Eritrea, 1999

Allow me at the outset to

join with others who have spoken before me in

congratulating you, Sir, on your election as President of the

General Assembly at its fifty-fourth session. I am certain

that your experience and skills, as well as your dedication

to freedom and justice, make you qualified to lead the

United Nations as it searches for peace in Africa and

elsewhere in the coming year.

I also take this opportunity to pay tribute to your

predecessor, Mr. Didier Opertti, for the effective manner in

which he guided the work of the previous session. I extend

my gratitude to the Secretary-General for his dedicated and

exemplary contributions to the cause of peace.

Permit me also to welcome the Republic of Kiribati,

the Republic of Nauru and the Kingdom of Tonga as new

Members of our Organization.

It is a matter of deep concern that this year is

witnessing the continuation of conflicts and the emergence

of new sources of conflict. In particular, it is disturbing to

note the growing tendency to resort to the use or threat of

force. This has become a grave danger to the independence

and unity of States as well as to regional and international

peace and security. This year has recorded some of the

bloodiest inter-State and intra-State conflicts, in Africa,

Asia and Europe.

Sub-Saharan African has been the part of the world

that has suffered most from those conflicts. Sub-Saharan

Africa’s economic performance and political stability have,

in fact, taken a turn for the worse in 1999. About one

third of the 52 members of the Organization of African

Unity (OAU), all of them in sub-Saharan Africa, have

been worse off economically in 1999 than they were in

the previous year. Almost 20 countries have been afflicted

by armed civil conflict or inter-State war. It is not

surprising that almost all of the countries that have

suffered economic relapse are the ones that are embroiled

in conflict.

Among those 20, the worst are to be found in the

Horn of Africa. More than two thirds of their people are

living in abject misery. Most have little or no food. They

are ridden with disease. The economies of most of those

countries are in shambles. The region is politically

unstable and racked by conflict. It is no surprise,

therefore, that some donor States and international

financial institutions have rightly denounced the state of

affairs and have informed a few of those States that they

would be better advised to feed their hungry millions and

better manage their economies than squander countless

millions to finance ill-advised military adventures.

In his report on Africa, Secretary-General Kofi

Annan made it amply clear that economic stagnation and

poverty are a direct function of conflict. However, this is

as evident elsewhere as it is in Africa. Thus, the situations

in East Timor, Afghanistan, Kosovo or Bosnia and

Herzegovina are no different from those in the Horn of

Africa, Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of the

Congo or Angola. In all those cases, conflicts have caused

serious setbacks in development plans and negatively

impacted on the living conditions of the people. In almost

all cases, conflict has been the intrinsic cause of famine

and serious violations of human rights and other

humanitarian crises. The international community cannot

afford complacency in the face of such threats to

international peace and security, if it is to be believed that

peace is indivisible and that what happens in one region

will have an impact on others.

Various reasons, including ethnic and religious

hatred, economic and political grievances and

unemployment, have been advanced as the root causes of

conflict. While these are valid factors, it must never be

forgotten that territorial expansionism, both within and

outside the State, and the determination to achieve it by

the use or threat of military force and by political and

economic coercion against the territorial integrity and

independence of neighbouring countries, has been the

major cause of conflict and the disturbance of peace in

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the Horn of Africa. Eritrea, the victim of Ethiopia’s

territorial ambitions and its policy of aggression, is one

example of this.

It has now been 16 months since the eruption of the

conflict between Eritrea and Ethiopia, the root cause of

which is Ethiopia’s avowedly ethnic-based policy of

territorial aggrandizement and its systematic annexation of

large areas of Eritrean territory. From the beginning of the

conflict, Eritrea has consistently pursued a policy of

peaceful resolution of the border problem even in the face

of provocation, creeping annexation of its territory and

outright aggression. To that end, it had attempted, before

the eruption of the conflict, to engage the Ethiopian

Government in peaceful dialogue to amicably resolve all

existing problems and controversies related to their

common border. Even after the start of the conflict, Eritrea

on several occasions requested the Ethiopian side to agree

to accept bilateral negotiations. When this was rejected by

Ethiopia, Eritrea unilaterally issued a proposal which

contained detailed modalities for the peaceful resolution of

the conflict. That too was rejected by the Ethiopian regime.

