Soldiers bodies to be returned home

A United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) military meeting agreed on the need to identify and return bodies of soldiers killed during the two year border conflict. In a statement released on Tuesday, UNMEE said the Military Coordination Commission (MCC) meeting had agreed “to develop a cooperative mechanism to handle the unburied remains” of those killed during the war. The bodies would be identified and returned to their country of origin, regardless of where they now lay, said the statement. During discussions regarding the number of Eritrean militia and police in the Temporary Security Zone (TSZ), the commission’s chairman, UNMEE Force Commander Maj-Gen Patrick Cammaert, pointed to a recent UN Security Council presidential statement. He said it had stressed that civilians in the TSZ should be protected by an “appropriate but limited” number of civilian militia and police. The meeting also agreed to establish sector-level MCCs, which will be chaired by the three sector commanders of UNMEE and will address local security and military concerns. The sixth MCC meeting was held in Nairobi, Kenya, on Monday, five days after the lifting of the UN arms embargo on the two countries.