By Teklay Assefa, Senior Columnist

The recent withdrawal of Eritrea from the Intergovernmental Authority on Development marks yet another chapter in the Horn of Africa’s chronicle of fractured regionalism. But to view this solely through the lens of Asmara’s perpetual isolationism would be to miss the forest for the trees. This departure, announced with characteristic terseness and wrapped in accusations of institutional bias, is fundamentally intertwined with Ethiopia’s escalating discourse on Red Sea access, a matter that strikes at the core of our national interests and regional stability.

As Ethiopians, we must confront this development with clear eyes and measured judgement. The reverberations of Eritrea’s exit extend far beyond conference halls in Djibouti or communiqués from foreign ministries. They touch upon questions that define our national trajectory: How does a nation of 120 million people sustain economic growth whilst landlocked? What are the legitimate means of securing maritime access? And crucially, how do we pursue our interests without plunging the region into renewed conflict?

The predicament of landlockedness represents an uncomfortable truth we must acknowledge. Ethiopia’s structural vulnerability grows more acute with each passing year. Since Eritrea’s independence in 1993, a separation that cost us our entire coastline, we have been dependent on Djibouti for the overwhelming majority of our maritime trade. The port of Djibouti handles an estimated 95 per cent of Ethiopia’s imports and exports, creating a single point of failure that would be strategically unthinkable for any nation with alternatives.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s recent statements framing sea access as existential are not mere rhetoric. They reflect a genuine developmental constraint. Our economy, amongst Africa’s fastest-growing, requires diversified trade routes. Our industrial ambitions demand reduced logistics costs. Our strategic autonomy necessitates alternatives to our current arrangement. Yet the manner in which this imperative is articulated matters profoundly. When Ethiopian officials speak of sea access in tones that Asmara and indeed, other regional capitals interpret as threatening, we risk transforming a legitimate economic concern into a security crisis.

Eritrea’s calculated isolation should surprise no careful observer of the region. President Isaias Afwerki’s government has long viewed multilateral institutions with suspicion, preferring bilateral arrangements where Asmara can negotiate from a position it perceives as strength. The country’s first withdrawal in 2007, during the height of border tensions, followed a similar pattern of accusation and departure. What makes this current exit noteworthy is its timing. Coming amidst Ethiopia’s increasingly vocal demands for Red Sea access, Asmara’s move reads less as institutional disengagement and more as strategic positioning.

By leaving IGAD, Eritrea signals that it will not allow regional institutions to mediate what it views as threats to its sovereignty. The message to Addis Ababa is unambiguous: any discussion of port access must be bilateral, not multilateral, and will occur on Eritrean terms or not at all. From Asmara’s perspective, the calculus may appear straightforward. Eritrea controls strategically valuable Red Sea ports at Massawa and Assab. Its coastline offers Ethiopia potential access, but also gives Eritrea leverage. By withdrawing from IGAD, President Isaias preserves maximum flexibility to negotiate directly whether with Ethiopia, Gulf states seeking strategic footholds, or other external actors.

The cost of miscalculation looms large for both nations. For Eritrea, isolation has historically bred stagnation. The country’s economy remains anaemic, its population subject to indefinite military conscription, its international standing diminished. IGAD membership, however nominal, provided institutional links to development programmes and donor coordination. Its departure further marginalises Eritrea precisely when engagement might serve its interests.

For Ethiopia, the risks are equally profound but of a different character. Our insistence on sea access, however justified economically, carries undertones that revive memories of the catastrophic 1998-2000 border war. That conflict claimed between 70,000 and 100,000 lives, devastated communities on both sides, and resolved nothing. To even hint at coercion or unilateral action is to play with fire in a region where historical grievances remain raw.

Moreover, Ethiopia’s regional relationships extend beyond Eritrea. Djibouti, our current maritime lifeline, watches our rhetoric with growing unease. If Addis Ababa’s pursuit of alternative access undermines Djibouti’s port economy, we risk alienating our most reliable partner. Somalia, struggling with its own stability challenges, cannot afford another source of regional tension. Sudan, consumed by civil war, offers no mediation capacity.

IGAD’s institutional weakness stands exposed by Eritrea’s departure. The bloc, despite occasional successes in mediation, has never overcome the structural challenge facing all African regional organisations: member states prioritise national sovereignty over collective action when interests diverge. The bloc’s inability to retain Eritrea’s meaningful participation reflects this deeper malaise. When the interests of major members clash—as Ethiopia’s and Eritrea’s evidently do—regional institutions become theatres for rivalry rather than frameworks for cooperation.

This is not unique to IGAD; similar patterns afflict regional bodies across the continent. But in the Horn, where conflicts rapidly escalate and humanitarian consequences cascade across borders, institutional weakness carries particularly grave implications. The absence of effective mediation mechanisms means that bilateral tensions between Addis Ababa and Asmara risk escalating unchecked, with neither side willing to back down and no credible arbiter to facilitate compromise.

The involvement of external powers adds another layer of complexity to an already fraught situation. The Red Sea corridor represents a critical artery for global trade, linking Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Gulf states, particularly the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, have invested heavily in Red Sea ports and military installations. Egypt views the Red Sea through the prism of its own security concerns, wary of Ethiopia’s regional ambitions. The United States and China, both with strategic interests anchored in Djibouti, are watching developments closely.

Eritrea’s isolation creates opportunities for these external actors. Gulf states may see a chance to deepen ties with Asmara, offering investment in exchange for strategic access to ports and military facilities. But this could exacerbate regional rivalries, drawing the Horn into broader geopolitical contests that have little to do with the region’s own development priorities. Ethiopia, too, may find itself courted by external powers seeking to counterbalance rivals, creating dependencies that constrain our autonomy.

A path forward demands pragmatism over provocation. As Ethiopians committed to both our national development and regional stability, we must advocate for an approach that reconciles these imperatives. Several principles should guide our thinking. Firstly, we must acknowledge that maritime access is indeed necessary for Ethiopia’s long-term prosperity, whilst clarifying that this need not come at the expense of Eritrean sovereignty. Economic arrangements port leases, trade corridors, joint development zones can serve mutual interests without territorial revision.

Secondly, we should recognise that bilateral negotiation with Eritrea, whilst challenging given the trust deficit, may prove more productive than multilateral pressure through weakened institutions. Quiet diplomacy, potentially facilitated by Gulf states with relationships in both capitals, offers possibilities that public confrontation forecloses. Thirdly, we must diversify our approach beyond Eritrea. Strengthening ties with Djibouti, exploring possibilities with Somaliland, and investing in logistics infrastructure that reduces per-unit costs can address our maritime vulnerability without singular dependence on Asmara’s goodwill.

Fourthly, Ethiopian officials must temper rhetoric that regional neighbours interpret as threatening. Our case for sea access is strongest when framed in terms of mutual economic benefit and regional integration, not strategic necessity that implies potential coercion. Language matters in diplomacy, and the difference between asserting legitimate interests and appearing to threaten neighbours can determine whether we achieve our goals through negotiation or find ourselves isolated and opposed.

The spectre of renewed conflict must concentrate minds in both capitals. The 1998-2000 war between Ethiopia and Eritrea stands as a cautionary tale of how quickly tensions can escalate and how devastating the consequences can be. That conflict resolved none of the underlying disputes, instead creating new grievances and deepening mistrust. Another war would be even more catastrophic, given the region’s current fragility and the potential for wider conflagration.

Ethiopia’s pursuit of sea access, however legitimate, must be pursued through means that prioritise stability. This is not weakness; it is wisdom born of painful experience. We have known war with Eritrea, and we know its costs. The challenge before us is to secure our maritime interests through patient diplomacy, economic incentives, and multilateral engagement rather than through confrontation that risks everything.

Regional dynamics beyond the bilateral relationship demand consideration as well. The Horn of Africa faces multiple overlapping crises: humanitarian emergencies, climate shocks, food insecurity, and armed conflicts. IGAD, for all its weaknesses, has played important roles in mediating disputes and coordinating responses to shared challenges. Its further weakening serves no one’s interests. Ethiopia, as the region’s most populous country and largest economy, bears particular responsibility for supporting rather than undermining collective institutions.

Our relationship with Djibouti deserves special attention. President Ismaïl Omar Guelleh’s government has been a reliable partner, providing port access that has sustained our trade for three decades. Any pursuit of alternative access must reassure Djibouti that we value the relationship and seek to complement rather than replace it. Diversification need not mean abandonment, and our diplomacy must reflect this understanding.

The stakes extend beyond economics and security to questions of regional identity and cooperation. The Horn of Africa has suffered immensely from cycles of conflict and state fragility. Building a more stable, prosperous region requires patience, mutual respect, and recognition that our fates are intertwined. Ethiopia’s size and influence mean that our choices carry outsized consequences for neighbours. We can use that influence to promote integration and development, or we can allow it to breed resentment and resistance.

