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Preventing a Potential Oil Ownership Conflict over Ilemi Triangle

Preventing a Potential Oil Ownership Conflict over Ilemi Triangle Kayumba Angelani Ange Master’s student at University of Nairobi and Research Associate at Institute for Law and Environmental Governance, Nairobi-Kenya Historical Dispute The Ilemi Triangle is situated between Kenya, South Sudan and Ethiopia borders and has been considered an area of disputed land in East Africa. The triangle has been named in honour of the Anuak Chief Ilemi Akwon. The territory is currently claimed by South Sudan and Kenya but the Ethiopian government has never made an official claim on any of the Ilemi and in fact agreed that the land was all Sudanese in 1902, 1907, and 1972 treaties. The dispute arose from unclear wording of a 1914 treaty which attempted to allow for the movements of the Turkana people nomadic herders who had traditionally grazed the area. Moreover, Britain’s hands-offs policy on Ilemi, is one of factors responsible for the uncertainty that has surrounded the position of the border Menas borders, December 2010 . Kenya has claimed that Sudan and Britain accepted the red line as the common border but this is not adequately verified by documentary evidence. This simply means that it will be difficult for Kenyan authorities to defend the validity of the unilaterally-imposed blue-line, which would seem to imply their clear and enduring breach of Sudanese territorial integrity. Furthermore, although the unilateral Sudanese Patrol Line meant for the effective abandonment of policing and economic responsibility to its east, it is near impossible to concede that this represents any formal transfer of territory to Kenya within the formalities of the modern international law doctrine. While the Sudanese authorities have surely failed in their responsibility to maintain a measure of effective territorial control over the triangle, Kenya practice has still been to breach territorial integrity. It is worth noting that no cession of territory has ever taken place. The 1914 Order of Council remains the only legal definition of international boundary. The incapable of controlling the territory by Sudan constitute the interactions of the triangle. The perceived economic marginality of the land as well as decades of Sudanese conflicts is two factors that have delayed the resolution of the dispute. The following table summarize the key historical successive evolution of the Ilemi triangle disputes. Date Evolution of Ilemi Dispute 1902 Mr. Archibald Butter and Captain Philip Maud (Royal Engineers) surveyed Ethiopia’s border with British East Africa in 1902-3 and marked the ‘Maud line’ which was recognized in 1907 as the de facto Kenya-Ethiopian border. Addis Ababa renounced Britain’s attempt to rectify this border through a survey by Major Charles Gwynn (Royal Engineers) in August 1908 for excluding Ethiopian surveyors. 1907 Ethiopian emperor Menelik laid claim to Lake Turkana and proposed a boundary with the British to run from the southern end of the lake eastward to the Indian Ocean, which was shifted northward when the British and Ethiopian governments signed a treaty. In December 1907, Anglo-Ethiopian agreement treaty was signed between Ethiopia and British East Africa. Though vague on the precise details of where the border was located, it clearly placed the entire Ilemi on the Sudan side of the Ethiopia-Sudan line. 1914 Uganda-Sudan Boundary Commission agreement provided Sudan access to Lake Turkana via the now-dry Sanderson Gulf at the southeast corner of the Ilemi. 1918 The Ethiopians armed the Nyangatom and Dassanech peoples, whereby the traditional raids turned into battles where hundreds died. 1928 Sudan agreed to allow Kenyan military units across the 1914 line to protect the Turkana against the Dassanech and Nyangatom. 1929 Kenya began subsidising Sudan to occupy the territory, which it did not wish to continue because of the perceived useless nature of it 1931 Sudan agreed to subsidise Kenya to occupy the territory. The Red Line (the Glenday Line) was drawn to represent the northern boundary of Turkana grazing. "In a series of agreements from 1929 to 1934, the Governor-General of the Sudan and the Governor of Kenya agreed that this Red Line should be accepted as the boundary." This line was based on the grazing limits of the Turkana peoples as required in the 1914 agreement to replace the provisional straight line 1936 Italy invaded Ethiopia and briefly claimed the area of the Ilemi triangle. 1938 A joint Kenya-Sudan survey team, demarcated the "Red Line" or "Wakefield Line", very close to the delimitation a few years earlier of this Red Line, marking the northern limit of grazing of Turkana. This line, to replace the provisional straight line of 1914 as required by that treaty was carefully mapped and demarked with stone monuments. While Egypt and Britain agreed on this, Italy did not. 1939 The Dassanetch and Inyangatom had suffered because of the Italian occupation, and wished to recoup their losses by making a raid against the Turkana. Several hundred Turkana people were killed in the raid. Italy gave up their claim on the Ilemi subsequently, and allowed the British to respond with a raid on the Inyangatom and Dassanech supported by the Royal Air Force. 1941 British troops of the King's African Rifles (KAR) occupied Ilemi during World War II. The KAR passed through Ilemi on their way to southwestern Ethiopia. 1944 Britain's Foreign Office surveyed a "blue line" which was further northwest than the "red line". 