The boundaries of Ethiopia and Eritrea follow a frontier defined by the Treaty of Addis Ababa between Ethiopia and Italy, which ruled Eritrea as a colony at the time.[2] However, the frontier near Badme was poorly defined in the treaty, and since Eritrea became a separate nation in 1993, each nation has disputed where the boundary actually runs. The town of Badme was ceded[citation needed] by the TPLF (the predecessor of the EPRDF, Ethiopia's currently ruling party) to the EPLF (the predecessor of the PFDJ, Eritrea's ruling organization) in November 1977.[3][page needed]