NEWS RELEASE

Tuesday, March 9, 1999

ETHIOPIA TREATS ERITREA’S ACCEPTANCE OF OAU PEACE PLAN WITH SCEPTICISM

Prime Minister Meles Zenawi yesterday told diplomats based in Addis Ababa that Ethiopia treats Eritrea’s sudden acceptance of the OAU Framework Agreement for peace with scepticism.

‘If the government of Isaias Afeworki is genuinely committed to the Framework Agreement, it must immediately and unconditionally withdraw its troops from all occupied Ethiopian territories as called for by the peace plan’, he said.

He added that the statements of Eritrean officials and actions of the Eritrean army prove that the government is using the acceptance of the OAU plan to buy time to regroup and reorganise attacks on Ethiopia.

The Eritrean government has not yet officially revealed to its own people that it has accepted the OAU plan. Moreover, the Prime Minister said that ‘the letter which the Eritrean president sent to the United Nations Secretary General stating its acceptance of the OAU package lacks clarity and is open to interpretation’.

Only a week before the war started (on February 6, 1999), the Eritrean authorities denounced the OAU peace plan as useless and demanded an alternative.

Meanwhile the Eritrean forces still occupy Ethiopian territory in the Zalambessa-Aiga, Bada-Bure and Egala regions.