The choice before us is clear. We can pursue sea access through means that build confidence and create mutual benefit, or we can allow legitimate interests to curdle into threatening postures that unite neighbours against us. We can support regional institutions even as we work to reform them, or we can dismiss them as irrelevant and face bilateral confrontations without mediation mechanisms. We can engage Eritrea with patience and creativity, or we can allow the relationship to deteriorate into renewed hostility.

History will judge how we navigate this moment. The Red Sea will remain long after current political leaders have departed the stage. The question is whether we approach it as a corridor for shared prosperity or a theatre for renewed confrontation. That choice will define not only Ethiopia’s trajectory but the fate of the entire Horn of Africa. As citizens and commentators, we must demand that our leaders choose wisely, that they pursue our interests with determination but also with restraint, and that they never forget the human cost of miscalculation in our volatile region.

Eritrea’s withdrawal from IGAD is a warning, not merely a diplomatic footnote. It signals the fragility of regional cooperation and the ease with which tensions can escalate. Ethiopia’s response will reveal whether we have learnt from history or are condemned to repeat it. Let us hope that wisdom prevails over hubris, that dialogue triumphs over confrontation, and that the peoples of the Horn are spared another generation of conflict born from failed diplomacy and strategic miscalculation.

Teklay Assefa is a senior columnist for the Ethiopian Tribune and expert on regional affairs. The views expressed are his own.

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By Sewasew Teklemariam

In the intricate theatre of Horn of Africa diplomacy, where ancient civilisations clash with modern statecraft and where water, land, and maritime access converge into existential questions, a particularly sophisticated strategy has emerged that demands careful examination. Egypt’s contemporary approach towards Ethiopia represents what might best be described as diplomatic “cooking” a patient, multi-layered process of combining regional anxieties, historical grievances, and strategic alliances into a coherent campaign designed to contain Ethiopian ambitions on two critical fronts: the Nile River and access to the Red Sea. This is not hasty improvisation but rather a carefully calibrated recipe, where ingredients are selected for maximum effect, temperatures are precisely controlled, and the intended outcome, Ethiopian strategic isolation, is pursued with methodical determination.

The metaphor of cooking proves remarkably apt when examining Cairo’s approach because, like any complex culinary endeavour, this strategy requires patience, precise timing, an understanding of how different elements interact, and the skill to adjust temperatures and ingredients as circumstances evolve. For those of us observing from Addis Ababa, the smell emanating from Egypt’s diplomatic kitchen has become impossible to ignore, particularly as the heat has been dramatically increased in recent weeks with the convening of an extraordinary tripartite summit in Cairo and the stunning announcement from Washington regarding Somaliland’s status. The implications of this particular meal extend far beyond the immediate bilateral relationship into questions that will shape the Horn of Africa for generations to come.

The foundation of Egypt’s strategy rests upon two fundamental components that serve as the base ingredients for everything that follows. The first, and certainly the most historically entrenched, concerns the Nile River and specifically the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, a project that represents vastly different things depending on one’s vantage point. For Ethiopia, the GERD embodies developmental aspirations, energy independence, and the exercise of sovereign rights over resources within our own territory. The dam, with its 6,450 megawatt generating capacity, promises to transform Ethiopian lives, providing electricity to the roughly 60 per cent of our population currently without reliable power access, spurring industrial development, and generating revenue through power exports to neighbouring countries. From this perspective, the GERD is not merely infrastructure but a tangible manifestation of Ethiopia’s determination to emerge from poverty through its own resources and efforts.

From Cairo’s perspective, however, the narrative could not be more different. Egypt depends upon the Nile for approximately 97 per cent of its freshwater needs, supporting a population that has now surpassed 105 million people in a country where arable land comprises barely 4 per cent of total territory. The Nile is not simply important to Egypt; it is, in the most literal sense, the difference between habitability and desert. Egyptian officials, with considerable historical precedent, have long maintained that any significant diminution of Nile flows would constitute an existential threat justifying extraordinary responses. When Ethiopian engineers began diverting the Blue Nile in May 2013 to commence GERD construction, it represented, from Cairo’s view, a fundamental shift in regional power dynamics upstream control over a resource Egypt had dominated for millennia.

The second core ingredient in Egypt’s diplomatic recipe emerged more recently but has proven equally potent: Ethiopia’s determined push to secure sovereign access to the Red Sea. Ethiopia’s landlocked status, a consequence of Eritrean independence in 1993, represents a profound economic vulnerability for a nation of approximately 120 million people. Our economy depends entirely upon Djibouti’s port infrastructure for 95 per cent of our international trade, creating both a logistical bottleneck and a strategic dependency that successive Ethiopian governments have found increasingly intolerable. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has been particularly vocal about this issue, declaring in October 2023 that Ethiopia’s maritime access is not merely desirable but essential, and suggesting that Ethiopia would pursue this objective “by any means necessary” rhetoric that, whilst perhaps intended for domestic consumption, sent alarm bells ringing throughout regional capitals.

The situation reached a critical juncture on 1 January 2024, when Ethiopia signed a memorandum of understanding with Somaliland, the self-declared independent region that broke away from Somalia in 1991 but lacks international recognition. The agreement, whose precise terms remain somewhat opaque, reportedly grants Ethiopia access to a 20-kilometre stretch of Red Sea coastline for the establishment of a naval base and commercial port facilities, in exchange for Ethiopian recognition of Somaliland’s sovereignty a recognition that would make Ethiopia the first nation to formally acknowledge Somaliland’s independence claim. The reaction from Mogadishu was swift and furious, with Somalia’s federal government declaring the agreement a violation of its territorial integrity and sovereignty, recalling its ambassador from Addis Ababa, and appealing to the international community for support in defending its territorial claims.

For Egypt, this Somaliland controversy represented something approaching a diplomatic gift, a catalytic ingredient that could transform the entire regional dynamic. Suddenly, Cairo possessed not merely a bilateral water dispute with Ethiopia, a matter where international sympathy has proven difficult to mobilise, but rather a compelling regional narrative: Ethiopia as a revisionist power threatening the territorial integrity of a fellow African Union member state, undermining the sacrosanct principle of colonial borders, and destabilising an already fragile region. This narrative proved far more potent in regional and international forums than arguments about historical water rights and treaties signed during the colonial era to which Ethiopia was never party.

Egypt’s response demonstrated both the sophistication of its diplomatic apparatus and the extent of its preparation for precisely such an opportunity. Within weeks of the Somaliland announcement, Cairo had deployed a comprehensive counter-strategy. In August 2024, Egypt and Somalia signed a comprehensive defence cooperation agreement, with Egyptian officials pledging military equipment, training, and support. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi hosted Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud for high-level consultations, with joint statements emphasising shared commitment to Somali sovereignty and territorial integrity. Egyptian military advisers began appearing in Mogadishu, Egyptian weapons shipments increased, and Cairo announced plans to contribute significant troop numbers to the African Union peacekeeping mission in Somalia, a mission from which Ethiopia, notably, would be excluded under the new arrangements.

The Egypt-Somalia axis, however, represents only one element of Cairo’s coalition-building efforts. Simultaneously, Egypt has deepened its strategic relationship with Eritrea, tapping into one of the region’s most enduring rivalries. The Ethiopia-Eritrea relationship remains profoundly complex, oscillating between the euphoria of the 2018 peace agreement, which earned Prime Minister Abiy the Nobel Peace Prize, and the subsequent cooling of relations as border demarcation stalled and mutual suspicions resurfaced. Eritrea, which fought a brutal independence war against Ethiopia from 1961 to 1991, followed by a devastating border war from 1998 to 2000 that killed an estimated 70,000 to 100,000 people, maintains a permanent defensive posture towards its larger neighbour. For Egypt, Eritrea represents a natural partner in any endeavour to check Ethiopian power, and Cairo has accordingly increased military cooperation, economic assistance, and diplomatic coordination with Asmara.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry’s multiple visits to Asmara, coupled with Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki’s rare trips abroad to Cairo, signal the depth of this coordination. Egypt has reportedly established a military presence at Eritrean ports, gaining forward positioning along the Red Sea coastline and the ability to monitor maritime traffic through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. From Ethiopia’s perspective, this represents a troubling development, the transformation of our northern neighbour from a peace partner into a potential security threat, backed by a major regional power with both the resources and motivation to complicate Ethiopian strategic calculations.

The simmering tensions reached a dramatic crescendo last week when Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed addressed the Ethiopian Parliament in what can only be described as a defiant and uncompromising speech that laid bare the depths of regional antagonism. Speaking to a packed chamber, the Prime Minister made clear that Ethiopia would not be cowed by external pressure, would not abandon its sovereign rights to develop the GERD, and would not retreat from its determination to secure Red Sea access. His language was notably forceful, warning that those who seek to encircle Ethiopia or threaten its vital interests would find themselves facing a nation that has never been colonised and has repeatedly demonstrated its willingness to defend its sovereignty at tremendous cost. He specifically addressed the military build-up along Ethiopia’s borders, the weapons shipments to neighbouring countries, and what he characterised as a coordinated campaign to isolate and pressure Ethiopia into submission.

