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HORN OF AFRICA
IRIN-HOA Weekly Round-up 133
22 - 28 March 2003


CONTENTS:

ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: Border ruling stays as it is, commission says
ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: US sending more food aid
ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: Security for demarcation under discussion
ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: UN force commander meets US Horn counterpart
ERITREA: International community accused of "double standards"
ERITREA: Eritrean Airlines takes off next month
ETHIOPIA: Oil imports from Sudan at a standstill
ETHIOPIA: Britain backs bio-diversity scheme
ETHIOPIA: HIV/AIDS awareness programmes increased
ETHIOPIA: Country facing huge urban population boom
ETHIOPIA: New food crisis "in the making
SOMALIA: Women peace delegates lobby for their rights
SOMALIA: Peace talks have achieved little, civil society says

ALSO SEE:

ETHIOPIA: Feature - "Silent water crisis" at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33088

SOMALIA: Feature - Continuity or change in Somaliland? at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33007

SOMALIA: Feature - Funding Somaliland's poll at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33066


ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: Border ruling stays as it is, commission says

The independent Boundary Commission has rejected calls by Ethiopia for
variations to the contested border with neighbouring Eritrea and called
for moving ahead with demarcation. In an 11-page "observations" report
issued on 21 March, the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission (EEBC) also
stated that the now-symbolic village of Badme - where the two-year border
war flared up - was in Eritrea. "It [EEBC] cannot allow one party to claim
a territorial right, to insist on adjustments of parts of the boundary
which that party finds disadvantageous," the EEBC said in its latest
report. It described the evidence put forward by Ethiopia as "inadequate".

"The maps submitted by Ethiopia were inconsistent as to the location of
Badme village and the evidence was nothing like what might have been
expected," it said. Ethiopia said a team of lawyers was analysing the
report. Eritrea's acting Information Minister Ali Abdu Ahmed said there
had been too much devastation and the two sides should work for peace.
[Full story at:  http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33116 ]

ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: US sending more food aid

Ethiopia and Eritrea, both reeling from severe drought, are to receive an
additional 200,000 mt of food aid from the US. According to a statement
from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the US
government has pledged 186,540 mt of food aid for Ethiopia, while Eritrea
will receive some 13,500 mt of wheat. According to aid agencies, the
harvest in Ethiopia is down by as much as 25 percent and Eritrea has
suffered its worst crop failure in a decade. The USAID statement said the
pledge demonstrated the government's commitment to the crisis in the Horn
of Africa. "We are pleased to be able to continue to help Ethiopia and
Eritrea address this dire situation," said USAID head Andrew Natsios. The
additional food is part of a US emergency food assistance programme for
Africa called the Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust, of which the two
countries are the main beneficiaries. The trust fund allows the US to
respond to unanticipated food crises around the globe for humanitarian
relief in developing countries. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33089 ]

ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: Security for demarcation under discussion

Security plans for the impending demarcation of the border between
Ethiopia and Eritrea are being drawn up, the head of the UN's peacekeeping
force said on Saturday. In a statement, the UN Secretary General's Special
Representative, Legwaila Joseph Legwaila, said talks of "common concern"
were underway about what security measures would be in place for
demarcation - now scheduled for July. The security talks have been taking
place between both countries, the independent Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary
Commission (EEBC) and the UN's Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE).
Issues under discussion included who would be responsible for securing the
pillar sites and for providing security to EEBC staff. Legwaila's
statement comes after the EEBC urged UNMEE to ensure the safety of
boundary commission staff who will be working on the ground in the 25
km-wide buffer zone to mark out the border. The commission has also asked
UNMEE to protect the concrete pillars that will mark the new 1,000 km-long
border to ensure the bases "are not disturbed". [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33002 ]

ERITREA-ETHIOPIA: UN force commander meets US Horn counterpart

The force commander of the UN peacekeeping mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea
(UNMEE) has held talks with the head of the US anti-terror taskforce based
in Djibouti. The two-day talks, which took place last week, focused on
security in the Horn of Africa and how to ensure long-term stability in
the war-ravaged region. UNMEE's Major General Robert Gordon met Major
General John F. Sattler aboard the USS Mount Whitney in the Gulf of Aden -
the headquarters of the Horn of Africa taskforce. A statement released by
the US after the talks, which ended on Thursday, said that while both
sides had "distinctly different missions," they discussed "topics of
mutual interest." It said the meeting addressed "security issues in the
Horn of Africa region, force protection and methods for establishing
conditions leading to long-term stability in the region".  Maj-Gen Sattler
heads a 1,700 strong US force, including special forces troops who aim to
"detect, disrupt and defeat" terrorist groups operating in the Horn of
Africa region. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33003 ]

