Escalating War of Words Among Ethiopian Government and Eritrea Sparks Fears of Armed Clash

Mounting worries have emerged about the chance of warfare involving East African neighbors, Ethiopia and Eritrea, as aggressive rhetoric has escalated in recent weeks.

What Did Ethiopia Stated?

Landlocked Ethiopia's demands for passage to the Red Sea through Eritrean territory has sparked a intense rhetorical conflict.

PM Abiy Ahmed initially stated publicly in last year that his government's maritime access was an existential matter, remarks that Eritrea dismissed.

Diplomatic connections between the two countries have often been tense. Following a decades-long struggle for freedom, the Eritrean state, which has a long maritime frontage, officially seceded from Ethiopia in 1993, making it landlocked.

Subsequently, a border war erupted in which over a hundred thousand people were killed.

Current Remarks from Ethiopian Leadership

Abiy and army chief Field Marshal Birhanu Jula have publicly asserted control of Eritrean southern port of the port of Assab – some 60 km from the boundary - and hinted at the wish to capture it through military means.

In early September, Abiy said Ethiopia's "mistake" of losing entry to the Red Sea as a because of Eritrea secession would be "addressed soon".

The Ethiopian envoy to neighboring Kenya, retired Gen Bacha Debele, said that Assab was "belonging to Ethiopia" and would be given back "using武力".

Eritrea's Answer to the Claims

Despite persistent threats from Ethiopian officials, Eritrea's reaction has been restricted to concise remarks on online platforms from Communications Head the minister.

The minister has dismissed Ethiopia's demand for maritime entry calling it "risky" and a "harmful plan" of "expansionism" – a strategy of retaking former lands.

Eritrean authorities warned on recently that attempts to validate "flagrant aggression" would have serious consequences for the Ethiopian government and its regional partners and is a "limit that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Military Activities on the Border

There have been few indications of large-scale army activities in the frontier regions between the both nations.

Nonetheless, in Ethiopia, national TV has displayed graduation ceremonies of many recruits at multiple army bases.

The leader of human resources department of the armed forces, the officer, commented lately in an interview that the defense forces was in a "reliable position" as "numerous of youths" were entering service, which he said was "a warning to our adversaries".

Previous Roots of the Conflict

For decades from the late 19th century, the territory was ruled by Italian colonisers.

After Italy's defeat, it was then managed by the British administration before evolving into a integrated region of Ethiopia.

But in the early 1960s Emperor Haile Selassie I ended this agreement and Eritrea became fully incorporated into the Ethiopian state.

A thirty-year armed struggle ensued, finishing with Ethiopia's defeat in the early 1990s. Independence was then endorsed by the population in a plebiscite in 1993.

For a few years in the 1990s, there were good relations between the authorities in Ethiopia's capital and Eritrea's capital, but they disagreed over the precise positioning of their mutual frontier, causing war in 1998.

Though this finished in a truce in 2000, it was never fully implemented, and the neighbors stayed at loggerheads.

This changed in 2018, when the Prime Minister made approaches to Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki. The two signed a announcement that the hostilities was over – a decision that won Abiy the Nobel Peace Prize.

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

Yet ties have later worsened again.