ADDIS ABABA, June 5 (Xinhua) -- The Executive Committee of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), Ethiopia's ruling party, announced on Tuesday it is committed to an unconditional implementation of peace agreement with arch rival Eritrea.

In a press statement, the EPRDF Executive Committee said Ethiopia is committed to the unconditional implementation of the December 2001 Algiers agreement, which gave the symbolically important town of Badme to Eritrea.

A border dispute between Ethiopia and its northern neighbor Eritrea led to a bloody two-year border war between 1998 and 2000, which killed an estimated 70,000 people from both sides.

Since then, the two countries are engaged in a state of armed standoff along their common border punctuated occasionally by sporadic small-scale clashes.

Ethiopia has until now insisted on the need for negotiations with Eritrea to come first before implementing the Algiers peace agreement.

Eritrea for its part has insisted the border demarcation has to be done first before any talks on normalizing ties.