In Horn of Africa, Fighting Dashes Promise for Nations

They fought side by side against a common enemy, shared Western-oriented policies and won admirers in Washington, where they were viewed as exemplars of an emerging kind of African government--lawful, clean and economically vibrant--bringing stability to a troubled continent.

But now, to the distress of diplomats and, indeed, many of their own people, Ethiopia and Eritrea have fallen into a sudden, seemingly senseless fratricidal war over a patch of arid, rocky land on their border that is devoid of any obvious economic or strategic value.

The fighting continued Monday, against a backdrop of renewed American, European and African efforts to get the two sides to stand down. But there was no sign that a U.S.-Rwandan plan for a cease-fire and disengagement had won the needed approval of both sides.

Since combat started with little notice in early May, hundreds of people are believed to have died in infantry and tank battles along the disputed border between the two countries and in a ghastly bombing raid carried out Friday by Eritrea’s tiny air force. In that raid, a bomb dropped from an Italian-made training jet fell among civilians, killing at least 47 people, including a large number of children. Eritrean authorities acknowledged the raid but said it was an answer to an earlier strike by Ethiopia on the military-civilian airport in Asmara, the Eritrean capital.

How could these two countries, their histories intertwined and their people often intermarried, have come to such conflict?

Politicians on either side have been shaking their heads. And on the streets of this capital, ordinary Ethiopians on Monday seemed baffled and worried.

“We don’t know why the war started, but we know the effect is bad,” said Tarekegn Abate, a sociology student talking with friends outside the imposing stone gates of the University of Addis Ababa. Abate blamed politicians hungry for power, saying of Eritreans and Ethiopians, “We are not enemies.”

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For many here, the combat has been even more disappointing because it has challenged the assumptions that this part of the Horn of Africa had left behind a legacy of three decades of war and dictatorship and that people could now look forward to a brighter future.

“The civil war was over, and we were living in peace, working on development, and in the meantime, this happens,” said Helen Negash, a 25-year-old honing her language and management skills in anticipation of a career in business. “It is a pity, to have our people dying day to day.”

The issue between Ethiopia and Eritrea seems to be mainly about pride. Eritrean forces on May 6 took up positions on land their nation claimed as its due under an Italian colonial treaty defining their country’s borders. There was a clash with Ethiopian forces in the area, with skirmishes continuing intermittently.

That situation escalated May 31 into a major battle, followed by the exchange of air raids last week. At best, the 155 square miles at the center of the dispute may be better for agriculture than some surrounding land, said one Western diplomat, noting, dismissively: “You might be able to grow a few more bushels of wheat on it.”

This diplomat said Ethiopian officials have indicated their willingness to turn over the land if an impartial panel of international experts agrees with Eritrean claims. But before that can happen, Ethiopia demands that Eritrea withdraw to its pre-May 6 positions.

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The people of Eritrea waged a stubborn 30-year guerrilla war for independence against Ethiopia that finally bore fruit when the Eritrean fighters joined forces with government opponents inside Ethiopia in a military campaign that ousted military dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam in 1991. As a reward for the aid in deposing Mengistu and his regime, Ethiopia’s new rulers agreed to independence for the former Ethiopian province on the Red Sea; in 1993, Eritrea officially became Africa’s newest state.

Relations between the nations stayed harmonious, despite the unresolved border questions, until late last year. Then things began to sour. When Eritrea introduced its own currency, to replace the Ethiopian birr, Eritreans expressed annoyance that Ethiopia instead wanted to settle inter-nation transactions in U.S. dollars or another hard currency.

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Later, Ethiopian businesses complained that Eritrean customs officials had started bottling up their shipments at the Red Sea port of Assab. Tensions rose, in spite of an attempt to mediate by Susan E. Rice, the U.S. assistant secretary of State for African affairs. She twice traveled to Africa to try to mend relations.

She brought a high-level State Department team, which worked with Rwandan diplomats to hammer out the initiative that calls for international arbitration after both sides return to their previous positions.

Ethiopia has accepted but Eritrea, which has made military advances, has balked. A statement Monday by the Eritrean News Agency, instead, sought “direct talks between Eritrea and Ethiopia in the presence of high-level mediators so as to ensure a speedy resolution of the crisis,” Reuters news service reported.

A Western diplomat said that the United States has counted heavily on Eritrea and Ethiopia to help create a zone of growth and democracy in the Horn of Africa, to stave off famines and other humanitarian tragedies that have been a fact of life in the region every few years. Both countries get substantial U.S. food and development aid, as well as “nonlethal” military help from Washington.

“It’s obviously a setback,” the diplomat said of the current dispute. “But it’s still salvageable, and that’s why we are trying as hard as we are. . . . Both Ethiopia and Eritrea were countries we felt were worth working with and helping and improving, and we still feel that way. But it’s going to be harder now.”