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Mounting apprehensions exist over the potential of military engagement among East African neighbors, Ethiopia and the Eritrean government, as confrontational rhetoric has intensified in the past few weeks.

What Did Ethiopian Officials Said?

Landlocked Ethiopia's requests for passage to the sea coast through Eritrea has sparked a heated war of words.

The Ethiopian leader first openly declared in last year that his country's sea access was an existential matter, remarks that Eritrea ignored.

Relations between the neighboring nations have frequently been strained. Following a decades-long struggle for freedom, Eritrea, which has a 1,350km (840-mile) sea border, formally separated from Ethiopian rule in the early 1990s, leaving it without sea access.

Five years later, a border war started in which numerous people died.

Recent Statements from Ethiopian Government

Abiy and army chief the army commander have directly stated sovereignty of Eritrea's coastal city of the port of Assab – approximately 60 kilometers from the border - and implied the desire to take it by force.

Recently, Abiy said the country's "blunder" of being denied passage to the Red Sea as a because of Eritrea secession would be "addressed tomorrow".

The Ethiopian envoy to Kenya, ex-military officer Bacha, said that the port was "belonging to Ethiopia" and would be returned "using武力".

Eritrean Answer to the Statements

Amid persistent threats from Ethiopia, Eritrea's reaction has been restricted to brief comments on online platforms from Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel.

Officials have denied Ethiopia's push for sea access calling it "hazardous" and a "harmful plan" of "expansionism" – a policy of claiming back lost territory.

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

Military Movements on the Border

Currently, there are no reports of large-scale army activities in the border areas between the neighboring states.

Nonetheless, in the country, government media has shown graduation ceremonies of thousands of cadets at multiple army bases.

The head of staff section of the armed forces, General Hachalu, recently said in an discussion that the defense forces was in a "secure situation" as "many thousands of young people" were joining it, which he said was "a signal to our enemies".

Historical Origins of the Tension

For over fifty years from 1890, the territory was administered by colonial powers.

After Italy's defeat, it was then controlled by the British administration before evolving into a integrated region of Ethiopia.

But in the early 1960s the Ethiopian emperor ended this agreement and the region became totally absorbed into Ethiopia.

A three-decade long armed struggle occurred, ending with Ethiopia's defeat in the early 1990s. Sovereignty was then approved by voters in a vote in 1993.

Temporarily in the 1990s, there were good relations between the governments in Ethiopia's capital and Asmara, but they clashed over the specific demarcation of their shared boundary, leading to hostilities in 1998.

Though this concluded in a ceasefire agreement in 2000, it was partially applied, and the both countries continued at in dispute.

This situation improved in 2018, when Abiy made overtures to Eritrea's leader President Isaias. The both leaders endorsed a declaration that the hostilities was finished – a move that won Abiy the international recognition.

The neighboring states were then cooperators in Ethiopia's previous civil war in the northern region.

But ties have later worsened anew.