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KENYA MAY WITHDRAW TROOPS FROM ETHIOPIA January 6, 2006
Apunyu Bonny
(SomaliNet) Kenyans who are the majority UN peacekeepers in Ethiopia and Eritrea could be withdrawn because the situation has become dangerous. A total of 335 Kenyan soldiers are playing a crucial role in the peace process as chief deminers and taking charge of logistics. Reports Daily Nation.
Kofi Annan, the UN’s Secretary-general has said that the situation has reached a dangerous stalemateleading to the possibility of withdrawing the force known as the UN Mission for Ethiopia and Eritrea. Annan told the UN Security Council that the present position of the mission was untenable.
The mission was sent to keep a five-year truce between the two countries however; Ethiopia has failed to comply with a border demarcation decision while Eritrea is restricting the UN mission working in the two Horn of Africa countries. Meanwhile a special investigation last month, the Government said that rising tension between the two states had made it difficult for the Kenyan troops to do their work, especially in Eritrea. Tension heightened after Eritrea banned UN helicopter flights in its airspace.
Kenyan embassy in Cairo, which is also responsible for the two countries, and Brigadier Abraham Wambugu, the Unmee deputy force commander, reported that tension had made it difficult for the troops to survey the buffer zone also known as the temporary security zone.
Eritrea has also restricted the movement of vehicles and foot patrols by UN soldiers, reducing the Unmee's performance by 30 per cent.