Ethiopia, Kenya border security meeting underway
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By Tesfa-Alem Tekle
May 31, 2011 (ADDIS ABABA) – Kenyan and Ethiopian officials are
holding a consultation meeting in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa,
on their common security concerns and other related social issues
along their shared border.
JPEG - 13.4 kb
Map of East Africa, showing the Ethiopia-Kenya border where clashes
killed over 30 in May, 2011.
The consultation meeting will be followed by a high level ministerial
meeting in the coming days which aims to find ways of ending
hostilities among border communities and set a strategic security
measure for a lasting solution to both people living on the common
border.
In early May, Shimels Kemal, spokesman for the Communications Ministry
of Ethiopia told Sudan Tribune that clashes along shared border
between Turkana herdsmen and Ethiopia’s Merille community killed 34
people.
There were fears of reprisal attacks but the security and military
forces from both Kenya and Ethiopia say they took control of the area
before the incident turned into a full scale confrontation.
Border security has remained in tight since the fighting until peace
and reconciliation efforts were initiated by both governments in a bid
to defuse tensions.
Ministers from Kenya are expected to arrive in Addis Ababa on
Wednesday to discuss with their Ethiopian counterparts who the border
communities can peacefully co-exist. Essential to this will be
allocation and utilization of the areas resources, such as pasture and
fertile fishing grounds, which are mainly, blamed being the primary
source of conflict.
Tribal clashes along the Ethiopian-Kenyan border are common however
the latest fighting has been of a larger scale than pervious
conflicts. The fighting caused an outcry in Kenya, with
parliamentarians accusing the government of doing little to protect
vulnerable people at the border.
Last Tuesday, on the sidelines of the second India-Africa summit,
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and Kenyan president Mwai Kibaki
held talks on the border concerns and ways of preventing future
disputes between the communities and harmonize their co-existence.
On daily bases it is thought several Kenyan members of the Turkana
tribe cross the border to Ethiopia to purchase food from Merrile
villagers and sometimes misunderstandings between the two sides lead
to deadly clashes.
Following the recent fighting, the Kenyan government has begun
distributing food to Turkana villagers to deter them from moving to
the Ethiopian side of the border in search of food.
(ST)
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