The Prime Minister’s parliamentary address, whilst undoubtedly intended to rally domestic support and project resolve in the face of mounting external pressure, appears to have served as the immediate catalyst for an extraordinary gathering in Cairo this week. The tripartite summit, bringing together President el-Sisi of Egypt, President Isaias Afwerki of Eritrea, and President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud of Somalia, represents the most visible manifestation yet of the anti-Ethiopia coalition that Cairo has been methodically constructing. The optics alone were striking: three heads of state, representing nations that surround Ethiopia geographically, meeting in the Egyptian capital to coordinate strategy and present a united front. The official communiqué from the summit, whilst couched in diplomatic language about regional stability and mutual cooperation, left little doubt about the gathering’s purpose, to coordinate responses to what the three leaders characterised as Ethiopian actions that threaten regional peace and established norms.

The summit’s timing, coming mere days after Prime Minister Abiy’s parliamentary speech, suggests a carefully orchestrated response designed to demonstrate that Ethiopia’s defiance would be met with enhanced coordination amongst its neighbours. Egyptian media coverage of the summit was extensive and triumphal, portraying President el-Sisi as the architect of a new regional order capable of constraining Ethiopian ambitions. Eritrean and Somali officials echoed these themes, with joint statements emphasising shared security concerns and mutual commitments to defend against what they portrayed as Ethiopian expansionism. The summit concluded with agreements on enhanced military cooperation, coordination of diplomatic positions in international forums, and what was described as “joint responses to threats against the sovereignty and territorial integrity of member states” language that, whilst not naming Ethiopia explicitly, left little room for ambiguity about the intended target.

Yet even as this tripartite coalition solidified in Cairo, an even more dramatic development was unfolding in Washington that threatens to fundamentally alter the strategic landscape. The United States government, in a stunning policy shift that caught most regional observers by surprise, announced its intention to recognise Somaliland as a sovereign state. The announcement, delivered through a combination of State Department statements and presidential remarks, represents the most significant change in American Horn of Africa policy in decades and carries implications that extend far beyond the immediate Somalia-Somaliland dispute.

The American decision appears to rest upon several converging considerations. Firstly, Somaliland’s remarkable record of democratic governance and stability in a region characterised by state fragility and authoritarian rule has long attracted admiration from Western observers. The territory has conducted multiple peaceful electoral transitions, maintained relative security in a dangerous neighbourhood, and cooperated effectively with Western counter-terrorism efforts, achievements that stand in stark contrast to the persistent instability in Somalia proper. Secondly, strategic considerations related to Red Sea security and competition with Chinese influence in the region appear to have weighed heavily in Washington’s calculations. Somaliland’s location at the southern entrance to the Red Sea, its willingness to grant basing rights to Western powers, and its resistance to Chinese port development projects that have proliferated elsewhere along the African coast all enhance its attractiveness as a strategic partner.

Thirdly, and perhaps most significantly from Ethiopia’s perspective, the American decision appears to reflect recognition that Ethiopia’s maritime access represents a legitimate interest that the international community must accommodate rather than indefinitely suppress. The memorandum of understanding between Ethiopia and Somaliland, whilst controversial, offers a potential pathway to addressing Ethiopian needs through negotiated agreement with a willing partner rather than through conflict or the permanent acceptance of complete landlocked dependence. American officials, in background briefings explaining the recognition decision, have notably emphasised that Somaliland’s three decades of de facto independence, combined with its record of governance and strategic importance, justify a reconsideration of the international community’s blanket refusal to engage with territorial realities that diverge from inherited colonial boundaries.

The American announcement has sent shockwaves through regional capitals, nowhere more profoundly than in Cairo. Egypt’s entire strategy towards Ethiopia has rested upon the assumption that the international community, and particularly Western powers, would maintain the established position that Somaliland’s status cannot change and that Ethiopian engagement with Somaliland authorities constitutes an unacceptable challenge to Somali sovereignty. The American recognition decision fundamentally undermines this assumption, potentially opening the door to a cascade of similar recognitions from other Western and African states. If Somaliland achieves widespread international recognition as a sovereign state, then Ethiopia’s memorandum of understanding transforms from a controversial challenge to territorial integrity into a perfectly normal bilateral agreement between two recognised states, a development that would deprive Egypt of one of its most potent tools for isolating Ethiopia in international forums.

The Egyptian response to the American announcement has been swift and sharply critical. Cairo issued strongly worded statements expressing “deep concern” about the implications for regional stability and African Unity principles, lobbied intensively within the Arab League and African Union for collective rejection of the American position, and reportedly engaged in urgent diplomatic consultations with European powers to discourage them from following the American lead. Egyptian officials have framed the American decision as a dangerous precedent that undermines the post-colonial African consensus on the inviolability of inherited borders, potentially encouraging secessionist movements across the continent and creating instabilities that could take generations to resolve.

Yet Egypt’s vigorous opposition to Somaliland recognition sits uneasily alongside Cairo’s own extensive historical record of pursuing policies based upon strategic interest rather than principled consistency. Egypt’s recognition of Eritrean independence in 1993, for instance, represented Egyptian support for a territorial change that created a new state through secession, precisely the precedent Cairo now claims would be so dangerous if extended to Somaliland. The difference, of course, is that Eritrean independence served Egyptian interests by creating a new, potentially friendly state along Ethiopia’s northern border and providing Egypt with opportunities to project influence into the Red Sea region. Somaliland recognition, conversely, threatens Egyptian interests by potentially legitimising Ethiopia’s maritime access strategy and depriving Cairo of a key instrument for Ethiopian containment.

The Mogadishu government’s response to the American announcement has been even more visceral, with Somali officials describing the decision as a betrayal, a violation of international law, and an unacceptable interference in Somalia’s internal affairs. President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, speaking at the Cairo summit, declared that Somalia would never accept the partition of its territory and called upon all nations to reject the American position. Somali officials have threatened to reconsider their security cooperation with the United States, to explore closer relationships with powers less committed to supporting what they characterise as secessionist movements, and to take the matter to the United Nations Security Council and International Court of Justice.

The irony, of course, is that Somalia’s federal government has exercised no meaningful authority over Somaliland territory for more than three decades, that repeated attempts at reunification negotiations have foundered on Somaliland’s absolute insistence upon maintaining its separate status, and that the Mogadishu government’s claims to sovereignty over Somaliland rest primarily upon inherited colonial boundaries rather than any contemporary reality of governance or popular legitimacy. Somaliland conducted a referendum on independence in 2001, with over 97 per cent of voters supporting separation, a level of popular support that few secessionist movements anywhere can claim. The territory has its own currency, security forces, government institutions, and democratic processes, all of which function with considerably more effectiveness than their counterparts in Somalia proper.

For Eritrea, the American decision presents a more complex set of calculations. On one hand, Asmara’s alignment with Egypt and Somalia in opposing Ethiopian regional influence would logically require Eritrean opposition to any development that serves Ethiopian interests, including Somaliland recognition. On the other hand, Eritrea’s own independence resulted from precisely the process that Somalia now claims must never be repeated, a region with distinct historical identity and popular support for separation ultimately achieving recognition despite the opposition of the state from which it seceded. Eritrean officials have thus far maintained public silence on the American announcement, a reticence that likely reflects the uncomfortable parallels between Eritrea’s own trajectory and Somaliland’s aspirations.

The sophistication of Egypt’s strategy lies not merely in bilateral relationship building but in the creation of a broader diplomatic ecosystem that is inherently hostile to Ethiopian interests. Cairo has skilfully leveraged multilateral forums to amplify its message and isolate Ethiopia. The Arab League, at Egypt’s instigation, issued strongly worded statements condemning Ethiopia’s Somaliland agreement and affirming support for Somali territorial integrity. The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation followed suit, with Egypt ensuring that Ethiopia’s actions were framed not as a bilateral dispute but as a challenge to regional stability requiring collective response. Even within the African Union, where Ethiopia hosts the organisation’s headquarters and has historically wielded considerable influence, Egypt has worked to shift opinion, emphasising principles of territorial integrity and the inviolability of borders, principles that serve Egyptian interests whilst constraining Ethiopian options.

