The Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission (EEBC), which was charged with setting a border both on maps and on the ground, ended its mandate on Saturday.

Ethiopia and Eritrea had opted not to allow the commission, which was set up by the Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration, to stay on past its November-end deadline.

In 2002, the EEBC granted Eritrea the border town of Badme, a decision that Ethiopia has not accepted.

In September, the two countries and the EEBC agreed that unless the 2002 ruling was accepted by November's end, "the boundary will automatically stand as demarcated".

Border ruling

With no agreement reached on a fully delineated border, the boundary set in the 2002 by the EEBC ruling remains the only legal borderline.

Michela Wrong, an author and journalist, told Al Jazeera that Ethiopia and Eritrea reacted to the 2002 ruling differently.

"While Eritrea accepted the decision unconditionally, Ethiopia has had a real problem with the decision... but they are the power and the country that controls the area which would need to be demarcated," she said.

"If you are going to see this decision demarcated on the ground, there is only one country that can do that, and that is Ethiopia.

"Essentially it is in the control of one country."

Fight over border

Eritrea has repeatedly accused Ethiopia of planning a new border war, a claim denied by Addis Ababa.

By "refusing to withdraw from sovereign Eritrean territories, the [Ethiopian] regime has already launched an aggression against the Eritrean people," Asmara said last week.

Meles Zenawi, Ethiopia's prime minister, told Al Jazeera recently that military conflict over the border issue was only a last resort.

"There have been many provocations on the part of the Eritrean government but we have clearly stated that the only time when we would respond is if there is full-scale invasion of our territory," he said.

He announced on Tuesday that he had increased Ethiopia’s defence budget by more than $54 million in preparation for any renewed fighting with its neighbour.

"We believe the government in Asmara is well aware of our capabilities and another invasion would lead to their downfall," Meles told the Ethiopian parliament.

Growing risk

The International Crisis Group last month warned of a "real risk of renewed conflict" within weeks if efforts are not made to avert it.

The policy group claimed Eritrea had some 4,000 troops and military hardware in a UN-supervised buffer zone with 120,000 troops close by.

The ICG also said that Ethiopia had around 100,000 troops along the border.

Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, has appealed to Eritrea to redeploy out of the region, urging Asmara to lift its continued restrictions on operations of the UN peacekeeping mission UNMEE.

About 1,700 UN peacekeepers have patrolled the Eritrea-Ethiopia frontier since the 2000 peace agreement.

Analysts say the two countries fought a proxy war in Somalia earlier this year.

Eritrea was accused of supporting the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), who fought Ethiopian troops supporting the weak Somalian government.

Ethiopia and Eritrea border warning 

A UN-appointed panel has told Eritrea and Ethiopia to resolve a six-year border dispute within a year or accept a boundary map drawn up by other parties.

The two countries have already rejected plans by the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission to demarcate their frontier on paper.

The stalemate has left the status of the 1,000km border unclear and reinforced UN reports that both nations are militarily active in Somalia.

The panel said it would not let the dispute run beyond November 2007, when it would rule on boundary points in line with a delimitation decided in 2002.

A statement issued by the commission said: "If, by the end of that period, the parties have not by themselves reached the necessary agreement and proceeded significantly to implement it ... the commission hereby determines that the boundary will automatically stand as demarcated by the boundary points" defined by the panel.

The commission's warning comes amid growing tension between the two countries, and fears of a war that could spill over into Somalia, threatening a wider regional conflict.

Proxy war

Both countries fought a border war which ended in December 2000, when they pledged that they would implement any frontier decision by the panel.

While Eritrea accepts the panel's current plan, Ethiopia rejects the boundary, and said the commission was acting outside its mandate.

Eritrea warned that the current stalemate was "not sustainable" and refused to rule out a new war with its historical foe in the Horn of Africa.

However, Asmara repeated denials that Somalia had become a proxy battleground for it and Addis Ababa amid reports the two countries are backing rival factions to settle scores from the 1998-2000 conflict.

Last year, Asmara restricted patrols by the UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) and expelled all of its North American and European staff, rebuffing UN Security Council demands to reverse the steps.

Since September, Eritrea has expelled five UNMEE staff for alleged espionage, and sent troops into a demilitarised buffer zone along the border in what the UN said was a "major breach" of the 2000 ceasefire.

Threats next door

Further to the border war with Eritrea, Somali Islamics have accusing Ethiopia of sending troops into Somalia to prop up Somalia's Addis Ababa-backed interim government.

Meles Zenawi, the Ethiopian prime minister, told a news conference on Saturday that he had explained Ethiopia's position to Western powers since the Islamists seized Mogadishu in June.

"Both Brussels and Washington appear to believe that any military response on our part might be counter-productive, saying that dialogue is the best way forward," he said.

"We too agree that dialogue is the best way, nevertheless as the direct victims of the aggression, we feel we might be forced at some stage to respond with force.

"It is our country that is being attacked. Naturally, we do not seek any light, green, red or yellow from anyone to protect ourselves.

"If, and when, we are convinced that all options of resolving the invasion through peaceful means are exhausted, only then we may act to respond in kind," he said.

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