🔗 Share this article

Growing worries are present over the potential of military engagement among Horn of Africa neighbours, Ethiopia and the Eritrean government, as aggressive rhetoric has escalated in the past few weeks.

What Has Ethiopia Said?

Ethiopia's, being landlocked, demands for access to the sea coast through Eritrean territory has provoked a heated rhetorical conflict.

Ethiopian Prime Minister first openly declared in the previous year that his government's sea access was an vital issue, statements that Eritrean authorities rejected.

Ties between the neighboring nations have regularly been difficult. After a prolonged struggle for freedom, the Eritrean state, which has a 1,350km (840-mile) maritime frontage, officially seceded from Ethiopia in the early 1990s, making it cut off from the sea.

In 1998, a border war broke out in which over a hundred thousand people were killed.

Current Statements from Ethiopia's Government

Abiy and army chief General Birhanu Jula have openly claimed ownership of Eritrean maritime facility of the port of Assab – approximately 60 kilometers from the frontier - and implied the wish to seize it militarily.

In early September, the Prime Minister said the country's "blunder" of losing entry to the sea as a due to Eritrea secession would be "addressed tomorrow".

The Ethiopian envoy to neighboring Kenya, ex-military officer Bacha, said that the port was "Ethiopian property" and would be restored "by force".

Eritrean Reaction to the Claims

Amid ongoing warnings from Ethiopia, Eritrea's response has been confined to concise remarks on X from Information Minister Yemane G..

The minister has dismissed Ethiopia's demand for sea access calling it "risky" and a "harmful plan" of "irredentism" – a approach of reclaiming lost territory.

The information ministry cautioned on recently that attempts to validate "flagrant aggression" would have serious consequences for the Ethiopian government and its neighbors and is a "boundary that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Defense Preparations on the Ground

There have been little evidence of large-scale army activities in the border areas between the two countries.

Nevertheless, in the country, state television has broadcast completion events of thousands of cadets at multiple army bases.

The leader of human resources department of the military, Lt Gen Hachalu Sheleme, commented lately in an interview that the defense forces was in a "secure situation" as "many thousands of recruits" were enlisting, which he said was "a message to our opponents".

Previous Origins of the Dispute

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

Following Italy's defeat, it was then controlled by the UK forces before becoming a federated part of Ethiopia.

However in 1962 Emperor Haile Selassie I terminated this arrangement and Eritrea became completely integrated into the Ethiopian state.

A thirty-year armed struggle ensued, ending with military reversal in 1991. Independence was then confirmed by the population in a plebiscite in 1993.

Briefly in the 1990s, there were friendly connections between the governments in Ethiopia's capital and Asmara, but they clashed over the specific demarcation of their mutual frontier, causing hostilities in 1998.

Even though this concluded in a ceasefire agreement in 2000, it was incompletely executed, and the neighbors continued at odds.

This ended in 2018, when Abiy made overtures to Eritrean President the president. The both leaders endorsed a statement that the hostilities was finished – a decision that earned Abiy the Nobel Peace Prize.

The neighboring states were then cooperators in Ethiopia's previous armed struggle in Tigray.

But diplomatic connections have since broken down anew.