ERITREA: International community accused of "double standards"

President Isayas Afewerki's top economic adviser, Dr Woldai Futur, on
Thursday accused the international community of subjecting Eritrea to
"double standards" over human rights issues. Speaking to reporters at the
Office of the President in Asmara, he said conditions imposed on Eritrea
in the field of human rights were "much harsher" than those imposed on
other countries. He also reiterated the government's position that the
closure of the private press and the detention of dozens of political
leaders and journalists in 2001 was - however regrettable - necessary in
order to ensure the country's national security. Dr Woldai said that the
European Union had, for example, recently taken positions "against
Eritrea", while "rewarding Ethiopia" with further development assistance,
despite a "worse" human rights record there. "We didn't massacre people,"
Woldai said in reference to anti-government protests in Addis Ababa last
year when dozens of students were killed by the Ethiopian military. "We
put people in jail. There is a difference. So there is a double standard
there." [Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33096
]

ERITREA: Eritrean Airlines takes off next month

The maiden flight of the newly-launched Eritrean Airlines is due to depart
from Asmara on 15 April, bound for Frankfurt in Germany. "The date has
been firmly established and we've been advertising it, and we'll continue
to do so for the next three to four weeks," said Mebrahtu Habte, executive
director of marketing and one of the airline's acting CEOs. Eritrean
Airlines is a government-financed endeavour established in May 1991. It
has so far remained an airline in name only however, serving as the only
ground handling agent at Asmara International Airport and at Assab. The
airline has also served as a sales agent for other major carriers which
fly to the country, including Lufthansa and British Airways. The expansion
of the company's operations to flights was decided at a workshop held in
Asmara last May, at which the government agreed to provide increased
financing for the lease or purchase of two planes. The government also
pledged it would ultimately privatise the endeavour in "a few years'
time", Mebrahtu told IRIN.  [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33013 ]

ETHIOPIA: Oil imports from Sudan at a standstill

Sudanese oil shipments to Ethiopia are expected to restart in April after
grinding to a halt barely two weeks after deliveries began, an official at
the Ethiopian petroleum ministry told IRIN on Thursday. Thousand of tons
of imported oil came to a standstill just weeks after the first ever
deliveries from Sudan to Ethiopia began arriving in late January, the
official confirmed. He blamed the current six-week shutdown - which
started in mid February - on the refinery run by the Sudan Petroleum
Corporation which, he said, needed an overhaul. "The refinery needed
maintenance - annual maintenance," he said. "That is why the deliveries
have stopped." However, a spokesman at the Sudanese embassy in Addis Ababa
said they were unaware that oil shipments had been halted. Prime Minister
Meles Zenawi has expressed concern that saboteurs could target oil
delivery trucks, although there is no indication any attacks have
occurred. Ethiopia is hoping to import about 10,000 mt a month of gasoline
from Sudan, the official said. Some 3,000 mt of diesel fuel would also be
imported monthly. Ethiopia's annual oil consumption stands at two million
mt and it spends about US $221 million on oil each year. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33092 ]

ETHIOPIA: Britain backs bio-diversity scheme

The British government announced on Tuesday that it is backing an
ecological scheme aimed at protecting Ethiopia's indigenous plant life.
The research programme aims to protect and boost native species of trees,
rather than fast growing imports which can damage the environment. Massive
deforestation in Ethiopia has left less than three percent of the country
covered in trees. The scheme will look at the role played by community
tree seeds in reversing the scale of damage caused by cutting down trees.
The project is part of a three-year research programme, run in partnership
with the world-renowned Royal Botanic Garden at Kew in London. The funding
comes under the Darwin Initiative which was established at the Rio Summit
in 1992 and aims to safeguard the world's biodiversity. Each year, some 30
schemes are funded worldwide through the British government's Department
for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Other projects in east Africa
that are receiving support include the conservation of flamingos on Lake
Bogoria in Kenya and rhino studies. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33045 ]