After the Organization of African Unity (OAU) was

seized of the matter, Eritrea accepted, despite its grave

reservations, the Framework Agreement submitted to both

parties following the Ouagadougou summit of June 1998,

after it had received the clarifications it had sought on

several critical issues. Eritrea also readily and unequivocally

accepted, at the Algiers OAU summit in July 1999, the

modalities for the implementation of the Framework

Agreement. The modalities were in fact drawn up to satisfy

the unjust, unfair and unwarranted new preconditions made

by Ethiopia on the basis of its own unilateral interpretation

of the Framework Agreement. Eritrea declared that it was

accepting the modalities only in the interests of peace and

of the good of both the Ethiopian and the Eritrean peoples.

Finally, Eritrea also accepted without any delay the

technical arrangements for the implementation of the

Framework Agreement and modalities which were

submitted to both parties on 23 August 1999.

Implementation of the provisions of the Framework

Agreement would entail, inter alia, the following: it would

require a cessation of hostilities, the redeployment of the

troops of both sides from disputed territories and the

deployment of peacekeeping forces in those areas. Eritrea

is fully committed to this. It would require investigation of

the sequence of events to determine the origins of the

conflict. Eritrea welcomes this since it would conclusively

identify the real aggressor. The Framework Agreement

envisages the investigation of human rights abuses. Eritrea

awaits the results eagerly. Implementation would

determine the exact borders between the two countries.

Eritrea is enthusiastic about this. Eritrea is certain that the

international community too is just as eager and

enthusiastic about finding the final truth on all these and

other related matters.

On the other hand, the Ethiopian Government was

determined to achieve its territorial ambitions by all

means, fair or foul. To this end, in 1997 and 1998,

members of the armed forces and militia of the Ethiopian

Government systematically used brute force to expel

Eritreans from Eritrean lands and to incorporate southern

and south-eastern Eritrean territories into Ethiopia. That

Government then rejected all Eritrean overtures on direct

peace talks and continued feverishly to prepare for new

aggression even as it paid lip service to the Framework

Agreement. On 6 February 1999, it launched an invasion

along several sectors of our common boundary, even

while peace facilitators from the United Nations and the

United States were engaged in shuttle diplomacy to bring

the conflict to an end. Sadly, tens of thousands of

Ethiopians and many Eritreans perished or were wounded

during that aggression.

When Eritrea accepted the Framework Agreement,

Ethiopia came out with new preconditions based solely on

its own interpretation of the Agreement, rather than

joining Eritrea in the implementation of the peace plan.

Yet Ethiopia was to accept the modalities — which were

actually formulated to satisfy its unfair, unjust and

unwarranted demands — only after much prevarication

and procrastination. Finally, Ethiopia issued a statement

on 4 September 1999 which was tantamount to a rejection

of the technical arrangements, which are only a procedure

for implementing the Framework Agreement and the

modalities, on the untenable grounds that it contained

elements which were not part of the previous two

documents. One week later, on the eve of the Ethiopian

new year, in a reiteration of Ethiopia’s previous

declaration of war, its President publicly announced that

Ethiopia would use force to impose its will over disputed

territory. That was a blatant repudiation of the OAU

effort, all of whose documents had been endorsed by the

United Nations and other concerned organizations and

Governments.

The OAU has given Ethiopia clear and unambiguous

clarifications in response to its queries and concerns. It is

also to be recalled that the OAU had decided, and both

parties had accepted, that any interpretation of the

documents would be made solely by the OAU and its

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current Chairman. The OAU and the United Nations have

also agreed to become guarantors of the scrupulous

implementation of all the provisions of the OAU peace

package. Ethiopia’s latest threat of war and its consequent

repudiation of its commitment to the OAU peace process,

which is inflexible about the peaceful resolution of the

conflict, are thus in contempt of the OAU, the United

Nations and the international community. Ethiopia’s refusal

to accept the technical arrangements until its new set of

preconditions are met is holding the peace process hostage

in spite of the clamour of the international community for

the acceptance and quick implementation of the peace plan.

