Norway spreading instability in the Horn of Africa – Ethiopia
August 28, 2007 (ADDIS ABABA) — Ethiopia accused Norway on Tuesday of undermining its national security and spreading instability in the Horn of Africa, a day after the Addis Ababa government asked Oslo to recall six diplomats.
“Norway has consistently and repeatedly (been) involved in acquiring leverage with the focus of causing instability in the Horn of Africa region,” said Wahide Belay, spokesman for Ethiopia’s Foreign Ministry.
“This, in turn, has seriously aggravated problems of stability in the Horn of Africa region and also threatened to undermine Ethiopia’s national security. … It has now become clear that there has been no change of policy in this regard.”
Norwegian media said Oslo’s efforts to help reduce tensions between Ethiopia and Eritrea — which fought a 1998-2000 border war that killed 70,000 people — appeared to be to blame.
A Norwegian official said Ethiopian officials were upset by Norwegian attempts to arrange a meeting of the Ethiopia-Eritrea border commission in September.
“They reacted very badly to that,” Raymond Johansen, state secretary in Norway’s Foreign Ministry, was quoted telling Norwegian news agency NTB. Tensions still run high between Asmara and Ababa over the disputed frontier.
Late on Monday, Norway’s foreign minister, Jonas Gahr Stoere, said in a statement that his government regretted the “unilateral decision” taken by the authorities in Addis Ababa.
“We must now take the consequences of the fact that the Ethiopian authorities are upholding their decision and we are therefore making preparations to withdraw six diplomats from our embassy in Addis Ababa (by Sept. 15),” Stoere said.
Stoere did not say whether Ethiopia provided any background on the reasons for the expulsions.
Stoere said the “sharp reduction in staffing” meant Norway might not be able to maintain development cooperation with Ethiopia at current levels, he said. Oil-rich Norway is one of the world’s biggest aid donors in per capita terms.
Wahide said Ethiopia’s government remained ready to talk.
“Our efforts have been and still are to engage Norway’s government in serious dialogue over the matter,” Wahide said.
(Reuters)
Fonqolcha Nura
Norway spreading instability in the Horn of Africa – Ethiopia
Taking the initiative to bring two war-torn improvised countries to negotiation table is really noble thing to do. Unfortunately the peace loving Norwegian effort to find a peaceful solution came at wrong time when the TPLF regime has unconditional support from lone superpower.
TPLF is war machine that uses war as its fuel to maintain its activity. Peace and stability are the main enemies of this regime. Without war TPLF can’t rule over other parties which won about 95% of the votes during the election.
Historically the biggest threat to Horn Africa’s peace and stability are the war fundamentalist Abyssinian ruler of the region. War and killing are their only means of negotiation and trying to solve disputes with others by dialogue without guns is totally unthinkable in the land of war heroes.
After Meles regimes victory over stateless and defenceless Somalia the TPLF government is expecting its rewards from the super power for successful Somalia invasion. Now Eritrea is demonised which means Meles has got a green light to invade Eritrea as well.
If he couldn’t remove the Asmara regime before the US election, it will be too late and Meles will never take any risks to loose this golden opportunity at this moment.