By Kevin Akor
Ethiopia has accused neighboring Eritrea of military aggression and supporting armed groups inside Ethiopian territory, demanding the “immediate” withdrawal of Eritrean troops amid sharply deteriorating relations between the two former foes.
In a letter dated Saturday, Feb. 7, Ethiopian Foreign Minister Gedion Timothewos told his Eritrean counterpart, Osman Saleh Mohammed, that Eritrean forces have occupied parts of Ethiopian territory along their shared border for an extended period.
“The incursions of Eritrean troops further into Ethiopian territory … are not just provocations but acts of outright aggression,” Timothewos wrote.
He accused Asmara of providing material support to armed groups operating within Ethiopia and called on Eritrea to “withdraw its troops from Ethiopian territory and cease all forms of collaboration with rebel groups.”
Eritrea has repeatedly denied accusations that it backs rebel fighters on Ethiopian soil. There was no immediate response from Eritrean officials to the latest letter.
The accusations mark a sharp downturn in relations between the two Horn of Africa neighbors, who fought a brutal border war between 1998 and 2000 before signing a landmark peace agreement in 2018. Eritrea later became a key ally of Ethiopia during the two-year war against authorities in the northern Tigray region.
However, Eritrea was not a signatory to the 2022 agreement that ended the Tigray conflict, and ties between Addis Ababa and Asmara have steadily worsened since then.
Despite the rising tensions, Timothewos said Ethiopia remained open to dialogue, provided Eritrea respected Ethiopia’s territorial integrity.
“Ethiopia stands ready to engage in good-faith negotiations on all matters of mutual interest,” he wrote, including discussions on maritime affairs and access to the Red Sea through Eritrea’s port of Assab.
Eritrea gained independence from Ethiopia in 1993 after decades of armed struggle. In recent years, Eritrean officials and commentators have bristled at repeated public statements by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed asserting that landlocked Ethiopia has a right to sea access. Many in Eritrea view those remarks as an implicit threat of military action.
The latest exchange underscores the fragility of peace in the Horn of Africa, where unresolved border disputes and shifting alliances continue to fuel regional instability.
