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Mounting concerns exist regarding the potential of military engagement involving Horn of Africa neighbours, Ethiopia and Eritrea, as confrontational language has escalated in recent weeks.

What Did Ethiopian Officials Said?

Landlocked Ethiopia's demands for access to the maritime outlet through Eritrea has provoked a intense war of words.

The Ethiopian leader first openly declared in last year that his country's access to the sea was an crucial concern, remarks that Eritrea dismissed.

Relations between the two countries have regularly been difficult. Following a decades-long struggle for freedom, the Eritrean state, which has a extensive sea border, officially seceded from Ethiopian rule in 1993, making it without sea access.

In 1998, a border war broke out in which numerous people lost their lives.

Latest Remarks from Ethiopian Officials

Prime Minister Abiy and military leader the army commander have openly claimed control of Eritrean coastal city of the port of Assab – approximately 60 kilometers from the frontier - and implied the desire to take it by force.

Recently, the Prime Minister said the country's "error" of losing entry to the Red Sea as a because of Eritrean independence would be "rectified soon".

The Ethiopian envoy to neighboring Kenya, retired Gen Bacha Debele, said that Assab was "Ethiopia's wealth" and would be restored "through military action".

Eritrean Reaction to the Claims

In the face of persistent warnings from Ethiopia, Asmara's position has been limited to short statements on online platforms from Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel.

The minister has dismissed Ethiopia's demand for sea access describing it as "risky" and a "negative policy" of "irredentism" – a strategy of claiming back former lands.

Eritrean authorities warned on recently that efforts to justify "obvious provocation" would have major implications for Ethiopia and its neighbouring countries and is a "limit that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Defense Activities on the Region

So far, there are no reports of large-scale army activities in the boundary zones between the two countries.

Nonetheless, in Ethiopia, state television has displayed completion events of thousands of cadets at different defense facilities.

The director of human resources department of the military, Lt Gen Hachalu Sheleme, stated recently in an interview that the military was in a "reliable position" as "tens of thousands of recruits" were enlisting, which he said was "a warning to our enemies".

Past Background of the Dispute

For over fifty years from the late 19th century, Eritrea was ruled by Italian colonisers.

After the end of Italian rule, it was then managed by the British administration before becoming a associated territory of Ethiopia.

Yet in 1962 the ruler ended this agreement and Eritrea became fully incorporated into Ethiopia.

A extended internal conflict occurred, ending with Ethiopia's defeat in the early 1990s. Autonomy was then confirmed by the population in a referendum in 1993.

Temporarily in the 1990s, there were friendly connections between the leadership in Ethiopia's capital and Asmara, but they fell out over the specific demarcation of their mutual frontier, resulting in hostilities in 1998.

Though this concluded in a ceasefire agreement in 2000, it was incompletely executed, and the both countries remained at in dispute.

This situation improved in 2018, when the Prime Minister made gestures to Eritrea's leader President Isaias. The both leaders endorsed a announcement that the war was over – a decision that won the Prime Minister the Nobel Peace Prize.

The two governments were then cooperators in Ethiopia's 2020-2022 internal conflict in the northern region.

Yet ties have since broken down anew.