The Cairo summit this week represented the culmination of these efforts, providing a highly visible platform for the anti-Ethiopia coalition to demonstrate unity and coordination. The summit’s agenda reportedly included detailed discussions of military cooperation, intelligence sharing, coordination of positions in international forums, and what Egyptian officials described as “joint contingency planning” for potential Ethiopian actions in the Red Sea region. Somali officials briefed regional media on Egyptian commitments to substantially increase military aid, including naval assets that would enhance Somalia’s ability to patrol its claimed territorial waters and challenge any Ethiopian military presence along the Somaliland coast. Eritrean representatives, whilst characteristically less forthcoming in public statements, reportedly committed to enhanced coordination with Egyptian forces operating from Eritrean ports and to maintaining defensive readiness along the Ethiopian border.

Yet this narrative of Egyptian strategic brilliance and Ethiopian isolation requires careful scrutiny and balance. Whilst Egypt’s diplomatic campaign is undeniably sophisticated, it also rests upon foundations that are more fragile than Cairo’s confident rhetoric might suggest. The coalition Egypt has assembled is not built upon shared values, complementary interests, or genuine strategic alignment, but rather represents a temporary convergence of grievances held together primarily through Egyptian financial inducements and the gravitational pull of Cairo’s regional influence. Somalia’s federal government, despite Egyptian support, exercises limited control beyond Mogadishu, with regional states, clan dynamics, and the persistent threat of Al-Shabaab insurgency creating an extraordinarily complex internal landscape that no amount of Egyptian military aid can resolve.

Indeed, the American recognition of Somaliland, whatever its other implications, reflects a hard-headed assessment that the fiction of Somali territorial unity has become increasingly untenable and that Western interests may be better served by engaging with the stable, cooperative territory that actually exists rather than the unified Somalia that exists primarily in diplomatic theory. Eritrea, meanwhile, remains one of the world’s most repressive states, with no elections since independence, indefinite military conscription, and a human rights record that has prompted massive refugee outflows. Egypt’s embrace of such a regime, whilst strategically logical, undermines Cairo’s attempts to position itself as a defender of international norms and regional stability.

Moreover, Egypt’s strategy contains an inherent contradiction that Ethiopian officials have been quick to highlight, particularly in Prime Minister Abiy’s parliamentary address last week. Cairo positions itself as the defender of international law and territorial integrity in the Somalia-Ethiopia dispute, yet Egypt itself has consistently rejected international arbitration mechanisms for the Nile dispute, walked away from negotiation frameworks when they proved inconvenient, and maintained positions on water rights that most international legal experts consider inconsistent with contemporary international water law. The 1959 Nile Waters Agreement between Egypt and Sudan, which Egypt continues to reference, allocated the entire Nile flow between two downstream countries whilst completely ignoring the interests of upstream riparian states, including Ethiopia, where 85 per cent of Nile waters originate.

Ethiopia’s consistent position has been that colonial-era agreements signed without our participation cannot bind us, a position that international law generally supports through principles of state succession and the invalidity of treaties imposed upon non-signatories. The GERD itself, contrary to Egyptian claims, operates under principles of equitable and reasonable utilisation enshrined in the 1997 UN Watercourses Convention, a convention that Egypt notably voted against. Ethiopian officials have repeatedly emphasised that the dam is designed for hydroelectric generation, not irrigation, meaning that water flows through rather than being consumed, and that Ethiopia has committed to operational protocols that protect downstream interests. Studies by international water management experts, including panels convened during the negotiations, have generally concluded that whilst the GERD will have impacts during filling periods, proper coordination can minimise downstream effects, and in the long term, the dam’s regulation of seasonal flows may actually benefit downstream countries by reducing flooding and providing more consistent water availability.

The maritime access question similarly admits of more nuance than Egypt’s absolutist position acknowledges. Ethiopia’s landlocked status represents a genuine developmental constraint. Economists have long documented the “landlocked penalty” the measurable economic disadvantages faced by countries without coastal access, including higher transport costs, reduced trade competitiveness, and vulnerability to the political stability and policy decisions of transit countries. Ethiopia’s dependence upon Djibouti, whilst generally functional, creates risks that any responsible government must seek to mitigate. The Somaliland memorandum, whatever its legal and diplomatic complications, represents an attempt to address a real problem through negotiated agreement rather than military force an approach that should, in principle, be encouraged rather than automatically condemned.

The question of Somaliland’s status itself defies simple categorisation, as the American recognition decision implicitly acknowledges. The territory has maintained de facto independence for over three decades, with functioning government institutions, its own currency, security forces, and democratic elections that international observers have generally characterised as more free and fair than those in many recognised states in the region. The international community’s refusal to recognise Somaliland has rested primarily upon the African Union’s principle of respecting colonial borders, yet this same principle has not prevented the recognition of other territorial changes, including, notably, Eritrea’s independence from Ethiopia and South Sudan’s separation from Sudan. The absolute position that Somaliland’s status cannot evolve, that Ethiopian engagement with Somaliland authorities automatically constitutes aggression against Somalia, represents a diplomatic rigidity that the American government has now explicitly rejected and that may not ultimately serve regional stability.

Egypt’s strategy also carries significant risks for regional security that extend well beyond the immediate bilateral relationship. By militarising disputes that should be resolved through negotiation, by providing weapons and military support to fragile states in an already volatile region, and by deliberately inflaming historical tensions, Cairo is not contributing to Red Sea security but potentially undermining it. The Horn of Africa represents one of the world’s most complex and dangerous regions, where state fragility, ethnic tensions, competition for scarce resources, historical grievances, and proxy conflicts have repeatedly combined to produce humanitarian catastrophes. The Ethiopian civil war in Tigray, which only formally ended in November 2022 after claiming hundreds of thousands of lives, demonstrated how quickly violence can spiral in this region and how limited the international community’s capacity to contain such conflicts proves to be.

Egyptian military support to Somalia, whilst framed as defensive capacity building, introduces new weapons into an environment where arms have an alarming tendency to migrate into unintended hands. Al-Shabaab, despite years of military pressure, retains the capacity to launch significant attacks and control territory. The group’s ability to capture weapons from Somali security forces is well documented. Egyptian arms shipments, ostensibly intended to strengthen the Somali federal government, may ultimately contribute to the armament of groups that threaten regional stability in ways that serve nobody’s interests, including Egypt’s. Similarly, the Egypt-Eritrea axis, whilst tactically advantageous for Cairo, provides legitimacy and support to one of the world’s most repressive regimes. Eritrea’s involvement in the Tigray conflict, where Eritrean forces were credibly accused of widespread atrocities, demonstrated the Isaias government’s willingness to destabilise the region in pursuit of perceived interests.

For Ethiopia, navigating this challenging diplomatic environment requires both strategic clarity and tactical flexibility. Prime Minister Abiy’s parliamentary address last week, whilst projecting necessary resolve for domestic audiences, must be balanced with diplomatic approaches that emphasise Ethiopia’s willingness to engage constructively with neighbours and the international community. The temptation to mirror Egyptian approaches, to build counter-coalitions and pursue escalatory responses, must be resisted in favour of strategies that emphasise the legitimacy of Ethiopian positions whilst demonstrating commitment to regional cooperation.

Ethiopia’s fundamental case is strong: we have the right to develop our water resources for the benefit of our people, we have legitimate economic interests in securing reliable maritime access, and we have consistently pursued these objectives through diplomatic engagement rather than military force. These positions need to be articulated clearly and consistently in every available regional and international forum. The American recognition of Somaliland, whatever complications it introduces, validates Ethiopia’s fundamental contention that our maritime access needs represent legitimate interests that the international community must accommodate rather than indefinitely suppress.

Ethiopian diplomacy must also work to diversify relationships and reduce dependence upon any single partnership or transit route. The Gulf states, particularly the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, have substantial interests in Red Sea stability and Horn of Africa development. Asian powers, notably China, have invested heavily in Ethiopian infrastructure and have their own interests in ensuring that the Belt and Road Initiative’s African components remain viable. Emerging African economies, from Kenya to South Africa, have stakes in demonstrating that African nations can resolve complex disputes through African mechanisms. These relationships, properly cultivated, can provide balance to Egyptian influence whilst avoiding the zero-sum dynamics that characterise current regional tensions.

Crucially, Ethiopia must demonstrate through concrete actions what we assert in rhetoric: that our objectives are defensive and developmental rather than aggressive and revisionist. This means maintaining transparency about GERD operations, sharing hydrological data, adhering to agreed protocols during filling operations, and demonstrating through measurable outcomes that the dam poses no existential threat to downstream water security. It means approaching the Somaliland question with sensitivity to regional concerns about territorial integrity whilst defending our right to pursue maritime access through diplomatic means. It means engaging Somalia directly and constructively on issues of mutual concern, from counter-terrorism cooperation to trade facilitation to the regulation of cross-border pastoralist movements, even as Mogadishu participates in Cairo’s containment coalition.

