, Algiers Agreement means nothing but three major fallouts, namely: (1) restraining Ethiopia with its 80 million populations to become landlocked and deprived of its traditional access to the sea; (2) curtailing the 2 million Afar populations to forcibly live divided within three different states including Eritrea, Ethiopia and Djibouti; and (3) in consequence, providing bad solutions that may breed the ground material for yet new conflicts between Eritrea and Ethiopia.
Whatever accord may be said and done, it is man-made; and not as sacred as one may like to romanticize it in theory. Agreements were said and done; and accords were cancelled or made null and void several times in the past especially when it comes to Eritrea-Ethiopia recent past history and links made thereof between the two parties. In similar fashion, even today, any accord should and must win the minds, soul and body of the people mutually co-existing in that region. In my view as the Algiers Agreement does not meet critical requirements; as it is already over due because of disputes; it must be apprehended and a New Deal must be forged in which talks between stakeholders representing Ethiopia and Eritrea respectively are held on the future of the two countries. Such future deal must consider core issues including Ethiopia’s access to the sea as well as the fate of the Afar population who still claim to become a breakaway nation in the region. It should also take into account the human rights and safety-nets of liberal democratic practices to be contained by either party sitting on the negotiation table.
Although Eritrea signaled acceptance of the Algiers Agreement claiming as a plan, which envisages an internationally- supervised graduation to its independence, Ethiopia on its part has rejected the Agreement outright by considering it as ‘fundamentally unacceptable.’ As a result, Afeworki is turning left and right and is master-minding the mother of all wars in the region.
To strife Afeworki for his malicious actions committed thus far, Ethiopia needs to continue banking on its traditional allies including USA, UK and other Western powers as well as Russia in order to block the Algiers Agreement due to Eritrea’s illegitimate involvement in anti-peace actions and activities that destabilize the region. As it is, only few Arab states recognize the new Eritrean state bilaterally as a state functioning in its own rights.
As regards EPRDF’s regime stand on this matter, I still find it thorny to perceive why it made an attempt to sign the Agreement. In fact no winning army as that of the EPRDF during the 1998-2000 border dispute signs a peace accord unless guaranteed what it secured militarily. So why did Meles sign the Algiers Agreement in haste in the first place? Given that the Ethiopian response during the 1998-2000 war was to reclaim Badme, and given that the high cost of achieving that goal is seared in the memories of Ethiopians, it would be politically unthinkable for the Meles regime to justify to the public why it would accept the handing over of Badme to Eritrea as the Border Commission had ruled. This puzzling question has to get its due answers before moving further with the Agreement’s realization process.
Algiers Agreement’s Fallacy Fallouts
In my view, the main fallacy fallouts of the Algiers Agreement are three fold, namely: (1) the demarcation issue that leaves families and communities along the frontiers in suspense, (2) allotting a corridor to the sea for Ethiopia, and (3) the fate of the Afar population that is divided against its wishes between three states. These three tier-fallacies to date were committed before and soon after the 1993 de facto Eritrean independence that resulted in the 1998-2000 fighting and in the lingering tension between Ethiopia and Eritrea for so long. Resolving these three major fallacy fallouts can happen when stakeholders of the two countries can free their minds from hard-line contempt and hypocrisy against the other; and stop biting the drum of war to kill yet other thousands of lives.
As it is, Eritrea is busy manufacturing combatants at its Sawa camps all over its bounds. Ethiopia is also sleeplessly performing the same fixture in order to counter attack likely invasions that may take place in future. Why not opt for sensible and sound discussions and come to reasonable and practical solutions? One point is clear. For a fair and fraternal solution to make, Eritrea remains indebted to share its coastal resources by returning Assab to Ethiopia. Likewise, the two nations have to compromise and make a deal on how best to settle the fate of the Afar people who remain divided between three states. These are the crux of the matter that has been overlooked by the Algiers Agreement.
As Algiers Agreement‘s ‘take it or leave it approach’ has no place after such a delay as seven years since it was envisaged, it is time now to opt for a New Deal that may bring lasting solutions between Ethiopia and Eritrea. After all, the 1998-2000 border dispute was ignited and triggered by the Eritrean side that forced a border issue in as much as there was no international border to begin with. Looked at from pure a legal perspective, Eritrea has consistently violated the Agreement by over-stretching the terms and the period set in for the accord; for which Ethiopia cannot be held accountable any more. Therefore, in reality, the TPLF-EPRDF government must side-step the Algiers Agreement as the contents of this accord are asymmetrical, bumpy, partial and outdated. Hence, without any further delay, now are the time and the chance for Meles and the EPRDF regime to reconsider and reverse the course of the previously concluded solitude and hasty decision pertaining to Assab and the Afar population.
In any case, Ethiopians will never rest in peace unless these two critical issues are redressed properly and be given fair, fraternal, judicious and rightful proprietorship to the overwhelming majority of Ethiopians who remain landlocked for reasons that they did not give their consent through public referendum.
Concluding Remarks
In summary, in my view, any border arrangement and agreement for final demarcation has to redress the issue of access to the seas so that the deal is acceptable defensible not only to the EPRDF regime itself, but also to the overwhelming majority of Ethiopians. Only to save the unthankful Eritrean skin, the EPRDF regime has paid a heavy cost in its 2005 election campaign, in part because the Ethiopian public felt betrayed by how the incumbent regime handled the 1993 de facto Eritrean independence, and particularly, that of Ethiopia’s access to the sea through Assab Port.
While the border dispute on the Ethiopian-regime’s side of the coin may be viewed as power politics by ensuring the persistent hold of power by EPRDF, on the Eritrean regime’s side of the coin it can safely be anticipated as dogmatic and suspicious outlook towards Ethiopia.
Afeworki’s regime remains rigidly hate-mongering to any matter that has to do with Ethiopia. As per its external policy, it wants to keep a weak and divided Ethiopia in order to ascertain its supremacy over its archenemy. Internally, it wants to remain in power through suppression and tight control of the Eritrean population. For these reasons, it has already dismantled the national educational systems in Eritrea and has pulled the youth into its Sawa-military camps designated in various parts of the country.
Afeworki’s and EPLF’s scorn and hate especially for the Tigre and the Amhara ethnic groups of Ethiopia is heavily pronounced and publicly well-known; and his demonstrative burning of the Ethiopian flag at national holidays has become a common place. Afeworki’s and EPLF’s bitter hate-mongering for anything Ethiopian remains just deadly, permanent and indefinite. With such mind-set at hand, it becomes difficult to attain any peaceful resolution between Ethiopia and Eritrea where the vast majority of the poor peoples in either of the two nations still remain to fight against and free themselves from abject misery, illiteracy and chronic common diseases.
* The author is former University lecturer of Political Science at Univ. of Reading, UK. He can be reached at [email protected]