- The government of Eritrea says that the peace plan presented made by Ethiopia last week is "hollow in practice" and constitutes "a serious violation of the Algiers Agreement" of 2000, establishing the Eritrean-Ethiopian peace. Ethiopia's new peace plan had already been hailed as a step forward by the international community.
In a statement issued on Saturday by the Eritrean Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the recent peace plan put forward by Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi is rejected. The statement also criticises the international hailing of the Ethiopian proposal.
- The announcement made by Ethiopia last week is hollow in practice despite unwarranted statements made by some countries 'welcoming it as a step forward', the Eritrean government said. According to the Asmara Ministry, Ethiopia was ignoring vital principles of the Algiers peace agreement.
In particular, Eritrea could not accept Ethiopia's "acceptance [only] in principle" of the international boundary commission's decision, which Prime Minister Zenawi continued to brand as "illegal and unjust". According to Asmara, this "constitutes a serious violation of the Algiers Agreement, which stipulates, without equivocation, that the decision is 'final and binding'."
The Ethiopian Prime Minister last week achieved an endorsement by the Addis Ababa parliament of his peace plan with Eritrea. While accepting "in principle" the border decision, Ethiopia however still holds it to be "unjust". The five-point plan peace plan further included a new dialogue with Eritrea, payment of Ethiopia's costs for the border commission and a start of the UN's demarcation of the border.
Mostly due to Ethiopia's rejection of the border ruling, a UN-led process of physically marking out the border has not advanced. Tensions have lately build up between Addis Ababa and Asmara and the international community has been concerned over the growing possibility of a return to the bloody 1998-2000 bloody war between Ethiopia and Eritrea.
Therefore, a new initiative to restart the Ethiopian-Eritrean peace process was immediately welcomed by the international community. The European Union (EU) welcomed the Zenawi plan "as a step forward". The British Ministry of Foreign Affairs "warmly welcomed" the plan and the UN showed interest in how it could "lead to the early and full demarcation of the border."
The Eritrean Ministry of Foreign Affairs however strongly rejected these positive signals from the international community, which its said "preferred to look sideways and to accommodate Ethiopia's violations rather than take credible action to ensure compliance." Asmara added that the EU's positive reaction had been "unfortunate".
- This is not a time to entertain or float new initiatives or 'proposals', the Asmara Foreign Ministry said in the statement. "This is a time to demarcate the boundary which should have happened much earlier in accordance with the Peace Agreement," it added.
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