People and crowds calling for peace in the Eritrean town of Adi Keyh, during visit of the Secretary-General.

Addis Ababa/Asmara, December 2000 – It is a pageant of humanity - colours, faces, ages. Several thousand people singing, ululating, waving homemade signs saying "We Want Peace." Old men in fedoras, women in white netselas, exuberant children testing the limits of local crowd control.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan slowly makes his way from his helicopter into the public square of the Eritrean town of Adi Keyh, surrounded by journalists and an entourage of blue.

"I know what you want and want desperately," he tells the crowds over a loudspeaker in the square. "The signs said 'We want to get on with our lives. Too much killing, too much discussion.' And I agree with you," he says.

Secretary-General walks through Adi Keyh, Eritrea with UNMEE Force Commander, Patrick Cammaert (Netherlands).

"It was an unnecessary war, a war which could have been avoided," the Secretary-General says. "But now it's over. Now we have peace," he says, just days before the two parties sign the final peace agreement in Algiers, ending one of the world's most intense, bloody and costly conflicts.

"Courage," he tells the people gathered on the flat roof tops, flooding the streets and peering out from blue shuttered windows. "As you begin to pick up the pieces and rebuild your lives, you must know you are not alone."

Last First World War

The conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea has affected and maimed a landscape far beyond simple old towns like Adi Keyh. In fact, it is just a short drive from this town square to some of the infamous trenches that helped earn the Ethiopian/Eritrean conflict the title of the "last First World War of the 20th century." The trenches look like dark gashes in the red dust mountains, and in some places, the two forces are so close they can hear each other speak.

Even though the heavily armed soldiers are still in position, there has been no fighting for over five months due to an agreement signed on 18 June by both parties. The agreement called for a "cessation of hostilities," asked the UN to send peacekeepers, and determined that both sides would move their forces to create a "temporary security zone" that will be 25 kilometres wide -- artillery range - into which blue berets will be deployed.

Peace Agreement

The new peace agreement, signed on 12 December, established a permanent end to armed conflict, and set up neutral bodies to make recommendations on the border, settle claims and investigate what caused the conflict.

In between these two agreements, the UN's newest peacekeeping operation, called UNMEE, or the UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea, completed its start-up phase and is now getting ready to deploy up to 4,200 peacekeepers into the no man's land between the two armies to monitor and verify compliance with the security agreements.

In less than three months, 147 military observers set up team sites along the front and are now actively patrolling the area, while in just the last few weeks, an additional 1,800 military personnel arrived in the mission area. The mission's first satellite camp is fast being constructed in a little place called Dek'emhare.

Almost every day hundreds of vehicles arrive by ship down in the port of Massawa, as do huge military containers of rations and equipment. These are transported up the winding mountain road past indifferent donkeys and camels and through the little towns that have withstood the recent war and the 30-year liberation war that preceded it.

UNMEE

UNMEE is positioned in the heart of ancient and cohesive cultures. We are an intrusion of schedules, shuttles and supplies. Our economic impact is already evident in the way rents have been rising. Eritrea will likely feel our presence most because of its size - roughly four million to Ethiopia's sixty million. For the most part, though, there is a sense that people will tolerate the inconvenience of our presence if it leads to a return to normalcy. An old man at a tea stand asks if I think there will be peace and closes his eyes in prayer. When I ask one family how many children they have, the father answers, "Four, and one on the front."

This war erupted on 6 May 1998, for reasons still to be determined. Depending on who you ask, the underlying cause could be any combination of port access, changing currencies, or border issues. Whatever the catalyst, the conflict has affected millions of people, caused massive displacements, diverted resources and destroyed infrastructure in both countries, and happened to coincide with severe drought in some areas. As always, the poor have felt it most.

The Pressure is On

A young Eritrean boy contemplates his future. In the background is the Mareb River Valley, site of one of the bloodiest battles of the war.

As for UNMEE, it has pressures of its own, even apart from supporting the peace process: We are the UN's latest peacekeeping operation, and our creation coincides with the Brahimi report, which focuses the international spotlight on improving UN peacekeeping. In addition, this is the first deployment of SHIRBRIG, the UN's multinational stand-by high readiness brigade. The Dutch are sending their first UN peacekeeping troops since Srebrenica.

UNMEE is viewed as a traditional peacekeeping operation dealing with two highly disciplined armies, and sometimes touted as the UN's best chance of peacekeeping success in Africa. But the issues are delicate, and tensions run high. And there are roughly 650,000 internally displaced persons throughout the two countries, who want to return to their homes in mine-strewn areas between the two countries.

"No one can claim to be a victor in this war," said the Secretary-General during his visit. "Particularly when you consider the misery, the hardship it has wrought on the people."

Just the other day, in a quiet triumph of humanity, UNMEE and members of the Ethiopian and Eritrean military - together - removed the remains of 20 soldiers from both sides who were killed in battle some months ago. Soldiers from both armies carried the dead to their respective countries. Four bodies were unidentified, one was still holding his canteen.

Not long ago, I was alone on a mountain listening to dogs barking and donkeys braying. A little boy and girl passed by. We smiled at each other and they kept walking across the valley, turning to wave from time to time. I wondered if they would ever be on a front. Each time I settled on an answer, they turned and waved at me again.