The broader African context cannot be ignored. How these disputes are ultimately resolved will establish precedents that extend far beyond Ethiopia and Egypt. The continent contains numerous shared river basins where upstream development rights and downstream water security must be balanced. Dozens of landlocked states face economic constraints similar to Ethiopia’s. If Egypt’s containment strategy succeeds, if pressure and isolation can deny Ethiopia’s legitimate developmental rights, the implications will be felt across the continent. Conversely, if Ethiopia can demonstrate that development and cooperation are compatible, that upstream rights and downstream security can be reconciled through good faith negotiation, this too will establish valuable precedents.

The African Union, IGAD, and other continental bodies face a critical test. Allowing one member state to systematically isolate another through coalition-building and pressure tactics, regardless of the merits of underlying disputes, undermines the principles of African solidarity and African solutions to African problems that these organisations exist to advance. The Cairo summit, with its explicit anti-Ethiopia agenda, represents a challenge to these principles that cannot be ignored. The international community more broadly must recognise that whilst Egypt’s diplomatic sophistication is impressive, sophistication should not be confused with legitimacy, and that the pressures being applied serve primarily Egyptian interests rather than regional stability or international legal principles.

Egypt’s “cooking” strategy continues, the diplomatic pot now boiling vigorously with this week’s Cairo summit turning up the heat to maximum levels. The carefully combined ingredients of water anxiety, territorial disputes, and historical rivalries simmer together, producing an acrid smoke that obscures rather than illuminates the path towards regional stability. The intended outcome remains unchanged: an Ethiopia sufficiently isolated and pressured to abandon its developmental aspirations and accept a subordinate regional position. Yet strategies built upon containment rather than cooperation, upon pressure rather than partnership, carry within themselves the seeds of their own failure.

They fail because they fundamentally misread the determination of peoples who have tasted development’s promise and will not willingly return to perpetual poverty. Prime Minister Abiy’s parliamentary address, whatever one thinks of its diplomatic wisdom, captured a sentiment that resonates deeply across Ethiopian society: we will not be contained, we will not abandon our sovereign rights, we will not accept permanent developmental subordination to accommodate Egyptian anxieties rooted in colonial-era entitlements. They fail because they create instabilities that, once unleashed, cannot be controlled by their instigators. The weapons flowing into Somalia, the military build-up along Eritrean borders, the escalating rhetoric from all sides, these dynamics, once set in motion, develop their own momentum that even sophisticated diplomats in Cairo may find impossible to contain.

They fail because the interests they seek to suppress, development, sovereignty, economic viability, are not negotiable preferences but existential necessities. Ethiopia will continue to fill and operate the GERD because we must, because our people deserve the electricity and development opportunities it provides, because abandoning our sovereign rights over resources within our own territory is simply not an option any government could accept whilst retaining legitimacy. We will continue to pursue legitimate maritime access because our economy cannot indefinitely bear the constraints of complete landlocked dependence, because 120 million people require economic integration with global markets, because geographical accidents of history need not permanently determine national trajectories.

The American recognition of Somaliland, whatever its broader implications, represents an acknowledgement of realities that the international community has too long ignored. The question facing the region is not whether Egypt’s cooking strategy will ultimately force Ethiopian capitulation, it will not. The question is rather how much diplomatic capital will be expended, how much regional instability will be generated, how much potential for genuine cooperation will be sacrificed before all parties recognise that Ethiopia’s development cannot be indefinitely contained, only accommodated within frameworks that respect legitimate interests on all sides.

The pot boils, temperatures rise to unprecedented levels as evidenced by this week’s Cairo summit, pressures build in ways that threaten to crack the vessel itself, but the meal Egypt is cooking will ultimately prove indigestible. The only remaining question is how much damage will accumulate before this reality is universally acknowledged and diplomacy returns to the essential task it should never have abandoned: not the containment of legitimate aspirations but their accommodation within frameworks of mutual benefit and regional stability. The ingredients have been combined, the heat applied, but the recipe produces only bitterness. Perhaps it is time to return to the kitchen and consider an entirely different approach, one based not on cooking but on genuine partnership, not on containment but on cooperation, not on zero-sum competition but on the recognition that all nations of the region share interests in stability, development, and mutual prosperity that no amount of diplomatic maneuvering can indefinitely suppress.

Sewasew Teklemariam is a regular columnist for The Ethiopian Tribune, focusing on regional geopolitics and Ethiopian foreign policy.

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A Correspondent’s Dispatch

ADDIS ABABA — The Economist’s stark assessment landed like a stone in still water. “Africa’s most secretive dictatorship,” it called Eritrea, now facing an “existential crisis” engineered by its giant neighbour. The ripples spread quickly, some nodding in grim recognition, others bristling at what they saw as inflammatory oversimplification. But between these poles of reaction lies something more troubling: a convergence of historical grievances, strategic desperation, and human tragedy that refuses easy categorisation.

What emerges from conversations with diplomats, academics, refugees, and political operatives across the Horn is not consensus but a fractured landscape of interpretation. The question isn’t merely whether crisis looms, but whose crisis this is, how it might unfold, and whether our very language for describing it has already become weaponised.

The arithmetic of vulnerability tells part of the story. Eritrea, with barely six million souls, has haemorrhaged over 680,000 registered refugees and asylum seekers by latest count, perhaps ten to fifteen per cent of its entire population, depending on which estimates one trusts. This exodus speaks to something broken at the core. The country’s indefinite national service, formally an eighteen-month obligation but in practice stretching into decades, has transformed citizenship into a form of bondage. By early 2023, the government escalated forced recruitment, sweeping up reservists approaching fifty, punishing families of draft evaders, conducting midnight roundups that sent thousands more fleeing towards Sudan and beyond.

Then came February 2025, when Asmara ordered a nationwide mobilisation extending to citizens under sixty. Previously discharged conscripts received summons. Married women, traditionally exempt, were called. Exit permits were denied to those under fifty. The machinery of the state, long geared towards control, shifted into what many recognised as a wartime posture, though no war had been declared.

Across the border, Ethiopia’s calculus operates on a different scale entirely. With over 120 million people and an economy that, before recent upheavals, consistently posted near-double-digit growth, it confronts what Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has repeatedly termed an “existential” constraint: landlocked isolation. Since Eritrean independence in 1993 severed Ethiopia from the Red Sea, successive Addis governments have chafed at dependence on Djibouti’s ports, at the vulnerability this creates, at what many Ethiopians view as a historical injustice.

Abiy’s public pronouncements walk a careful line. Yes, sea access is existential, he insists. Yes, Ethiopia must secure reliable outlets to global trade. But no, he adds with studied emphasis, this will not be achieved through war. Negotiations, mutual benefit, respect for sovereignty, these are the terms he deploys before international audiences. Yet other signals complicate this reassuring narrative. Senior military officers speak differently in less formal settings. Eritrean officials, including Foreign Minister Osman Saleh, warn of “misguided and outdated ambitions” being pursued “through diplomacy or military force.” Reports filter through of Ethiopian troop concentrations along shared borders, though reliable confirmation proves elusive.

The regional architecture shifted dramatically when Washington, in a move that reverberated from Mogadishu to Asmara, formally recognised Somaliland as an independent state in early 2025. This American endorsement of Somaliland’s three-decade quest for international legitimacy, achieved through relative stability and democratic governance that contrasts sharply with Somalia’s persistent fragility, transformed Ethiopia’s strategic calculus overnight. The port agreement Addis had negotiated with Hargeisa suddenly acquired the imprimatur of great power blessing, offering Ethiopia not merely access but partnership with an internationally recognised entity. For Asmara, watching from across the Red Sea, the implications proved chilling: if borders could be redrawn with American approval, if separatist regions could achieve statehood through sustained lobbying and strategic alignment, what precedents were being established?

The Afar dimension adds another volatile element to this combustible mixture. Straddling the borders of Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Djibouti, the Afar people have long navigated between competing sovereignties and their own aspirations for self-determination. Within Eritrea’s southern lowlands, Afar communities have endured decades under Asmara’s centralised, highland-dominated authoritarianism a regime that has systematically marginalised pastoralist populations, conscripted their youth into indefinite military service, and shown little tolerance for ethnic or regional autonomy. Now, observing Somaliland’s recognition and Ethiopia’s aggressive pursuit of coastal access, some Afar political movements see opportunity in the emerging disorder.

Whispers of Afar separatism, long dismissed as fantasy given the community’s relatively small numbers within Eritrea, have acquired new currency. If Somaliland could persist for thirty years before achieving recognition, if Ethiopia might support entities offering port access, if Asmara’s grip weakens under combined internal and external pressure, might the Afar-inhabited regions, including the strategic port of Assab itself, become viable as an autonomous zone or even an independent entity aligned with Ethiopia? The logic, however premature, circulates in diaspora forums, in hushed conversations in Addis, in the calculations of regional power brokers seeking leverage.

For Asmara, this represents nightmare arithmetic: not merely Ethiopian pressure for port access, but the potential fracturing of the state itself along ethnic and regional lines, encouraged by external actors and legitimised by recent precedent. The regime’s response, intensified mobilisation, tightened control over border regions, heightened surveillance of Afar communities reflects paranoia that may not be entirely unjustified.

