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Growing concerns are present about the chance of warfare involving Horn of Africa neighbors, Ethiopia and Eritrea, as hostile rhetoric has ratcheted up in the past few weeks.

What Has Ethiopian Officials Declared?

Ethiopia's, being landlocked, calls for access to the maritime outlet through Eritrean territory has sparked a intense verbal exchange.

The Ethiopian leader previously announced in last year that his country's access to the sea was an crucial concern, comments that Eritrean authorities rejected.

Diplomatic connections between the two countries have often been tense. After a prolonged fight for sovereignty, the Eritrean state, which has a 1,350km (840-mile) Red Sea coastline, formally separated from Ethiopia in 1993, rendering it landlocked.

Subsequently, a territorial conflict erupted in which more than 100,000 people died.

Latest Remarks from Ethiopian Officials

Abiy and army chief Field Marshal Birhanu Jula have publicly asserted sovereignty of Eritrea's maritime facility of the port of Assab – some 60 km from the boundary - and hinted at the intention to seize it militarily.

Recently, Abiy said Ethiopia's "error" of losing access to the sea as a due to Eritrea secession would be "corrected in the future".

Ethiopia's ambassador to Kenya, retired Gen Bacha Debele, said that Assab was "Ethiopia's wealth" and would be given back "by force".

Eritrean Response to the Statements

Amid persistent challenges from Ethiopia, Eritrea's reaction has been limited to concise remarks on X from Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel.

Officials have denied Ethiopia's push for maritime entry calling it "dangerous" and a "negative policy" of "territorial claims" – a policy of claiming back lost territory.

The information ministry cautioned on recently that moves to legitimise "blatant hostility" would have serious consequences for the Ethiopian government and its regional partners and is a "boundary that should not be crossed|violated|breached".

Military Preparations on the Region

So far, there are no reports of significant troop deployments in the border areas between the both nations.

Nonetheless, in the country, government media has displayed training completions of many recruits at different defense facilities.

The director of personnel division of the defense force, General Hachalu, recently said in an conversation that the army was in a "secure situation" as "many thousands of youths" were enlisting, which he said was "a message to our enemies".

Previous Background of the Dispute

For more than half a century from the late 19th century, Eritrea was administered by Italian rulers.

Following World War II, it was then controlled by the UK forces before evolving into a federated part of Ethiopia.

Yet in 1962 Emperor Haile Selassie I cancelled this agreement and the region became completely integrated into the Ethiopian state.

A extended armed struggle ensued, concluding with military reversal in the early 1990s. Independence was then approved by voters in a referendum in 1993.

Briefly in the 1990s, there were good relations between the leadership in Addis Ababa and Asmara, but they fell out over the exact location of their shared boundary, resulting in war in 1998.

Even though this concluded in a peace deal in 2000, it was never fully implemented, and the both countries continued at loggerheads.

This changed in 2018, when the Prime Minister made approaches to Eritrea's leader the president. The both leaders endorsed a declaration that the hostilities was concluded – a action that gained the Prime Minister the international recognition.

The both administrations were then cooperators in the country's recent armed struggle in Tigray.

However relations have subsequently deteriorated anew.