🔗 Share this article

Mounting worries exist over the chance of armed conflict among East African countries, the Ethiopian government and the Eritrean government, as aggressive language has intensified in the last month.

What Did Ethiopia Stated?

Landlocked Ethiopia's demands for entry to the maritime outlet through Eritrea has sparked a heated rhetorical conflict.

Ethiopian Prime Minister first openly declared in last year that his country's sea access was an existential matter, remarks that Eritrea ignored.

Relations between the both governments have often been tense. After a long-standing struggle for freedom, Eritrea, which has a extensive Red Sea coastline, formally separated from Ethiopian rule in the early 1990s, leaving it cut off from the sea.

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

Current Comments from Ethiopia's Government

Abiy and army chief the army commander have publicly asserted sovereignty of Eritrean maritime facility of the port of Assab – some 60 km from the frontier - and suggested the wish to take it by force.

Recently, Abiy said Ethiopia's "blunder" of losing access to the Red Sea as a due to Eritrean independence would be "corrected soon".

Ethiopia's ambassador to Kenya, former General Bacha Debele, said that Assab was "Ethiopian property" and would be restored "using武力".

Eritrean Response to the Statements

Despite persistent warnings from Ethiopia, Asmara's position has been confined to brief comments on X from Communications Head Yemane Gebremeskel.

He has rejected Ethiopia's push for access to the Red Sea labeling it "dangerous" and a "negative policy" of "expansionism" – a policy of reclaiming lost territory.

Government spokespeople warned on recently that attempts to validate "blatant hostility" would have significant repercussions for the Ethiopian government and its neighbouring countries and is a "limit that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Security Movements on the Ground

There have been no reports of significant troop deployments in the frontier regions between the both nations.

Nevertheless, in the country, government media has displayed completion events of many recruits at various military training camps.

The director of human resources department of the military, General Hachalu, recently said in an discussion that the military was in a "secure situation" as "numerous of youths" were joining it, which he said was "a signal to our opponents".

Previous Roots of the Conflict

For decades from the late 19th century, the territory was administered by Italian rulers.

After the end of Italian rule, it was then controlled by the British military before evolving into a integrated region of the Ethiopian empire.

But in 1962 the Ethiopian emperor ended this arrangement and Eritrea became completely integrated into the Ethiopian state.

A thirty-year armed struggle ensued, finishing with Ethiopia's defeat in 1991. Sovereignty was then endorsed by the population in a plebiscite in 1993.

Briefly in the 1990s, there were good relations between the governments in Addis Ababa and Asmara, but they fell out over the precise positioning of their common border, causing hostilities in 1998.

Although this concluded in a peace deal in 2000, it was never fully implemented, and the both countries continued at in dispute.

This ended in 2018, when Abiy made gestures to Eritrean President the president. The both leaders endorsed a announcement that the hostilities was over – a action that gained the Prime Minister the international recognition.

The both administrations were then allies in the country's recent armed struggle in the northern region.

But relations have since broken down again.