Those who accept the “existential crisis” framework point to this accumulation of pressure. The mobilisation in Eritrea, they argue, represents not paranoia but rational response to genuine threat. Ethiopia’s diplomatic offensives the port agreement with now-recognised Somaliland, the careful cultivation of regional alliances, the persistent public discourse about maritime necessity these lay groundwork for coercion, whether overt or subtle. When a country already weakened by mass emigration, economic anaemia (trade deficits approaching ninety million dollars), and systemic repression faces pressure from a neighbour forty times its size, whilst separatist movements within its borders sense opportunity and external powers redraw regional maps, the word “existential” seems less like hyperbole than description.

Human rights investigators reinforce this reading. Their documentation of indefinite conscription as forced labour, of torture in military camps, of families punished for their children’s escape, paints a picture of a state consuming itself to maintain control. When over half a million citizens have chosen refugee camps over home, when the working-age population drains away despite shoot-to-kill border policies, internal collapse becomes thinkable even without external invasion.

Yet the opposing interpretation deserves serious hearing. Its proponents note that Ethiopia has not, in fact, massed invasion forces. Abiy’s repeated disavowals of military action, whilst perhaps convenient, have been consistent and public. The port negotiations with Somaliland, controversial as they are, represent exactly the kind of diplomatic alternative to force that critics claim Ethiopia rejects. Moreover, Ethiopia’s strategic interest in Red Sea access, however aggressively pursued, remains fundamentally rational for a landlocked nation whose economic future depends on trade. To frame legitimate national interest as inherently threatening, this argument runs, is to deny Ethiopia agency whilst infantilising Eritrea.

This camp also notes Eritrea’s demonstrated resilience. The Isaias Afwerki regime has survived decades of isolation, weathered UN sanctions, maintained internal control through comprehensive surveillance, and even deployed forces to support Ethiopia during the Tigray conflict. The state apparatus, however repressive, remains functional. The military, though weakened by defections, retains discipline. And the psychological and diplomatic costs of interstate war international condemnation, economic disruption, unpredictable escalation create powerful deterrents that armchair analysts too easily dismiss.

Then there are those who reject the framing itself as distorted, though from opposing directions. Some accuse Western media of whitewashing Eritrea’s self-inflicted wounds by emphasising external threat over internal oppression. The “existential crisis,” they contend, originates not in Addis but in Asmara’s brutal governance. By foregrounding Ethiopian ambitions and American recognition of Somaliland, the narrative obscures decades of systematic human rights violations, forced labour masquerading as national service, and economic mismanagement that has produced the exodus. The suffering is real, but attributing it primarily to Ethiopian pressure absolves those actually responsible.

Others see whitewashing in the opposite direction a sanitising of Ethiopian assertiveness. They point to selective leaks from military circles, to the gap between Abiy’s diplomatic language and harder rhetoric from security officials, to the historical precedent of the 1998-2000 border war when Ethiopia proved willing to deploy massive force over disputed territory. The port deal with Somaliland, they note, violated Somalia’s sovereignty and American recognition rewarded that violation in ways that suggest Ethiopia’s commitment to legal norms remains contingent. If Ethiopia can unilaterally negotiate away another country’s territorial integrity and secure great power endorsement, what prevents similar logic being applied to Eritrea? And if Afar separatism becomes a useful tool for achieving port access, what ethical constraints would prevent its exploitation?

Weighing these competing accounts requires moving beyond assertion to probability. The likelihood of sustained diplomatic and economic pressure approaches certainty Ethiopia’s strategic imperatives and public commitments make this inevitable. The probability of border incidents or low-intensity clashes seems considerable, given the military posturing, historical tensions, and potential for miscalculation. The risk of internal fragmentation, particularly amongst Afar and other marginalised communities emboldened by regional precedents, has risen from theoretical to plausible. But the risk of full-scale invasion or territorial seizure, whilst not dismissible, appears lower. International norms, African Union protocols, and the sheer logistical and political costs of overt aggression create meaningful constraints, even if imperfect ones.

What seems most probable is something murkier than either war or peace: a prolonged period of coercive diplomacy, incremental pressure, perhaps proxies and leverage points that fall short of invasion but nonetheless compromise Eritrean sovereignty in practice if not in law. This is the space where “existential crisis” becomes not metaphor but slowly unfolding reality not a single catastrophic moment but an erosion of autonomy, a reduction of options, a state that retains formal independence whilst losing substantive control over its strategic choices.

The humanitarian implications unfold regardless of which interpretation prevails. Mobilisation alone has already accelerated refugee flows. The families of conscripts face impossible choices impoverishment and punishment if their children flee, conscription without end if they stay. If tensions escalate to actual conflict, or if internal fracturing accelerates, displacement could overwhelm already strained neighbouring countries. Sudan, itself convulsed by civil war, can absorb no more. Djibouti’s camps overflow. European destinations grow increasingly hostile to African migrants.

Regional stability hangs in the balance as well. The Red Sea corridor, critical to global commerce and energy flows, becomes a theatre where Horn of Africa conflicts intersect with Gulf rivalries, Egyptian security concerns, and great power competition. Port politics in Somalia and Somaliland reverberates through clan dynamics and federal disputes. American recognition of Somaliland signals shifting Western priorities in the region, potentially encouraging other secessionist movements whilst alarming governments facing their own territorial integrity questions. Every move at this chessboard shifts pieces across the broader game.

For those watching closely, certain indicators matter more than others. Ethiopian military deployments beyond what Addis officially acknowledges would signal genuine preparation rather than mere posturing. Further expansion of Eritrea’s mobilisation, particularly if it begins affecting previously protected categories of citizens or targeting specific ethnic communities like the Afar with particular intensity, would suggest Asmara perceives imminent rather than theoretical threat. International reactions whether the African Union and United Nations respond with forceful diplomacy or empty resolutions to both the Somaliland precedent and Ethiopian assertiveness will shape both sides’ calculations about costs and constraints. And internal developments in Eritrea, from student resistance to military defections to elite fractures to organised Afar political activity, could transform the equation overnight.

What remains clear is that Eritrea’s crisis, existential or not, is simultaneously internal and external, self-inflicted and imposed, slow-moving and potentially sudden. The state apparatus survives through repression that guarantees its long-term weakness. The population’s exodus reflects both tyranny at home and fear of worse to come. Ethiopia’s strategic necessity collides with Eritrea’s desperate determination to preserve what independence it has retained at such terrible cost. And now, American recognition of Somaliland and the stirrings of Afar separatism add new dimensions to a crisis already dangerously multifaceted.

The Economist’s warning, then, captures something real even if incomplete. This is not yet collapse, not yet invasion, not yet the catastrophe that “existential crisis” suggests as imminent. But neither is it ordinary diplomatic friction or media exaggeration. It is rather a convergence of structural pressures demographic, economic, strategic, political, ethnic that creates conditions where catastrophe becomes thinkable, where decisions made in coming months could tip towards outcomes no one fully intends but everyone will inherit.

Those who report on such matters must navigate between Cassandra’s curse and Pollyanna’s blindness. To sound alarm too loudly risks inflaming the very tensions one hopes to defuse. To reassure too readily risks complicity when prevention was still possible. The narratives we construct “existential threat,” “legitimate interest,” “internal repression,” “external aggression,” “separatist opportunity” do not merely describe reality but shape it, influencing how policymakers act and populations react.

Perhaps what distinguishes this moment is not whether crisis has arrived but whether enough people believe it has to make it so. Eritrea mobilises because it perceives threat. Ethiopia presses harder because it perceives necessity. Afar activists sense possibilities their parents never imagined. International observers parse language and count troops, trying to divine intention from incomplete evidence. And ordinary citizens, on all sides of increasingly contested borders, watch their leaders’ rhetoric and their own diminishing options, wondering whether the next headline will announce what no one wanted but many feared: that the Horn of Africa’s long, troubled peace has finally broken.

The fracture lines are visible. Whether they hold or give way remains the question that haunts every informed observer’s sleepless nights.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

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By Thomas Araya Ethiopian Tribune columnist

In the Horn of Africa, where silence is often mistaken for stability and memory is curated like a museum exhibit, the spectre of proxy war is no longer a distant threat, it is a gathering storm. Ethiopia and Eritrea, once locked in open conflict and later bound by a brittle peace, now find themselves at the centre of a geopolitical recalibration. The terrain is familiar: water, ports, sovereignty, and silence. But the actors have changed, and the stakes have grown.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s recent declaration that Ethiopia will “correct” the historic mistake of losing access to the Red Sea has reignited tensions across the region. “Remaining a prisoner of the land is no longer sustainable,” he said. “This is not a matter of pride, it has become an existential issue.” The remarks, delivered with characteristic rhetorical flourish, were swiftly echoed by Ethiopia’s top military diplomat, General Teshome Gemechu, who described Eritrea’s Assab port as a “national objective”.