However quixotic and unjustifiable it may be, the

Ethiopian Government has declared that it will not accept

the technical arrangements until it receives from the OAU

a firm assurance of Ethiopian sovereignty over the disputed

areas. Obviously, this is a direct contradiction of, and a

frontal assault on, the Framework Agreement, whose

provisions clearly declare that the

“redeployment will not prejudge the final status of the

area concerned, which will be determined at the end

of the delimitation and demarcation of the border and,

if need be, through an appropriate mechanism of

arbitration”. (S/1998/1223, annex, p. 25)

Surely, the proposition that a State must a priori be

awarded full sovereignty over contested territory before the

determination of ownership must distort the norms of

international law and international relations. Ethiopia has

also claimed that its decision to use force to control

contested areas was taken in self-defence. Such a notion

relegates the concept of self-defence to the realm of self-

help.

It is not difficult to conclude which party to the

Eritrean-Ethiopian conflict has undertaken to fulfil in good

faith its obligations under the OAU peace package and

which party is determined to undermine, by direct or

indirect aggression, the Charters of the United Nations and

the OAU, thereby endangering peace, security, stability and

peaceful development in our region. It is not difficult to

determine which of the parties is resolved to bring about

territorial changes, in clear violation of the OAU and

United Nations Charters, by aggression, coercion,

infiltration and subterfuge. A perfunctory analysis of the

media — particularly the broadcast media — of both

countries will also reveal which of the parties is fanning the

flames of ethnic hatred and is actively engaged in

propaganda and in preparation for a new war, thereby

committing a crime against peace. In short, it is very easy

to identify which of the parties is committed to peace and

which is committed to war and aggression.

Once again, war clouds are looming ominously over

our region. It is now self-evident that the Ethiopian

Government is still determined to pursue a policy

predicated on violent aggression. By its shrill war

hysteria, the Government of Ethiopia is making it clear

that it is poised to invade our country yet again. It is not

our wish to fight. The bitter experience of a long war of

independence has taught us to dread war. We seek no

territorial expansion, and we have no plan to commit

aggression against any other State. We seek to live in

peaceful cooperation with all our neighbours. Yet if war

is imposed on us we must — and will — fight to

safeguard the sovereignty of our country and to preserve

our dignity as a people. In this connection, Eritrea

solemnly declares in this Assembly that the responsibility

for any new military engagement will lie with the Addis

Ababa regime.

We have exercised prudence and patience in the face

of aggression, provocation and crimes committed by the

Government of Ethiopia against our nationals in Ethiopia

and Eritrea. A State has the duty to protect its nationals

from injury caused by the Government of any State. Yet

Eritrea has hitherto preferred to react with equanimity to

the gross and violent violations of the human rights of

Eritreans and Ethiopians of Eritrean origin in the hope of

securing a peaceful resolution of the conflict.

However, there are limits to the misdoings that any

respectable State must tolerate. It would be unacceptable

for any Government worthy of the trust of its people not

to defend the State and the people it represents against

aggression. It would be an unthinkable calamity for a

people which had fought for so long, endured

unimaginable hardship and won its independence against

all odds to lose its rights as a people and a nation to an

aggressor.

It is incumbent on those who love freedom and

justice and respect the equality of peoples, who are

committed to peace and cherish the norms and principles

of the United Nations, to ensure that law and moral

principles prevail against international lawlessness and

immorality.

Ethiopia’s threatened aggression must be a source of

deep concern to the international community and

particularly to the OAU and the United Nations which

have consistently urged both parties to restrain themselves

31

from the use or threat of force and to solve the conflict by

peaceful means.

To this end, the international community must insist

that both parties recognize and respect each other’s right to

live in peace within secure and recognized borders. It is for

this reason that Eritrea believes that this Assembly has the

duty to uphold the decision of the OAU, which has already

been endorsed by the United Nations Security Council, and

calls upon the Assembly to denounce Ethiopia’s renewed

preparation for war against Eritrea and to demand that it

accept and implement the OAU peace package. Surely, if

there is any lesson that must have been learned in the last

16 months, it is that nothing can be gained, and everything

may be lost, by continued warfare.

Therefore, the Government of Eritrea calls upon the

United Nations and the international community to: first,

condemn Ethiopia’s commitment to the use and threat of

force; secondly, establish a short time-frame within which

Ethiopia must definitively respond to the peace package;

thirdly, take timely and appropriate measures for the

immediate and unconditional implementation of the OAU

peace plan in its entirety; and, fourthly, immediately deploy

an observer mission to identify the aggression in the event

of renewed conflict.