🔗 Share this article

Increasing worries exist regarding the chance of armed conflict among East African countries, Ethiopia and the Eritrean government, as hostile rhetoric has intensified in recent weeks.

What Has Ethiopian Officials Stated?

Ethiopia's, being landlocked, requests for access to the maritime outlet through Eritrea has sparked a fierce rhetorical conflict.

Ethiopian Prime Minister previously announced in last year that his government's sea access was an existential matter, comments that Eritrea ignored.

Diplomatic connections between the two countries have regularly been difficult. Following a decades-long struggle for freedom, the Eritrean state, which has a 1,350km (840-mile) Red Sea coastline, formally separated from Ethiopian rule in 1993, rendering it cut off from the sea.

In 1998, a military clash broke out in which over a hundred thousand people died.

Current Statements from Ethiopian Officials

Abiy and military leader Field Marshal Birhanu Jula have publicly asserted sovereignty of Eritrea's maritime facility of the port of Assab – about 60km from the boundary - and hinted at the desire to seize it militarily.

In early September, the Prime Minister said the country's "error" of losing entry to the sea as a due to Eritrea's separation would be "addressed in the future".

The Ethiopian envoy to Kenya, former General Bacha Debele, said that the port was "Ethiopia's wealth" and would be given back "using武力".

Eritrean Reaction to the Statements

Despite continuous challenges from Ethiopia, Asmara's position has been limited to short statements on X from Information Minister Yemane G..

The minister has dismissed Ethiopia's demand for access to the Red Sea labeling it "risky" and a "harmful plan" of "irredentism" – a approach of reclaiming former lands.

Eritrean authorities alerted on 16 September that moves to justify "obvious provocation" would have major implications for the Ethiopian government and its neighbouring countries and is a "redline that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Security Activities on the Border

Currently, there are no reports of major military movements in the border areas between the both nations.

Nevertheless, in Ethiopia, state television has broadcast completion events of many recruits at different defense facilities.

The director of human resources department of the armed forces, the officer, recently said in an conversation that the military was in a "reliable position" as "tens of thousands of youths" were entering service, which he said was "a warning to our opponents".

Past Origins of the Tension

For over fifty years from 1890, Eritrea was governed by Italian colonisers.

Following the end of Italian rule, it was then controlled by the UK forces before evolving into a associated territory of Ethiopia.

But in the early 1960s the Ethiopian emperor ended this arrangement and Eritrea became fully incorporated into the Ethiopian state.

A thirty-year internal conflict occurred, concluding with military reversal in the early 1990s. Autonomy was then approved by voters in a referendum in 1993.

Temporarily in the 1990s, there were positive ties between the leadership in Addis Ababa and Eritrea's capital, but they disagreed over the precise positioning of their shared boundary, leading to war in 1998.

Though this finished in a ceasefire agreement in 2000, it was incompletely executed, and the neighbors stayed at in dispute.

This situation improved in 2018, when the Prime Minister made overtures to Eritrean President President Isaias. The two signed a declaration that the hostilities was concluded – a decision that won the Prime Minister the international recognition.

The neighboring states were then cooperators in Ethiopia's 2020-2022 armed struggle in the northern region.

But diplomatic connections have subsequently deteriorated once more.