The guns fall silent

By Gamal Nkrumah
It was not exactly an exuberant affair, but the peace accord signed in Algiers last week was a landmark development in the African political arena. The Algiers Agreement was brokered by Algerian President Abdel-Aziz Bouteflika, working in tandem with the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), the United Nations and the United States. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan was among a coterie of political celebrities who flew to Algiers to attend the signing of the agreement. US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, OAU Secretary-General Salim Ahmed Salim, the Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki and the Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi were also present.
Locked in a costly dance of death and destruction, Ethiopia and Eritrea were cajoled into signing the Algiers peace accord by a peculiar combination of factors. There is currently a grim joke circulating among the two million-strong Ethiopian immigrant community in the US, the vast majority of whom are devout adherents of the Ethiopian Orthodox creed. Like St George's dragon, the conflicts of the war-torn Horn of Africa region will not lie down and die. Only the new St George, US President-elect George W Bush, they say, and his nominee Secretary of State General Colin Powell have the power to drive a stake through its heart. The irony is that Bush has hardly started to formulate an Africa policy. The moral of the story is that only US intervention can silence the guns of war in Africa. However, what the Algiers Agreement demonstrates is that, yes, Washington's good offices are indispensable, but peacemaking diplomacy is a concerted effort that also necessitates the active involvement and commitment of the OAU and the UN. The flurry of diplomatic activity by concerned neighbours also played a decisive part in establishing peace.
Peacemaking, however, has never come cheap. The outgoing Clinton Administration was in no position to promise funds, but international financial institutions were quick to reward the Ethiopians for signing the Algiers Agreement. Barely a week after the signing of the agreement, the World Bank launched a $460 million recovery programme package for economic and infrastructural development and the reintegration of military personnel. That sum, it appears, was the first instalment of an undoubtedly larger aggregate price for peace and placating the indignant Ethiopians.
Ethiopia would rather have cudgelled Eritrea into obedience. In May Ethiopia launched a major offensive deep into Eritrea, and the resulting war claimed tens of thousands of lives and widespread destruction of property and infrastructure. Maritime Eritrea has 3.5 million people, while its landlocked and much larger neighbour, Ethiopia, has more than 60 million. Ethiopian access to the Eritrean Red Sea ports of Assab and Massawa was a serious bone of contention between the two protagonists.
A new Horn of Africa with a more assertive Ethiopian power emerged after the devastating two-year border dispute between Eritrea and Ethiopia. Tens of thousands were killed and more than 1.2 million people displaced. Last June, Ethiopia grudgingly signed a "cessation of hostilities" with Eritrea which included undertakings to work towards a permanent cease-fire and a full peace accord. Even after the cessation of hostilities, Ethiopia was determined to flex its muscles and teach what it saw as an impertinent and insubordinate Eritrea a tough lesson.
Behind this promising event lies a combination of adverse developments. First, the Ethiopian Parliament has not yet ratified the accord, and there are vociferous anti-Eritrean lobbies both inside Ethiopia and among the large, prosperous and influential Ethiopian-American community in the US who question the legitimacy of the Algiers Agreement. Many Ethiopians feel that their country has bent over backwards to accommodate what they see as the unreasonable demands of the ungrateful Eritreans -- an upstart nation which they are convinced should revert to the lowly status of an Ethiopian province. Ethiopian officials vigorously deny this, but Ethiopian opposition groups both at home and abroad incessantly voice this view.
Progress on at least one front is vitally important. There is much political intrigue and unrest among the Afar people who inhabit the southern coastal strip of Eritrea around the Eritrean port city of Assab and the adjacent regions in Ethiopia, who want to unite politically with their kith and kin in Djibouti and Eritrea. Assab, or access to Assab, lies at the heart of a dispute that still threatens to pull down the fledgling peace process between the two Horn of Africa countries.
A decisive factor in clinching the peace deal was that determined men like Algeria's Bouteflika and the UN's Annan saw the Horn of Africa dispute as an opportunity to demonstrate their diplomatic skills. Annan wanted to play African statesman, and made sure that the warring parties were persuaded to give peace a chance. "It is a positive story for Africa which ends the year with a story of peace," he said after the signing ceremony.
The reality, though, is more complicated and, potentially, more explosive. A 4,200-strong UN peace-keeping force is to be deployed along the disputed 1,000-kilometre border to supervise the cease-fire. That is, of course, an important proviso. Under the terms of the Algiers peace accord, Eritrea and Ethiopia are obliged to release and exchange thousands of prisoners of war. The deal also includes provision of compensation for damaged or confiscated property. The UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) will supervise the situation on the ground. UNMEE Force Commander Major General Patrick Cammaert has already taken up his post in the region.
The accord also establishes a neutral commission to demarcate the 1,000 kilometre-long disputed border. There will be two members from each country, with an independent chairman. Both Eritrea and Ethiopia have submitted claims to the UN Cartographic Unit, and the commission will also take into account legal arguments. The demarcation process will take up to six months to complete.
The UN Cartographic Unit faces a Herculean task. The demarcation will take into account the treaties signed between Ethiopia and Italy at the turn of last century. Certain areas of Ethiopia have been administered by Eritrea and vice versa. Complicated land disputes are likely to arise as and when the border commission adjudicates between the warring neighbours. Shaky peace, perhaps. But the alternative is an endless prospect of violence, carrying with it much human misery and suffering.
Related stories:
Open hostilities, hidden agendas 25 - 31 May 2000
Charging on empty 18 - 24 May 2000
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