Joseph Legwaila

"I am an African, and these are two African countries which have shed a lot of blood in the war that ended in 2000."

"Therefore I will be the happiest man on earth if the decision is announced and we go forward to help them demarcate the border and thereafter live in peace as neighbours."

"The decision is the start of a new chapter for Ethiopia and Eritrea and to tell you the truth, in advance of the announcement of the decision, I wish them the best."

"It is a decision that is the whole raison d’etre for the peace process."

"The peace process is supposed to culminate in the normalisation of the boundary between Eritrea and Ethiopia and the normalisation ... is the opening of a new chapter for peaceful relations between the two countries."

"That's why the decision is very important."

"What it means for UNMEE is that the two parties have succeeded in resolving their dispute, that is if there is no problem with the decision."

"It would mean that UNMEE has been able to help the two parties solve their border problem, at least so far as delimitation is concerned because the border still has to be demarcated."

"He also said UNMEE would maintain a strong presence for many months to come while the physical demarcation of the border was carried out."

".Our mandate only terminates with the planting of the last pillar on the border."

""Therefore we still have lots of months to be here, to continue to keep the forces of the two sides separated while the boundary is demarcated...We are not winding down simply because the decision of the Boundary Commission will be announced on Saturday."

"If the decision is announced on Saturday and we are told by the president of the Boundary Commission that we should go ahead with demining for demarcation, we will do so."

"As far as we are concerned we have virtually demined access roads, not for demarcation, but we have been demining access roads because we use these roads in our patrolling of the Temporary Security Zone."

"Therefore all we would need to do is demine the areas where the pillars are planted."

"But I have always said to everybody, by the way, the people who are handling this peace process are human beings and the governments are also run by human beings."

"Once in a while there will be mistakes."

"And here we are, we are enjoying relative tranquillity and the peace process is on track, we are preparing the border to be demarcated."

"The most important thing is you have to deal with those problems effectively in order to protect the integrity of the process you are developing."

"There is still a lot of bitterness between them."

"the mission has not achieved every objective that we wanted to achieve"

"Our work is tied to the work of the Boundary Commission [and we] can only complete our mission if the Boundary Commission completes its work, announces the decision, and the parties accept it."

"We are worried that the longer they take to begin the process of normalising their relations the longer and harder it will be for them to do it after we have left. I keep telling them that every successful peacekeeping operation is successful because of the cooperation of the parties."

"The stalemate is firmly wedged between these two irreconcilable positions. The danger of the continued stalemate is war."

"The longer there is no solution to the stalemate, the more it becomes very difficult to monitor a temporary security zone, while violent rhetoric is emanating from both capitals."