Ethiopia-Sudan border conflict escalates with Al Burhan visit
16 January, 2021
Sudan’s head of state and leading general vowed to guard to the previous man a border strip his forces recently wrested from Ethiopian control following decades of occupation.
“It had been never expected that it will come to that between us and our Ethiopian neighbours, but the party that started it must suffer the consequences,” Gen Abdel Fattah Al Burhan said.
Gen Al Burhan gave some addresses on Wednesday throughout a lightning visit to eastern Sudan’s border region.
His comments were released by the Sudanese military time after his go back to Khartoum that evening.
Gen Al Burhan’s visit to Al Fashqa fuelled tension between your several neighbours, pushing them closer to the chance of an all-out battle.
“We've been patient for too much time and we've been suffering alone, but everything offers its limits," he explained.
"This is our correct and our territory and we'll all die defending it. Be totally certain that we will never budge and we'll never surrender our land ever again.”
The border crisis can be likely to compound the deadlock plaguing negotiations between the two countries and Egypt over a Nile dam being built by Ethiopia, which Sudan regards as a threat to its security.
Al Fashqa is at Sudan's international boundaries but had long been settled by Ethiopian farmers from the country’s powerful Amhara group
There were weeks of clashes somewhere between forces from both sides in the region late last year.
But the most current flare-up was sparked by the eliminating on Monday of five Sudanese women and a kid, which Sudan blamed on a government-backed militia from Ethiopia.
Two Sudanese women remain missing following the raid.
Gen Al Burhan's comments were met with cheers by viewing soldiers and residents.
Photos released by the army showed him touring the spot while position on the trunk of a great all-terrain pickup truck.
Time earlier, Sudan’s Foreign Ministry warned of “dangerous implications” after an Ethiopian warplane breached Sudanese airspace above the border region.
Also on Thursday, a high-level Sudanese military delegation flew to neighbouring Egypt.
Generally there it briefed President Abdel Fattah El Sisi about the “latest in the existing tension along the Sudanese-Ethiopian border", the Egyptian presidency said.
Egypt, Sudan’s long-period on-and-off ally, has been forging close ties with the Sudanese military in recent months.
The two recently held joint war games and exchanged high-level visits, and Cairo has repeatedly pledged to aid Sudan's military and economy.
Ethiopia delivered its group of stern warnings for Sudan this week.
On Tuesday, it told Khartoum that it had been running out of patience with its continued military build-up in the border place.
"The Sudanese side seems to be pushing in so as to inflame the scenario on the ground," Ethiopian Foreign Ministry spokesman Dina Mufti said.
"Is Ethiopia heading to start a war? Very well, we are saying, 'Let's focus on diplomacy'."
Ethiopia also accuses the Sudanese army of infiltrating its territory, trying to have good thing about its continuing fight separatist rebels found in the northern place of Tigray.
The fighting there's forced at least 60,000 persons to flee their homes and look for refuge in Sudan.
Sudan denied the statements.
“The area is Sudanese whatever anyone says,” Gen Al Burhan said on Wednesday, promising civilians living in the border area that his troops would protect them.
“You will remain here and you may live in security."
Sudan and Ethiopia have very long had concerns along their border, the demarcation which was determined found in agreements reached in 1902 and reaffirmed in 1972.
A joint committee set up last month to solve the border dispute didn't make any progress, the Sudanese authorities said.
Both countries are bound by close cultural ties but, in various conflicts because the 1950s, each side has supported rebel groups fighting the other’s government.
Source: www.thenationalnews.com