Canada says Badme is Eritrean and Future cooperation depends on Ethiopia’s acceptance EEBC decision
Ottawa, Canada 4 May 2005 (S.B.) A Canadian Committees of the House of
Commons "by unanimous consent" has agreed that "Algiers Agreement, the
recommendations of the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission (EEBC) are
binding on both parties of the conflict and are final".
The Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade
added that it is "Alarmed over Ethiopian failure to fully comply with,
and accept, the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission's
recommendations, especially with regards to the town of Badme." The
Committee added that it "Agrees with the EEBC April 13, 2002 to grant
the disputed town of Badme to Eritrea".
The Canadian House of Commons Committees reached this unanimous
decision pursuant to its consultation with the former Canadian Foreign
Minister and currently United Nations Special Envoy to Eritrea and
Ethiopia, Hon. Lloyd Axworthy.
During the consultation the Special Envoy had stressed to the
Committee that, "First the rule of law must be upheld. In this context
this means that the Algeria Agreement and the Boundary Commission is
legal framework through which the conflict must resolve and the
decision of April 2002 must be implemented. There is no alternative
mechanism. The only alternative is going to war."
Mr. Axworthy underscored that Canada "at the present time substantial
transfer of direct aid to the government of Ethiopia of well over $100
million at last count." Mr. Axworthy pointed out that this "direct
budgetary support" to Ethiopia could "elevate the risk of such fund
contributing to a military build-up."
In a similar manner the Committee proposed, "that the Government of
Canada forcefully indicate to the Government of Ethiopia that our
future cooperation would heavily depend on Ethiopia's acquiescence to
the recommendations of the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission;"
In taking note of Ethiopia's mid-December military deployment of
additional 60 to 90 thousand troops close to the Temporary Security
Zone (TSZ), the Committee repeated UN Resolution 1586, for both
parties to redeploy "levels of deployment which existed previous to
mid-December, 2004."
On May 14 2005 the UN Security Council urged Ethiopia to reaffirm
unequivocally its acceptance of the EEBC decision and redeploy to
levels and positions that existed previous to mid-December.
While Ethiopia remains opposed to the border commission ruling,
Eritrea has unequivocally accepted it and Eritrea has also stressed
that it is ready to implement the border commissions ruling in its
entirety.
On May 15, 2005 Elections
Mr. Stockwell Day's motion that was passed "by unanimous consent"
declared that "in the opinion of the Standing Committee on Foreign
Affairs and International Trade, the government should send a
monitoring team to Ethiopia to observe and to report on the general
elections to be held there on May 15, 2005"
An AFP, April 15, report on the expulsion of two US citizens working
for democracy advocacy groups from Ethiopia, stated that the "two US
democracy advocacy groups said this week that the expulsion of their
staffs from Ethiopia last month raise questions about the credibility
of the country's upcoming elections."
Moreover, Ethiopia's "accusations of bias" to a senior European Union
election observer monitoring Mr. Siegfried Pausewang and his
subsequent withdrawal have raised more "questions about the
credibility" of the upcoming election.
Ethiopia and Eritrea signed an Agreement on Cessation of Hostilities
on 18 June 2000 in Algiers, Algeria. The two countries had gone to war
in May 1998 because of a border dispute. It is estimated that 19,000
Eritrean and more than 100,000 Ethiopians perished prior to the
signing of the Cessation of Hostilities. The cessation of hostilities
agreement was followed by the signing of a comprehensive peace
agreement on 12 December 2000, also in Algiers, with US, UN, EU and AU
as witness and guarantors to implement the "final and binding" ruling
of a Boundary Commission mandated to delaminate and demarcate their
borders.
--
Yonas Mehari DVM, MSc,
School of Computational Sciences
George Mason University