ETHIOPIA: HIV/AIDS awareness programmes increased

An international aid organisation in Ethiopia has announced it is stepping
up HIV/AIDS awareness, as the country is gripped by drought, to ensure the
virus does not further hamper relief efforts. Save the Children said it
would target remote areas in Ethiopia, where families have been hit by the
severe drought, to warn of the dangers of HIV/AIDS. Dennis Walto, deputy
programme director of Save the Children US, said that HIV/AIDS can
undermine emergency aid work as the virus hits the most productive age
group in communities. "In parts of Africa the emergency situation is said
to be worsened or even caused by HIV/AIDS," he said. "We are trying to
head off that type of situation by using the emergency as an opportunity
to reach hundreds of thousands of remote people with the message about
HIV/AIDS." The organisation uses teenagers within local communities to
perform plays and to set up training within community-based committees. It
also distributes condoms under the awareness raising scheme, funded by the
UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the US Agency for International
Development (USAID). [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33038 ]

ETHIOPIA: Country facing huge urban population boom

Ethiopia is facing a massive urban population explosion as families move
from rural areas to cities. The country, which is reeling from a severe
drought and food crisis, is facing one of the highest migrations from
villages to cities in Africa. The scale of the population boom within
towns and cities emerged at a conference on regional and urban planning
and landscape architecture in Addis Ababa. Berhanu Tamrat, Minister of
State in the ministry of federal affairs, said a federal urban planning
law would ensure "structured and organised" development. He told German
and Ethiopian experts at the conference that the government was drawing up
a draft law on a federal urban planning law. Urban population growth in
Ethiopia is increasing at around six percent a year, compared to other
sub-Saharan countries where growth rates are rising by four percent.
German Ambassador Helga Strachwitz said that Ethiopia faces major
challenges as the boom in the numbers moving to urban areas increases. The
ambassador said that "increased pressures" on the country's already
stretched infrastructure would rise as more people move into cities. [Full
story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33039 ]

ETHIOPIA: New food crisis "in the making

The UN's Emergencies Unit for Ethiopia (EUE) has warned of a new food
crisis "in the making" because of a lack of planting seeds for farmers.
The unit said hundreds of thousands of farmers are in urgent need of seeds
so that they can plant crops to harvest after the current short rains in
the country. Without the seeds, farmers will once again be forced to rely
on international aid to survive. "Major problems are posed by the supply
of seeds," the EUE said in a report entitled 'Shortage of seeds leads to
the next crisis'. "The problem of seed shortage, if not immediately
solved, will lead to marginal harvests in many places and to a certain
prolonged dependency on food aid," it said. It added that lack of
comunication and misunderstandings among concerned agencies was reducing
the prospect of a good harvest. Requests for seeds for farmers had been
made weeks ago, but none had yet been received and time was running out as
the rains had started. Farmers have been forced to eat the seeds they
would normally plant because of the severe drought and they now have
almost nothing to plant, the report stressed. [Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33004 ]

SOMALIA: Women peace delegates lobby for their rights

Somali women attending the ongoing peace conference in Nairobi, Kenya,
have called for women's rights to be included in all stages of the peace
process. Their call came at a three-day workshop for women delegates,
supported by the regional body Inter-Governmental Authority on Development
(IGAD), the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and the UN Development
Programme (UNDP). The workshop ends on Friday. On Thursday, the women met
the mediator, Bethwel Kiplagat of Kenya, to urge his support for their
cause. Somali women delegates have agreed to advocate for at least 25
percent representation in the new institutions, including parliament. "We
will start our effective lobbying soon after we finish this workshop,"
Somali women's activist Asha Haji Elmi told IRIN. "We are not lobbying for
only the 25 percent, but we are advocating a package for women's inclusion
in this process, and women's inclusion in every document of this process."
[Full story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33113 ]

SOMALIA: Peace talks have achieved little, civil society says

The Somali peace talks currently underway in Kenya have achieved very few
tangible results, members of Somali civil society said on Tuesday.
According to a statement, received by IRIN, the group listed a range of
objectives it said had not been met. These included "peace and national
reconciliation, agreement on a provisional charter and other core issues,
as well as the establishment of a national government". "The organisation
of the process is poor and should it continue in this manner, very little
can be expected," the statement warned. The talks - which began last
October - are being held under the auspices of the regional
Inter-Governmental Authority on Development's (IGAD) technical committee,
made up of Somalia's neighbours or so-called frontline states - Ethiopia,
Kenya and Djibouti. The statement accused the international community -
"especially the frontline states, the EU and the US" - of "heavily
influencing an inappropriate selection criteria for conference
participants", thereby legitimising and empowering faction leaders. [Full
story at: http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33041 ]


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