🔗 Share this article

Increasing worries have emerged regarding the chance of warfare between Horn of Africa countries, Ethiopia and the Eritrean government, as confrontational language has ratcheted up in the past few weeks.

What Did Ethiopian Officials Stated?

Ethiopia's, being landlocked, demands for passage to the sea coast through Eritrea has triggered a intense verbal exchange.

PM Abiy Ahmed initially stated publicly in the previous year that his nation's maritime access was an vital issue, statements that Eritrea dismissed.

Ties between the both governments have often been tense. After a prolonged fight for sovereignty, Eritrea, which has a 1,350km (840-mile) sea border, formally separated from Ethiopia in 1993, leaving it without sea access.

In 1998, a military clash started in which numerous people died.

Latest Remarks from Ethiopian Leadership

Abiy and military leader Field Marshal Birhanu Jula have publicly asserted ownership of Eritrean coastal city of the port of Assab – some 60 km from the frontier - and hinted at the desire to seize it militarily.

In early September, Abiy said Ethiopia's "error" of losing entry to the sea as a result of Eritrea's separation would be "rectified soon".

Ethiopia's ambassador to Kenya, retired Gen Bacha Debele, said that Assab was "Ethiopian property" and would be given back "by force".

Eritrea's Answer to the Claims

In the face of persistent challenges from Ethiopian officials, Eritrea's reaction has been limited to short statements on online platforms from Information Minister the minister.

He has rejected Ethiopia's push for access to the Red Sea calling it "hazardous" and a "toxic agenda" of "expansionism" – a strategy of claiming back lost territory.

Eritrean authorities warned on mid-September that attempts to legitimise "obvious provocation" would have significant repercussions for the Ethiopian government and its neighbouring countries and is a "limit that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Defense Movements on the Region

Currently, there are no reports of large-scale army activities in the frontier regions between the two countries.

Nevertheless, in the country, state television has displayed graduation ceremonies of thousands of cadets at different defense facilities.

The head of staff section of the armed forces, Lt Gen Hachalu Sheleme, commented lately in an discussion that the army was in a "strong stance" as "many thousands of youths" were joining it, which he said was "a warning to our opponents".

Previous Background of the Conflict

For decades from 1890, the territory was ruled by colonial powers.

Following Italy's defeat, it was then controlled by the British military before becoming a integrated region of the Ethiopian empire.

Yet in the early 1960s the Ethiopian emperor ended this agreement and the region became totally absorbed into Ethiopia.

A thirty-year civil war occurred, ending with the government's loss in 1991. Sovereignty was then approved by voters in a plebiscite in 1993.

For a few years in the 1990s, there were good relations between the governments in Addis Ababa and Eritrea's capital, but they fell out over the precise positioning of their shared boundary, causing war in 1998.

Though this ended in a truce in 2000, it was incompletely executed, and the neighbors stayed at loggerheads.

This ended in 2018, when the Prime Minister made approaches to Eritrean President President Isaias. The both leaders endorsed a statement that the conflict was concluded – a action that gained Abiy the Nobel Peace Prize.

The neighboring states were then partners in the country's recent internal conflict in the northern region.

But ties have later worsened again.