Ethiopia, Sudan agree to demarcate common border

ADDIS ABABA, Nov 14, 2004 (The Reporter) — Sudanese envoy to Ethiopia Ambassador Osman al-Sayed Fadil al-Sayed has disclosed that Ethiopia and Sudan had finalized the drawing up of a map on their common border on paper and that they were awaiting assistance from the international community to demarcate the border on the ground.

Ethiopian prime minister Meles Zenawi with the Sudanese president Omar el-Beshir (file/AFP).

The Sudanese ambassador told The Reporter in an interview that Ethiopia and Sudan had been working on the border issue by setting up three committees — a general, a technical and a special committees. The ambassador said though there were no problems whatsoever as Ethiopia and Sudan had similar maps on their common border, “a few greedy” farmers living along the border occasionally created problems.

Ambassador Osman said the cost of demarcating the 1,600 km-long border was very high and that the foreign ministers of the two countries had jointly asked international institutions to provide financial support.

Noting that he had read a report saying that the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) — ruling coalition government — had ceded Humera — in northwestern Ethiopia — to Sudan, the ambassador said the report was falls and that the Sudanese government and people had no claim on Humera.

Ambassador Osman reiterated that “even if we do not secure foreign financial aid for the demarcation of the border, the two countries can do it on their own. However, if the two countries fail to do it now, they may never do it in future”.

Indicating that the EPRDF government was the first Ethiopian government to be willing to talk with Sudan on the border issue, the ambassador said the two countries had also established excellent bilateral relations in others fields.

Material from the BBC Monitoring service — Original text in Amharic