Analysis: Peace eludes Horn

A settlement seems far away

By BBC News Online's Justin Pearce

Brokering peace between Eritrea and Ethiopia was never going to be easy.

But amid reports of heavy fighting in the last few days, there is no evidence of progress at the renewed peace talks in Algiers.

In the past week, Algerian mediators acting on behalf of the Organisation of African Unity have presented Ethiopian and Eritrean representatives with a "revised, consolidated" peace proposal.

Zalambessa: Ethiopia has recaptured the town from Eritrea

The two sides were supposed to consider the proposals over the weekend - but a press conference scheduled for Monday and intended to report on progress in the talks was ominously cancelled.

Few details of the revised plan have been released. Chief negotiator Ahmed Ouyahia has said only that the proposal would give reinforced guarantees for Ethiopian troops to be redeployed and for Eritrean troops to withdraw.

Meditators have spoken of an atmosphere of goodwill at the talks, but the continuing fighting seems to belie this assessment.

Far apart

The two countries' positions remain, if anything, further apart than they were before the war resumed a month ago.

The OAU first drafted a peace plan for the Horn in 1998, in response to the first round of fighting.

Eritreans in Rome voice their support for the peace plan

In theory, that plan still exists. But the fighting over the last few months means that it will be harder than ever to get to the first stage of the peace programme - and Ethiopia's new demands for an armed neutral buffer force deployed within Eritrea might mean a complete redrafting of the agreement.

From the start, the peace plan was held up by disagreements over how it was to be implemented. Ethiopia insisted that Eritrea must withdraw from areas occupied at the start of the war before the two countries could engage in face-to-face talks to resolve the border dispute - a condition which was unacceptable to Eritrea.

Military advantage

Ethiopia's principal intention in seizing Eritrean territory last month appears to have been to reverse Eritrea's gains, so that any subsequent talks would take place with Ethiopia having the military advantage.

Eritrea cannot muster as many troops as its larger neighbour

In that respect, Ethiopia has succeeded - and its position of strength means that mediators will be under pressure to accommodate the demand for a buffer force.

Since the talks began in Algiers, fighting has intensified in the Bure area, with reports suggesting that Ethiopia has pushed deep into Eritrean territory there.

The Bure area - a remote desert with few settlements or other obvious landmarks - is likely to pose particular problems when it comes to determining which land rightly belongs to which country.

Redundant plan?

The original OAU peace programme plans for a 92-day period from the signing of the agreement to the restoration of civilian administration in the disputed territories.

This process will include the deployment of an OAU observer force, with UN backing, and the establishment of a military co-ordinating commission.

Meanwhile, UN cartographers will start investigating the causes of the territorial dispute.

Once civilian administration has been restored, an independent body will be set up to demarcate the border - a process which is supposed to have been completed within 185 days (about six months) of the signing of the agreement.

But that scheme has largely been overtaken by events - and if a buffer force is to be brought into the equation as the Ethiopians want, a future peace plan will have to operate on an even longer time-scale.

And once it comes to defining the border, meditators may well find Ethiopia in no mood to accept a judgement which is not in its favour.