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Comment: Eritrea Must Provide Concrete GuaranteesSaturday, Feb 27, 1999"The analysis of senior UN diplomats and officials is simple and brutal. They say that Eritrea is now taking a hammering on the battlefield and is therefore anxious to accept a ceasefire. Even the Eritreans are admitting their losses. The Eritrean ambassador to the UN says Ethiopian forces have now advanced 10 kilometers beyond the disputed broder area of Badime. Some UN officials believe that Eritrea is concerned Ethiopia may press even further." BBC World News Summary; Top Headline; 23:00 UTC http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/news/summary.ram Dear Netters: On this very day that Eritrea claims it is accepting the OAU peace plan, its foreign minister verbally bashed the OAU and Eritrea rejected the OAUs attempt to send a peacekeeping team to Eritrea. This is indicates that Eritrea's acceptance of the OAU plan is a highly insincere move. Why didn't Eritrea notify the OAU directly? Why was an emergency UN Security council meeting necessary? All journalists are unanimously confirming that Eritrea has suffered massive defeats on the battlefield. These defeats and the ensuing panic in the Eritrean military command headquarters is the only reason why Eritrea cried for an emergency UN meeting. It's totally insincere. There is no commitment to peace here. Remember, as I have stated many times before, the major objection that Eritrea had was not the withdrawal, but their demand to have the unilateral Italian maps established as the only basis for border demarcation. Without this, Eritrea knows it will lose in arbitration. The only logical explanation for Eritea's claimed acceptance of the OAU peace plan now, is that they want time to regroup their army. The Eritrean dictator is a very stubborn fellow. He hasn't given up the fight yet. In order to convince Ethiopia of its sincerity, Eritrea must undertake concrete measures that demonstrate its irreversible commitment to peace. It is up to Eritrea itself to come up with these convincing measures, but I would suggest a few for starters:
(2) Immediately release all Ethiopian cargo held hostage at Assab port. (3) Apologise to the OAU for all their insults. (4) Immediately withdraw all their troops from Ethiopian territory (5) Hand over Habtezion Hadgu and other air force criminals for trial in Ethiopia (6) Present dictator Issayas Afeworki to the International Court in Hague for a trial (7) Repay Ethiopia the 1 Billion Birr debt which they borrowed in 1997. These are just a few suggestions I came up with. I think the Eritrean dictator and his intellectual parrots should spend the next few hours producing a convincing list of concrete measures that will show the world they are sincere. They must demonstrate that they are ready to renounce the aggressive, militaristic nationalism that has caused this war. Ethiopians will be waiting. The world should not expect Ethiopia to embrace a convicted backstabber without ironclad guarantees. - Dagmawi |