'Too soon to lift African Horn's arms embargo'
2001-01-10 12:00
United Nations - The Security Council is expected to lift an eight month old arms embargo on Ethiopia and Eritrea, despite objections from countries which say it is too soon to do so, diplomats said on Tuesday.
A spokesperson for Singapore, this month's council president, confirmed that a meeting had been scheduled for Wednesday morning to discuss a draft resolution to remove the embargo unconditionally.
The United States sponsored the draft, but a diplomat said that at least four council members were expected to abstain in the vote.
Since none of the permanent members is opposed, the resolution would be adopted, he said. Council resolutions require a positive vote by nine of the 15 members, but can be defeated by the veto of a permanent member.
The diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said those against lifting the embargo believed the United States was trying to force the pace before President Bill Clinton leaves office on 20 January.
The arms embargo, imposed in a unanimous council decision on 17 May last year, was the first example of UN sanctions with a time limit, and would automatically expire after 12 months unless expressly renewed.
But Resolution 1298, which imposed it, said the purpose of the embargo was to force the warring parties to immediately cease all military action, withdraw from military engagement, and resume peace talks.
The diplomat said they had only partly complied with the conditions.
Ethiopia and Eritrea signed a comprehensive peace agreement in Algiers on 12 December, ending a border war that had killed tens of thousands of soldiers in intermittent fighting since May 1998.
At the time, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan hailed the peace agreement as "a positive story for Africa which ends the year with a story of peace."
Speaking at a joint news conference with Annan in Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, said he was "confident and optimistic."
But the two sides have not fully disengaged their forces, and, in a letter to the Security Council on Thursday, Zenawi accused Eritrea of seeking to renegotiate the Algiers agreement.
He said Eritrea had raised "preposterous" territorial claims at a meeting on 28 December in Nairobi of the military co-ordination commission set up under the peace accord.
The draft resolution nevertheless "notes with satisfaction that the implementation of confidence-building measures and the exercise of restraint" had helped to dispel distrust between the two sides. - Sapa-AFP
- SAPA