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22 March 2007
ASMARA (AFP) - The Eritrean government expelled the head of UN demining operations on its border with Ethiopia in the latest in a series of bans it has imposed on the world body's mission, the UN said on Wednesday.
The UN Mission in Eritrea and Ethiopia (UNMEE) said Asmara sent a letter requesting that South African David Bax leave the country for alleged "repeated violations of Eritrean laws and regulations by UNMEE-MACC (Mine Action Coordination Centre)."
"UNMEE does not agree with this decision or the rationale given, but has complied with the expulsion order and Mr. Bax has already left Eritrea," the UN said in a statement.
Bax, who heads the mission's demining wing, left Eritrea by the deadline of March 20, it added.
There was no immediate reaction from Asmara, which has increasingly slapped restrictions on patrols by UNMEE on its territory and expelled all of its European and North American staff.
Eritrea has refused to rescind them under the threat of UN sanctions, forcing the Security Council to reduce the number of its peacekeepers from the current 2,300 to 1,700, including 230 military observers.
Eritrea and Ethiopia last year rejected plans by an independent panel, the Eritrea Ethiopia Boundary Commission, to demarcate their frontier on paper.
The stalemate has left the status of the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) border with southern arch-rival Ethiopia unclear more than six years after a peace deal was signed.
When a border war between both countries ended in December 2000, they pledged they would implement any frontier decision by the UN-appointed panel.
Eritrea accepts the panel's current plan, which awarded it the flashpoint town of Badme, and wants it to be physically laid out. Ethiopia, which rejects the boundary, says the commission was acting outside its mandate.