🔗 Share this article

Growing apprehensions are present regarding the possibility of armed conflict involving East African countries, the Ethiopian government and the Eritrean government, as confrontational discourse has intensified in recent weeks.

What Did Ethiopian Officials Said?

Landlocked Ethiopia's calls for passage to the Red Sea through Eritrean territory has provoked a intense war of words.

The Ethiopian leader first openly declared in 2023 that his nation's access to the sea was an crucial concern, statements that Eritrean authorities rejected.

Ties between the both governments have frequently been strained. After a prolonged fight for sovereignty, Eritrea, which has a extensive sea border, formally separated from Ethiopia in the early 1990s, rendering it cut off from the sea.

Five years later, a territorial conflict started in which more than 100,000 people lost their lives.

Current Statements from Ethiopian Officials

Prime Minister Abiy and army chief General Birhanu Jula have publicly asserted ownership of Eritrea's coastal city of Assab – approximately 60 kilometers from the frontier - and hinted at the wish to take it by force.

Recently, Abiy said Ethiopia's "blunder" of losing access to the Red Sea as a because of Eritrea's separation would be "corrected in the future".

Ethiopia's ambassador to neighboring Kenya, ex-military officer Bacha, said that Assab was "Ethiopia's wealth" and would be restored "by force".

Eritrean Reaction to the Threats

In the face of persistent warnings from Ethiopian officials, Eritrea's response has been restricted to concise remarks on online platforms from Communications Head Yemane Gebremeskel.

The minister has dismissed Ethiopia's push for maritime entry describing it as "risky" and a "harmful plan" of "irredentism" – a policy of reclaiming lost territory.

Eritrean authorities cautioned on mid-September that moves to legitimise "blatant hostility" would have serious consequences for Ethiopia and its neighbouring countries and is a "redline that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Security Movements on the Region

So far, there are no reports of major military movements in the boundary zones between the two countries.

However, in Ethiopia, government media has broadcast training completions of numerous trainees at different defense facilities.

The director of staff section of the armed forces, the officer, recently said in an conversation that the military was in a "secure situation" as "numerous of young people" were joining it, which he said was "a message to our opponents".

Past Background of the Dispute

For over fifty years from the late 19th century, the territory was governed by colonial powers.

Following the end of Italian rule, it was then managed by the British military before turning into a associated territory of Ethiopia.

However in the early 1960s the Ethiopian emperor ended this agreement and Eritrea became totally absorbed into the Ethiopian state.

A three-decade long civil war ensued, ending with Ethiopia's defeat in the early 1990s. Sovereignty was then approved by Eritreans in a referendum in 1993.

Briefly in the 1990s, there were positive ties between the governments in Ethiopia's capital and Eritrea's capital, but they clashed over the specific demarcation of their common border, leading to war in 1998.

Though this finished in a peace deal in 2000, it was incompletely executed, and the neighbors remained at odds.

This situation improved in 2018, when Abiy made approaches to Eritrea's leader Isaias Afwerki. The two signed a declaration that the war was over – a action that earned the Prime Minister the prestigious award.

The neighboring states were then allies in Ethiopia's 2020-2022 armed struggle in Tigray.

But ties have later worsened anew.