Eritrea: Italian Minister, parliamentarian call for effecting boundary ruling as is

(AGI) - Asmara, July 2 - The United Nations should recognise Eritrea's right to the right borders as they have been marked. This was the appeal by the minister for Italians in the world, Mirko Tremaglia, who met president Isayas Afeworki this morning during his visit in Eritrea. The meeting took place on the even of the visit by the general secretary of the UN Kofi Annan to Asmara. The president of the parliamentary defence commission Camera Luigi Ramponi also went along. At the end of the visit, Tremaglia announced that Italy will begin cooperating again with Eritrea because the situation has become favourable. Eritrea, on its part, has undertaken to normalised diplomatic relations with Italy naming a new ambassador, currently there isn't one in Italy. "Eritrea Tremaglia explained, has a right to the right borders and the UN should subscribe those which have recently been traced, otherwise I will ask the government to take the initiative to guarantee the Algiers agreement of 2000. In Eritrea, because of the surveillance of borders with Ethiopia, there are 4,000 UN blue helmets including 50 Italian carabineri. The dispute had led to a war in May 1998 with the occupation by Eritrea of areas contended with Ethiopia. For the last few months, though, the peace process between the two nations is going through a difficult phase. The United Nations, the African Union, the EU and the US have recently declared that both countries should abide by the agreements taken in Algiers in December 2000 with no conditions and should accept the verdict of the international commission on the borders of April 13 2002 as final and binding. Last month the UN general secretary Kofi Annan sent a letter to the president in which no alternative mechanism is being sought for the evaluation of borders. Also because of this did Afeworki accept to meet the UN secretary.

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