Military expenditures - dollar figure:
$337.1 million (2004)
Military expenditures - percent of GDP:
4.6% (2004)
Transnational Issues Ethiopia
Disputes - international:
Eritrea and Ethiopia agreed to abide by the 2002 Eritrea-Ethiopia
Boundary Commission's (EEBC) delimitation decision, but despite
international intervention, mutual animosities, accusations and
armed posturing prevail, preventing demarcation; Ethiopia refuses to
withdraw to the delimited boundary until technical errors made by
the EEBC that ignored "human geography" are addressed, including the
award of Badme, the focus of the 1998-2000 war; Eritrea insists that
the EEBC decision be implemented immediately without modifications;
Ethiopia has only an administrative line and no international border
with the Oromo region of southern Somalia where it maintains
alliances with local clans in opposition to the unrecognized Somali
Interim Government in Mogadishu; "Somaliland" secessionists provide
port facilities and trade ties to landlocked Ethiopia; the UNHCR
expects most of the remaining 23,000 Somali refugees in Ethiopia to
be repatriated in 2005; efforts to demarcate the porous boundary
with Sudan have been delayed by civil war
Refugees and internally displaced persons:
refugees (country of origin): 93,032 (Sudan) 23,578 (Somalia)
IDPs: 132,000 (border war with Eritrea from 1998-2000 and ethnic
clashes in Gambela; most IDPs are in Tigray and Gambela Provinces)
(2004)
Illicit drugs:
Transit hub for heroin originating in Southwest and Southeast Asia
and destined for Europe and North America as well as cocaine
destined for markets in southern Africa; cultivates qat (khat) for
local use and regional export, principally to Djibouti and Somalia
(legal in all three countries); the lack of a well-developed
financial system limits the country's utility as a money-laundering
center
This page was last updated on 20 October, 2005
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