Eritrea and Ethiopia: Rhetoric, Blame and Domestic Challenges

Despite being the most significant violence on the Eritrea-Ethiopia border since 2000, the 12/13 June overnight clashes on the central Tserona-Zalambessa front are unlikely to escalate. The precise cause for this sudden escalation is not known, primarily due to conflicting accounts from both countries and their tendency to trade blame for any increased tensions on their shared border. Whilst we only have speculative information about the clashes themselves, including casualty figures, the two countries have settled into a well-worn pattern of strident aggression towards one another. Yet, despite ensuing hostile rhetoric, armed conflict is unlikely. Both nations are currently suffering significant domestic challenges and have recently become increasingly concerned about their international and economic reputation. They also both lack the military capacity for outright victory and do not have the political will to conduct a potentially protracted and costly war. 

Yet, the recent clashes offer a unique deflection away from domestic challenges faced by both Ethiopia and Eritrea that have come to the fore during 2016. For Eritrea, this centres around the 08 June UN Commission of Inquiry (COI) report on the human rights situation in Eritrea, which stated that crimes against humanity are being committed in Eritrea. The report further recommended Eritrea be referred to the International Criminal Court (ICC). Eritrea was not only vociferous in its criticism of the report, callings its conclusions “null and void”, but mobilised sections of the Eritrean diaspora to petition the COI and protest its findings in Geneva on 21 June. Additionally, Eritrea has accused the international community of focusing overwhelmingly on the situation in Eritrea, whilst ignoring the human rights situation in Ethiopia.

Ethiopia meanwhile is continuing to suffer from continued civil unrest, driven primarily by perceived administrative and ethnic grievances, most notably in the Oromia region, and spreading more recently to Amhara. The Oromo demonstrations have been continuing since late 2015, in protest against the Addis Ababa ‘Master Plan’, which many Oromos believed legitimised the encroachment of the capital city onto Oromo land. Meanwhile in Gondar, in the Amhara region, the arrests of prominent members of the Welkait community were met with sustained protests in July 2016. This comes after the community requested to be administered by the Amhara regional state, in line with their claimed Amhara identity, rather than the current Tigray regional state. In both cases, Ethiopia has accused Eritrea of fomenting the protests, particularly those in Amhara, close to the Eritrean border. A further round of protests in Oromia and Amhara spread to Addis Ababa on 06 and 07 August, resulting in an unconfirmed number of fatalities and arrests. 

Despite these domestic challenges requiring distraction, border skirmishes of this kind are not uncommon. The 12 June clashes were the eighth cross-border engagement between the two countries since 2011. There is a strong precedent of increased verbal aggression and cross-border engagement of a similar or lower scale. This is a cycle that both countries have become accustomed to since the conclusion of the 1998-2000 border war. 

Over the past year, both countries have sought to enhance their international status and reputation, for geostrategic and economic reasons, as well as to try and boost Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). Ethiopia’s recent successful bid to win a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council (UNSC), which commences in January 2017, has been touted as a momentous diplomatic achievement by the Ethiopian government. It is hoped this will focus increased international attention on Ethiopia, its growing economy, and its perceived African diplomatic leadership. Ethiopia continues to highlight its economic growth, and visits by high-profile leaders, from President Obama in July 2015 and Prime Minister Netanyahu in July 2016 to former UK Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond in June 2016, as evidence of support for the government’s economic policies. With the UNSC seat commencing in January 2017, and Ethiopia’s nomination of its high profile foreign minister, Dr Tedros Adhanom, as candidate for Directorship of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Ethiopia’s profile in the international community will only increase. A war with Eritrea would serve to only distract from this attention, but also directly impact the economy and slow-down both FDI and the government spending that is the engine of the economy.

Eritrea, although less of a target for FDI due to its largely closed economy, is using its geostrategic location on the Red Sea to engage in regional matters and remove itself from its perceived international isolation. For example, Eritrea has been a strident supporter of the Saudi-led Operation Restoring Hope in Yemen, and has signed a 30-year lease for the port of Assab in southern Eritrea with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Similarly, Eritrea has also increased its engagement with the European Union (EU) on migration issues, as Eritreans form the second largest group of migrants to the EU, and the country was earmarked for receipt of unspecified levels of financial support to help manage migration. Eritrea’s engagement has also been stepped up as part of its quest to ensure that the COI report’s recommendations, especially with reference to referral to the ICC, are not implemented. 

Finally, although both countries spend a significant proportion of their GDP on their military, both militaries are not in a strong enough position to guarantee the all-out victory that would be demanded by both populations, and the political elite, if war was to break out. Eritrea’s defence forces have been weakened by over a decade of defections from those in its indefinite national service scheme, who form the bulk of the estimated 4,000 Eritreans that leave the country every month. Ethiopia’s military meanwhile is deployed across the country to address ongoing civil unrest, as well as forming significant proportions of UN peacekeepers in various missions across the African continent. At first glance, the rhetoric and verbal attacks between the two states would suggest that a war is imminent. Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn stated in March 2016 that Ethiopia would conduct "proportionate military action against Eritrea" for the "continuous acts of provocation and destabilisation of Ethiopia" whilst in May 2016 President Isaias Afwerki of Eritrea called Ethiopia a “corrupt regime that serves the agenda of [US] hegemony.” However, these verbal attacks are part of a long-pattern of heated rhetoric against one another that have characterised the two countries’ relationship since the conclusion of the border war in 2000. 

Although we are likely to see continued aggressive rhetoric between both countries, the situation is unlikely to escalate beyond the current status quo, comprising verbal salvos and small-scale localised clashes. Both countries will continue to focus on their internal challenges, whilst continuing to support the other’s opposition groups. Total war is highly unlikely given that both countries need to dampen international criticism – Eritrea to avoid an ICC referral, and Ethiopia to ensure that its term on the UNSC is not overshadowed by focus on its domestic challenges. With both countries unable to afford a sustained military campaign, and both showing a desire, particularly from Ethiopia, to attract increased direct foreign investment, the clashes of 12 June 2016 can be firmly placed into the cycle of rhetoric and blame that continues to categorise the two countries tortuous relationship.