The reaction from Asmara was predictably caustic. Eritrean officials accused Addis Ababa of threatening their sovereignty, warning of a “toxic agenda of territorial claims.” President Isaias Afwerki, long accustomed to strategic ambiguity, now finds himself in a defensive posture, aligning more closely with Egypt, a nation whose own anxieties over the Nile have shaped decades of covert policy in the region.

Richard Reid’s Shallow Graves offers a lens through which to interpret this moment. The book, a memoir of the Ethiopia–Eritrea war, is less concerned with battlefield tactics than with the architecture of forgetting. Reid describes Eritrea as a state obsessed with memory, but only the kind it can control. “The Eritrean state is not interested in history,” he writes. “It is interested in memory, controlled, curated, and weaponised.” Veterans are revered but silenced; personal histories are discouraged, lest they disrupt the official narrative. The state’s legitimacy, he argues, is built on a curated past one that justifies perpetual mobilisation and strategic opacity.

This culture of controlled remembrance explains much about Eritrea’s posture today. Its involvement in the Tigray war, its silence on the GERD dispute, and its growing cooperation with Egypt are not anomalies, they are expressions of a doctrine that sees survival in secrecy and sovereignty in silence. Reid’s framing helps decode why Eritrea entered Tigray, why it stayed, and why it now retreats into diplomatic ambiguity.

Teferi Mekonen’s paper on the Nile–Eritrea nexus adds another layer to this analysis. From 1941 to 1991, Egypt and Sudan actively supported Eritrean insurgents, not out of ideological solidarity, but to sabotage Ethiopia’s upstream ambitions. “Egypt’s interest in Eritrea was never merely territorial,” Mekonen writes. “It was hydro-strategic, aimed at securing control over the Nile’s headwaters.” Ethiopia’s attempts to harness its waters, whether through the Lake Tana dam in the 1950s or the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam today, have been met with obstruction, sabotage, and diplomatic pressure. Eritrea, situated at the crossroads of these hydropolitical tensions, became both pawn and player, its insurgency subsidised by those who feared a strong, water-secure Ethiopia.

Today, the proxy war economy in East Africa is no longer confined to Cold War binaries. It is transactional, multi-polar, and increasingly opaque. The United Arab Emirates seeks control of Red Sea ports and influence through drone diplomacy. Egypt remains fixated on Nile sovereignty, backing actors that can contain Ethiopia’s rise. Turkey and Qatar jostle for position in Somalia, while Russia peddles arms and mercenaries under the guise of anti-Western solidarity. The United States and European Union, meanwhile, fund containment regimes to stem migration, often turning a blind eye to the abuses committed by their regional partners.

Ethiopia and Eritrea, though sovereign in name, are increasingly platforms for these foreign agendas. Their soil hosts military bases, their airspace is patrolled by imported drones, and their youth are conscripted into conflicts whose origins lie far beyond their borders. The resources that fuel these wars, water, minerals, ports, and even memory itself are being commodified, traded, and weaponised in a theatre where the local is always subordinate to the strategic.

Egypt’s recent deployment of troops to Somalia under the African Union Support and Stabilisation Mission (AUSSOM) has further complicated the picture. Ethiopian officials view the move with suspicion, tying it to Cairo’s long-running dispute over the GERD. Ethiopia’s ambassador in Mogadishu warned that Egyptian forces could pose “a political and strategic challenge” to Ethiopia’s 4,000 soldiers already stationed in Somalia. Cairo, for its part, insists the deployment is at Mogadishu’s invitation and fully endorsed by the African Union Peace and Security Council.

Somali officials have welcomed Egypt’s involvement, with Defence Minister Abdulkadir Nur declaring that Somalia would no longer wait for others to dictate its security partnerships. Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty reaffirmed that Cairo’s support is rooted in strengthening Somalia’s unity and territorial integrity. Yet the timing and scale of Egypt’s military expansion suggest a broader agenda one that includes containing Ethiopia’s regional ambitions and perhaps even influencing its internal cohesion.

This brings us to a more symbolic, but no less potent, dimension of the proxy war narrative: the flag of Oromia. Its resemblance to Egypt’s national colours has not gone unnoticed. In diaspora circles and among Ethiopian federalists, the flag has become a cipher a symbol of water politics, identity fragmentation, and external manipulation. Some interpret its prominence as evidence of Egyptian influence within Ethiopia’s federal architecture, pointing to figures like Professor Berhanu Nega, whose role in the government is seen by critics as emblematic of a broader ideological shift.

Berhanu, once a firebrand opposition figure, now serves as Minister of Education. His transformation from dissident to cabinet member has raised eyebrows, particularly among those who view the current federal arrangement as a Trojan horse for disintegration. “Egypt, unable to confront Ethiopia directly, has opted for a subtler strategy,” one diaspora analyst noted. “Support federal actors who favour decentralisation, weaken the centre, and ensure that no unified Ethiopian state can challenge its Nile hegemony.”

Whether this theory holds water is debatable. What is clear, however, is that Ethiopia’s internal divisions are being exploited by external powers. The Tigray war, the Oromo protests, the Amhara insurgency all have been framed as domestic crises. But in a region where foreign embassies double as intelligence hubs and humanitarian aid often masks strategic interests, the line between internal and external is increasingly blurred.

Yet even as these proxy dynamics unfold, a new force is beginning to stir one that neither Egypt nor Eritrea, nor the Ethiopian federal elite, seem prepared for. In Morocco, Gen Z protesters have taken to the streets, demanding dignity, transparency, and a future not mortgaged to corruption. Their slogans are not ideological they are existential. Their mobilisation is not partisan it is generational. And their fury is not confined to Rabat.

Egyptian cities, long subdued by surveillance and repression, are beginning to echo with the same discontent. The youth, born into economic stagnation and political theatre, are no longer content to inherit silence. Their digital fluency, their disdain for state propaganda, and their hunger for justice make them unpredictable and potent.

Ethiopia and Eritrea will not be immune. The new generation, raised on broken promises and buried truths, is beginning to ask questions that cannot be answered with slogans or arrests. They see through the proxy choreography. They understand the cost of curated memory. And they are beginning to speak.

“The old men are still talking about sovereignty,” one young Ethiopian activist posted online. “We’re talking about survival.”

The danger now is not merely that proxy wars will erupt, but that they will be met with uprisings leaderless, borderless, and unforgiving. The Horn of Africa, long governed by secrecy and strategic ambiguity, may soon be redrawn not by generals or diplomats, but by teenagers with smartphones and nothing left to lose.

For the diaspora, the imperative is clear. To understand the present, one must excavate the past not the official histories, but the buried truths, the shallow graves of memory and meaning. Only then can the region’s future be reclaimed from the hands that seek to shape it in their own image.

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The two-year war in Ethiopia’s Tigray region left thousands of people dead. (AFP/File Photo)

By Hafed Al-Ghwell

The Pretoria peace agreement that halted Ethiopia’s two-year war in its Tigray region is unraveling. Fighting has flared again as rival factions within the Tigray People’s Liberation Front turn on each other, raising fears that Ethiopia and its northernmost region are sliding back into conflict.

This comes barely two years after a ceasefire agreement purportedly ended the brutal 2020-2022 war. That conflict, which pitted the TPLF’s Tigray Defense Forces against Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s federal military (backed by Eritrea), killed tens of thousands of people and displaced millions. The truce in November 2022 was intended to silence the guns, create an interim administration in Tigray, and initiate the disarmament of the TDF, and the withdrawal of Eritrean troops.

Yet key grievances remained, resulting in renewed tensions. Eritrea, which had intervened in the conflict in an attempt to crush its old TPLF enemies, was excluded from the Pretoria talks and reportedly maintained forces inside parts of Tigray despite the peace deal. The TPLF, meanwhile, never fully reconciled with Ethiopia’s political fold, sowing the seeds of future discord.

One of the immediate causes of the present meltdown in Tigray is a bitter power struggle within the leadership of the region. The TPLF has split into rival camps led by its longtime chairperson, Debretsion Gebremichael, and the federally appointed interim president, Getachew Reda.

This feud has now spilled over into open confrontation, with each side claiming to represent the true Tigrayan cause. The resulting divide has paralyzed governance and security in the region. The interim regional government — short on trust and beset by factional mutiny — is pleading for Prime Minister Abiy to intervene as armed loyalists on both sides jostle for control.

What was left of the Pretoria Agreement’s security framework is rapidly collapsing, with former comrades-in-arms now clashing, civilians again fleeing in fear, and Addis Ababa’s authority in the region becoming increasingly tenuous.

