The land boundary between Eritrea and Sudan extends for 686 kilometers from the Red Sea to the tripoint with Ethiopia, mainly following a course laid out by Italian and British colonial surveyors. The initial delimitation occurred in 1898, shortly after Italy gained control of Eritrea, and an Anglo–Italian demarcation commission followed the next year. The boundary received a series of adjustments and re-demarcations throughout the colonial period, but due to post-independence instability in both states, there have been no modern boundary examination efforts.