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The Eritrean–Ethiopian War took place from May 1998 to June 2000 between Ethiopia and Eritrea, forming one of the conflicts in the Horn of Africa. While Eritrea and Ethiopia,Spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the war〔(Will arms ban slow war? ) BBC 18 May 2000〕〔Staff. (Ethiopia rejects war criticism ), BBC, 14 April 2000〕 and suffered tens of thousands of casualties as a direct consequence of the conflict,〔Tens of thousands *(Eritrea: Final deal with Ethiopia ) BBC 4 December 2000 *(Eritrea orders Westerners in UN mission out in 10 days ), International Herald Tribune, 7 December 2005〕 only minor border changes resulted. According to a ruling by an international commission in The Hague, Eritrea broke international law and triggered the war by invading Ethiopia. At the end of the war, Ethiopia held all of the disputed territory and had advanced into Eritrea.〔Andrew England (Associated Press). (500,000 flee as Ethiopian troops storm Eritrea ), The Independent, 18 May 2000.〕 After the war ended, the Eritrea–Ethiopia Boundary Commission, a body founded by the UN, established that Badme, the disputed territory at the heart of the conflict, belongs to Eritrea. , Ethiopia still occupies the territory. ==Prelude== From 1961 until 1991, Eritrea had fought a long war of independence against Ethiopia. The Ethiopian Civil War began on 12 September 1974 when the Marxist Derg staged a coup d'état against Emperor Haile Selassie.〔 It lasted until 1991 when the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF)—a coalition of rebel groups led by the Tigrayan People's Liberation Front (TPLF)—overthrew the Derg government and installed a transitional government in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa.〔 The Derg government had been weakened by their loss of support due to the fall of communism in Eastern Europe. During the civil war, the groups fighting the Derg government had a common enemy, so the TPLF allied itself with the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF). In 1991 as part of the United Nations-facilitated transition of power to the transitional government, it was agreed that the EPLF should set up an autonomous transitional government in Eritrea and that a referendum would be held in Eritrea to find out if Eritreans wanted to secede from Ethiopia. The referendum was held and the vote was overwhelmingly in favour of independence. In April 1993 independence was achieved and the new state joined the United Nations. In 1991 the EPLF-backed transitional government of Eritrea and the TPLF-backed transitional government of Ethiopia, agreed to set up a commission to look into any problems that arose between the two former wartime allies over the foreseen independence of Eritrea. This commission was not successful and during the following years relations between the governments of the two sovereign states deteriorated.〔 The border between the two states became a major irritant, and in November 1997 a border committee was set up to try to resolve that specific dispute. After federation and before independence the line of the border had been of minor importance because it was only a demarcation line between federated provinces and initially the two governments tacitly agreed that the border should remain as it had been immediately before independence. However, on independence the border became an international frontier, and the two governments could not agree on the line that the border should take along its entire length,〔 and they looked back to the colonial period treaties between Italy and Ethiopia for a basis in international law for the precise line of the frontier between the states. Problems then arose because they could not agree on the interpretation of those agreements and treaties, and it was not clear under international law how binding colonial treaties were on the two states. Writing after the war had finished Jon Abbink postulates that President Isaias Afewerki of Eritrea, realising that his influence over the government in Ethiopia was slipping and given that "the facts on the ground, in the absence of a concrete border being marked—which anyhow lost much of its relevance after 1962 when Eritrea was absorbed by Ethiopia—have eminent relevance to any borderline decision of today" calculated that Eritrea could annex Badme.〔"Issaias believed that Meles was weak and that war would result in his overthrow. He was wrong." ()〕 If successful this acquisition could be used to enhance his reputation and help maintain Eritrea's privileged economic relationship with Ethiopia. However, because Badme was in the province of Tigray, the region from which many of the members of the Ethiopian government originate (including Meles Zenawi the former Ethiopian prime minister), the Ethiopian government came under political pressure from within the EPRDF as well as from the wider Ethiopian public to meet force with force. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Eritrean–Ethiopian War」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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