Eritrea Accepts UN Deployment PlanEritrea has accepted the United Nations' plan for a temporary demilitarized zone along its border with Ethiopia, reported the Herald, an Ethiopian newspaper, on Wednesday.According to the newspaper, the plan facilitates ways for the deployment of the United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea to the buffer zone between the two neighbors to monitor the implementation of a peace accord signed on December 12, 2000. It is believed that the Eritrean move is an act of good faith intended to break the impasse on creating a more permanent buffer zone between the two countries. Following the agreement, a total of 4,200 U.N. peacekeepers are expected to be deployed in the buffer zone to keep Eritrean and Ethiopian troops apart as of March 3, 2001. Eritrea won independence from Ethiopia in 1993, but the border between the two countries was never formally demarcated. The border disputes triggered a two-year war between the two countries beginning from 1998. |
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