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Mounting apprehensions have emerged about the possibility of armed conflict among Horn of Africa neighbours, Ethiopia and the Eritrean government, as confrontational rhetoric has escalated in the past few weeks.

What Did Ethiopian Officials Stated?

Landlocked Ethiopia's demands for access to the maritime outlet through Eritrean territory has sparked a intense war of words.

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

Ties between the both governments have often been tense. Following a long-standing struggle for freedom, the Eritrean state, which has a extensive Red Sea coastline, legally broke away from Ethiopia in 1993, making it without sea access.

In 1998, a border war broke out in which numerous people died.

Recent Statements from Ethiopia's Leadership

Prime Minister Abiy and military leader Field Marshal Birhanu Jula have publicly asserted sovereignty of Eritrean maritime facility of Assab – about 60km from the frontier - and implied the desire to take it by force.

Recently, the Prime Minister said the country's "blunder" of being denied passage to the sea as a due to Eritrean independence would be "addressed in the future".

The Ethiopian envoy to Kenya, retired Gen Bacha Debele, said that the port was "Ethiopian property" and would be given back "using武力".

Eritrea's Reaction to the Threats

Despite persistent challenges from Ethiopia, Asmara's position has been confined to brief comments on X from Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel.

The minister has dismissed Ethiopia's demand for sea access calling it "hazardous" and a "toxic agenda" of "expansionism" – a strategy of reclaiming previous domains.

Eritrean authorities alerted on recently that moves to validate "blatant hostility" would have serious consequences for the Ethiopian government and its neighbors and is a "boundary that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Security Preparations on the Region

Currently, there are few indications of significant troop deployments in the border areas between the both nations.

Nevertheless, in the country, state television has shown completion events of many recruits at multiple army bases.

The head of staff section of the military, the officer, recently said in an discussion that the defense forces was in a "strong stance" as "many thousands of young people" were enlisting, which he said was "a signal to our adversaries".

Previous Background of the Tension

For more than half a century from the late 19th century, the territory was ruled by Italian colonisers.

After World War II, it was then administered by the British administration before turning into a associated territory of the Ethiopian empire.

Yet in the early 1960s the ruler ended this agreement and the region became fully incorporated into the Ethiopian state.

A three-decade long internal conflict followed, finishing with military reversal in 1991. Independence was then confirmed by voters in a referendum in 1993.

Briefly in the 1990s, there were positive ties between the authorities in Ethiopia's capital and Asmara, but they fell out over the specific demarcation of their mutual frontier, leading to conflict in 1998.

Even though this finished in a truce in 2000, it was never fully implemented, and the both countries remained at odds.

This ended in 2018, when the Prime Minister made approaches to Eritrean President the president. The both leaders agreed to a announcement that the conflict was concluded – a move that won Abiy the international recognition.

The both administrations were then allies in Ethiopia's recent civil war in the northern region.

However ties have since broken down anew.