Neighboring Eritrea is watching these developments with growing alarm — and, naturally, some sense of opportunism. It remains deeply hostile to the TPLF, in any form, and seeks to prevent any resurgent Tigrayan power along its border.

Also at the heart of the Eritrean unease is Ethiopia’s revived push for access to the Red Sea coast. Abiy has repeatedly declared that regaining a seaport is an existential imperative for landlocked Ethiopia, which lost its coastline when Eritrea gained independence in 1993. Ethiopia currently pays about $1 billion a year to ship goods via Djibouti, and Abiy’s government has openly stated that Ethiopia has a sovereign right to sea access.

To Eritrea, such discourse sounds like a direct, certainly an implied, threat to its territory, and in particular to the port of Assab, which Ethiopia covets.

The bad blood runs deep. Eritrea and Ethiopia fought a border war from 1998 to 2000 and remained bitter rivals until Abiy’s rapprochement in 2018. Eritrea then aligned with Abiy against the TPLF during the Tigray war. But this “enemy-of-my-enemy” alliance soured quickly after Addis Ababa and the Tigrayan authorities made peace.

Should Ethiopia and Eritrea relapse into war, the consequences would reverberate across the region.

Hafed Al-Ghwell

Eritrea sees Ethiopia’s federal government and the TPLF’s interim administration converging, a scenario it has long feared. Some reports even suggest Eritrean leaders felt more threatened after the Pretoria deal because they believed it increased cooperation against Eritrean interests between the leadership in Tigray and Abiy’s government. With Abiy eyeing access to the Red Sea, and Tigray in turmoil, Eritrea might calculate that confrontation is looming.

Should Ethiopia and Eritrea relapse into war, the consequences would reverberate across an already fragile region. The ongoing civil war in Sudan would probably be the first arena of spillover; the Sudanese Armed Forces and its rival military faction, the Rapid Support Forces, each seek external support, and the conflict in Tigray has already aroused suspicions of meddling. The RSF at one point accused Tigrayan fighters of joining the fray on the side of the SAF. At the same time, Eritrea has reportedly been backing tribal militias in eastern Sudan to help contain the spread of the RSF near the border.

A full-on Ethiopia-Eritrea war could therefore entangle Sudan on several fronts: Ethiopia might lean on it for strategic access or support, while Eritrea could intensify its covert support for Sudanese factions for instance. Naturally, such proxy entanglements would demolish the fragile efforts to bring stability to Sudan, dimming hopes for peace in the short term.

Meanwhile, Somalia’s security woes would likely deepen. The country’s federal government relies heavily on regional support, including Ethiopian troops, to keep militants at bay. If Ethiopia becomes consumed by a war at home, its military deployments in Somalia could cease, providing insurgent group Al-Shabab with an opening.

Therefore, a wider conflict would be catastrophic at a time when cooperation against extremists and famine relief is crucial.

Even Egypt is possibly a part of the equation. Cairo has had reservations with Ethiopia over the waters of the Nile. Egypt has cultivated ties with Eritrea and Sudan as counterweights. This week, Eritrea’s foreign minister visited Egypt to coordinate their positions, with both governments pointedly asserting that Red Sea security should be led by coastal nations — implicitly sidelining Ethiopia.

Eritrea and Egypt share concerns about an ascendant Ethiopia, and a conflict could bring them into even closer alignment. Egypt might see an opportunity to press Ethiopia on the Nile issue if the country were bogged down with fighting on several fronts.

Tremors from any of these, and other, interconnected fault lines — the civil war in Sudan, South Sudan’s fragility, Somalia’s insurgency, Ethiopia’s rivalries with Eritrea and Egypt — would not stop at the borders of one country but would likely spread across the Red Sea corridor, potentially undermining security on African and Arabian shores.

With the Horn of Africa teetering on the brink, the window for preventive diplomacy is rapidly closing. The cost of inaction would be enormous. A renewed interstate war in the region could make other, existing flashpoints dramatically worse, and risk drawing in extra-regional powers.

Yet so far, external engagement has been dismal and inadequate, given the urgent need for high-level, proactive diplomatic interventions. A first step could be to press all sides to halt military build-ups and inflammatory rhetoric; essentially hitting the pause button on the march to war.

Above all, mediators need to be laser focused on internal reconciliation within Tigray. The feuding TPLF factions must be brought back to the negotiating table to prevent a political breakdown from sparking a full-blown civil war.

If the global community remains passive, Ethiopia and Tigray might well sleepwalk into a war that no one truly wants, in a region that has known enough bloodshed. With firm and farsighted diplomacy, however, another catastrophe can still be averted.

• Hafed Al-Ghwell is a senior fellow and executive director of the North Africa Initiative at the Foreign Policy Institute of the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, DC. X: @HafedAlGhwell

Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Ethiopian Tribune’s point of view

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The possibility of a renewed Ethiopia–Eritrea conflict in 2025 remains speculative. While no one can predict the future with certainty, analysts have outlined several conditions and trigger events that—if they were to coincide—could spark a military confrontation between the two nations. Below is one hypothetical scenario drawn from current trends and expert assessments:

Background of Long-Standing Tensions

Both Ethiopia and Eritrea have a fraught history marked by past wars (such as the 1998–2000 border conflict) and decades of “no war, but no peace” afterward. Although the 2018 peace initiative (and the subsequent Joint Declaration of Peace and Friendship) brought hope of reconciliation, unresolved issues remain. These include:

   •   Border Disputes and Access to the Sea: Ethiopia’s enduring desire for direct access to the Red Sea—an aspiration linked to its economic and strategic vulnerabilities—continues to create friction. In recent public statements, Ethiopia’s Prime Minister has hinted that if diplomatic solutions fail, military options could be considered to secure access to port facilities, a notion that deeply alarms Eritrea.

   •   Mutual Distrust and Military Posturing: Despite past rapprochement, both sides continue to engage in provocative military maneuvers along the border. Eritrean forces have maintained a presence in disputed areas, while Ethiopia’s military has been modernizing and repositioning in response to both internal conflicts and regional rivalries.

   •   Regional Alliances and External Influences: Recent agreements—such as the trilateral security cooperation between Egypt, Eritrea, and Somalia—demonstrate that some of Ethiopia’s neighbors are prepared to counterbalance its ambitions. Such alliances could further isolate Ethiopia and heighten the risk of miscalculation.

A Hypothetical Scenario for 2025

1. Escalation of Border Incidents

A small-scale military incident—perhaps an accidental clash during routine patrols along a poorly demarcated section of the border (such as around the disputed town of Badme)—could rapidly escalate. If either side misinterprets the incident as deliberate aggression, this could serve as a spark for full-scale mobilization.

2. Diplomatic Breakdown and Provocative Rhetoric

Amidst mounting domestic pressure and unresolved internal conflicts (such as those in the Amhara and Oromia regions), leaders on both sides might adopt increasingly belligerent rhetoric. For Ethiopia, frustration over economic hardships and the need to assert its claim for a Red Sea port could prompt a departure from cautious diplomacy. Simultaneously, Eritrea’s leadership, unwilling to tolerate what it sees as Ethiopia’s encroachment on its sovereign territory, could pre-emptively mobilize its forces.

3. Regional Involvement and Alliance Dynamics

External actors could also play a role. If Egypt, Somalia, or even other regional players pressurize Eritrea to adopt a harder stance against Ethiopia—as indicated by recent trilateral security agreements—they may inadvertently contribute to an atmosphere in which a local incident triggers a broader conflict. In this scenario, Eritrea might choose to retaliate militarily to “defend” its borders, with Ethiopia responding in kind.

4. Miscalculation and Rapid Military Mobilization

Under these conditions, what begins as a limited exchange of fire could quickly spiral out of control if high-ranking military commanders on either side misinterpret defensive measures as offensive aggression. With both sides already on heightened alert and engaged in military exercises, a misstep could lead to a rapid escalation into full-scale war.

Key Points and Uncertainties

   •   Speculative Nature: It is crucial to emphasize that this scenario is highly speculative. No definitive plans or imminent threats have been confirmed by either side.

   •   Complex Internal Dynamics: Ethiopia’s internal conflicts and political challenges, as well as Eritrea’s own domestic constraints, mean that both governments might ultimately find the costs of war too high.

   •   International Pressure: Global and regional diplomatic efforts, including those by bodies like the United States Institute of Peace and the African Union, could intervene to de-escalate tensions before any conflict erupts.

In summary, a potential outbreak of war in 2025 could stem from a convergence of an accidental border incident, a breakdown in diplomatic restraint, provocative military posturing, and reinforcing regional alliances. However, given the severe human, economic, and political costs associated with renewed conflict, many analysts believe that while the risk remains, a deliberate decision to go to war is unlikely without a major miscalculation.

References:

*Reuters, “Egypt, Eritrea and Somalia agree to boost security cooperation”

*Analysis from the United States Institute of Peace and related reports on regional tensions.

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