1950 Sudan established their own patrol line even further northwest into Sudan where they prohibited Kenyan and Ethiopian pastoralists from moving west of it, giving up policing and development to the area east of it. However, that Kenya-Sudan agreement specified that this patrol line in no way affected sovereignty; that it was not an international boundary, and money continued to be paid to Kenya to patrol this Sudanese territory. 1949 and 1953 - There was fighting as Sudan attempted to keep the Nyangatom behind this line. 1949-1950 There was fighting as Sudan attempted to keep the Nyangatom behind this line. 1967 President Kenyatta's administration had made overtures to the British in order to secure support for the cession of the Triangle to Kenya. The British were unresponsive and the results amounted to little. The matter was sidelined and successive Kenyan administrations have been seemingly willing to accept the territorial status quo and their de facto territorial control, even if the Kenyan influence did diminish after the relocation of the Sudanese People Liberation Movement- SPLM to Sudan in the 1980s-90s 1964 Kenya and Ethiopia reaffirmed their boundary, confirming Kenyan sovereignty to Namuruputh, which is just south of the southeastern point of the triangle. 1972 Sudan-Ethiopia boundary alteration did not solve the Ilemi issue because it did not involve Kenya, but did confirm that Ethiopia had no claim to the Ilemi Triangle. 1990 Ethiopia armed the Dassanech with Kalashnikov automatic rifles, perhaps in response to Kenyan government arming in 1978 of the Turkana. 1960’s Many Kenyan maps have marked the Red Line as the official boundary of Kenya, rather than a dotted boundary which it had been previously. More recently, most Kenyan maps depict the 1950 patrol line, the furthest northwest, as the boundary. 2011 South Sudan gains independence and the claim to the Ilemi Triangle transferred to the new national government in Juba. 2012 It has been said that the government of South Sudan has opened a case against Kenya over the country, popularly known as Ilemi triangle. The discovery of oil might intensify the long-time dispute over Ilemi triangle The Ilemi triangle conflict has never been considered as a big deal. However, the discovery of oil in the area may intensify the dispute over Ilemi triangle and might lead to conflicts. At this oil discovery stage, it will better for Kenya, South Sudan and Ethiopia to urgently find out peaceful ways to solve the dispute on ownership of the triangle. Otherwise, serious conflict over oil ownership might occur by affecting the exploration and late exploitation of oil in the region. It may lead to war over oil owner ship with potential of losing life. This article calls for the use of regional mediation as the only way to resolve dispute over the ownership of the triangle. Mediation will lead to long-lasting agreements in a peaceful environment. Endnote Almagor, Uri. Pastoral Partners Affinity and Bond Partnership Among the Dassanech of Southwest Ethiopia. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1978. Also consult, Austin, Major. With MacDonald in Uganda. London: Edward Arnold, 1903, p. 187-189. Blake, Gerald. Imperial Boundary Making: The diary of Captain Kelly and the Sudan-Uganda Boundary Commission of 1913. Oxford: British Academy, 1997, p.99.  Beaten, A.C., “Record of the Toposa Tribe.” Sudan Notes and Records XXXI, (1950): 129-132; Driberg, John. “Preliminary account of the Didinga.” Sudan Notes and Records V, (1922): 208-222.  Command Papers in Public Records Office (Cmd.) 4318. Kew Gardens, London. ‘Agreement between the United Kingdom and Ethiopia relative to the frontiers between British East Africa, Uganda and Ethiopia’, signed at Addis Ababa by the Emperor Menelik II and his Britannic Majesty’s charge d’affaires on 6 December 1907, published in Treaty Series No. 27 (1908). Greenfield, Richard. Ethiopia: A New Political History. London: Pall Mall Press, 1965, p.76-91; Hertslet, Sir Edward. The map of Africa by treaty. Vol.II. London: His Majesty’s Stationery, 1896, p. 316. Hendrickson Dylan, et al. “Livestock Raiding Among the Pastoral Turkana of Kenya: Redistribution, Predation and Links to Famine.” IDS Bulletin. 27, no. 3, (1996): 17-30. Lamphear, John. “The evolution of Ateker ‘New Model Armies: Jie & Turkana.” In Ethnicity & Conflict in the Horn of Africa, ed. Fukui Katuyoshi and Markakis John (London: James Currey, 1994), p.63-92. Lamphear John. “Brothers in Arms: Military Aspects of East Africa Age-class systems in historical perspective.” In Conflict, Age & Power in Northeast Africa: Age Systems in Transition, ed. Esei Kurimoto and Simon Simonse (London: James Currey, 1998), p.79-97. Identities on the Move: Clanship and Pastoralism in Northern Kenya. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1989, p. 41-54; Watkins, Jomo’s Jailer, p.133. Kurimoto, Esei. “Resonance of Age Systems in S-E Sudan.” Kurimoto and Simonse, Conflict Age & Power, p. 48; Cmd. 9798 ‘Report on the administration of the Sudan for the year 1950-51’ London: His Majesty’s Stationery, 1956, p.659. Kenya National Archives(KNA), Nairobi. DC/ISO/2/5/5 ‘The Kenya/Sudan boundary and the Ilemi Triangle’ in Isiolo District Reports. See illustration Fig 1. Also, consult, ‘Elemi triangle, World Statistics Atlases’  and, ‘Appendix F: cross-reference list of geographical names’, http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/docs. McEwen, Alec. International Boundaries of East Africa. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971.  Ngatia Fred H. “The Legal Difficulty of Delimiting the Kenya - Sudan Boundary.” MA Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science, 1984.   Tornay, Serge. “Generation set systems on the threshold of the third millennium: an anthropological perspective.” In Conflict Age & Power. ed. Kurimoto & Simonse, p.98-120;   Watkins, Elizabeth. Jomo’s Jailer Grand Warrior of Kenya. Calais: Mulbery Books, 1993 Map source: Google