Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Rome (Fides Service)- “A possible key to understanding recent military manoeuvres on the Ethiopia / Eritrea border is a regime faced with domestic problems trying to divert tension to an outside enemy” said Federico Battera, researcher of History of Africa at Trieste University, commenting the warning issued by UN general secretary Koffi Annan, with regard to movement of troops in the frontier between the two countries. Annan has urged the countries to suspend immediately any actions which could be seen in a negative light or may threaten security agreements decided as part of the peace plan.
“Eritrea’s regime and president Isaias Afewerki appear to be more and more isolated at home where it has imposed strict control on the people” said Battera. “Ertirea’s opposition is quite varied: different tendencies and positions. In this context some outside observers might fear an increase in Islamic extremism. In my opinion the problem at the moment is restricted to northern Eritrea and the activity of armed fundamentalist groups with bases in neighbouring Sudan. I doubt that fundamentalism has many followers in the rest of Eritrea”.
“But we must consider” - the researcher adds - “the influence of fundamentalists in camps which house thousands of Eritrea refugees who fled to Sudan. There is a danger that young men may have been educated by fundamentalists and that therefore the country has a whole generation raised by Islamic fundamentalists with all the consequences for the country and indeed the whole of the Horn of Africa. Another factor to keep in mind is the financial capacity of extremist organisations. In a poor country like Eritrea this fact can have powerful destabilising effect”.
In this situation observers note an increasing number of people from Eritrea seek refuge in Europe.
Ethiopia and Eritrea fought a bloody border war from 1998 to 2000 in which at least 100,000 people died. Hostilities ceased in 2000 with an agreement reached in Algiers which entrusted an independent international commission with the task of drawing the border line. The UN sent peace keepers UNMEE (UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea), some 4,200 soldiers from 44 different countries to monitor the peace agreement.
Recently however Eritrea barred UN helicopters from its air-space and limited land the movements of the UN peacekeepers. In a letter to the UN Security Council last week President Afewerki said the organisation had lost credibility because Ethiopia had failed to respect the UN order to leave the borderline town of Badme assigned to Eritrea by the commission instituted as part of the peace agreement. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 3/11/2005 righe 42 parole 508)
