The AU's peace and security commissioner, Bankole Adeoye, says the continental body is engaging leaders in Asmara and Addis Ababa to stop tensions turning into a full-blown crisis. Former Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta is leading consultations in the region.
The African Union (AU) is engaging leaders and other stakeholders in Eritrea and Ethiopia to reduce tensions and prevent relations deteriorating further, the AU Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security, Ambassador Bankole Adeoye, told a press conference in Addis Ababa, Capital reported on 4 November.
Adeoye said the AU was working to "re-energize" the implementation of the Algiers Agreement between Ethiopia and Eritrea. It was also working on the Pretoria Agreement, which ended the war between the Ethiopian federal government and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) in November 2022. He said the obligations in both agreements should continue to guide diplomatic efforts. The commission would keep engaging all parties at different levels to stop the situation becoming "a full-scale crisis".
He said former Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta, the AU Chairperson's High Representative for the Horn of Africa, was holding consultations and conducting shuttle diplomacy in the region. Adeoye also criticised outside involvement: "We condemn any external interference in African conflicts because what we see is that the more you have external interference in the crisis, the more you have prolonged crisis," he said. He added that the AU "does not take sides".
Background
The Algiers Agreement of December 2000 ended the 1998–2000 border war and set up a commission whose 2002 ruling on the boundary, including Badme, went unimplemented for years. Relations broke down again this autumn. On 1 October, Ethiopia declared 10 Eritrean diplomats persona non grata and closed its embassy in Asmara, and Eritrea severed diplomatic ties, Zegabi reported. Each government has told the UN Security Council that the other is the aggressor. Ethiopia says Eritrean units have moved into Tigray, which Asmara denies. Eritrea says Addis Ababa's claims to Red Sea access amount to a declaration of war.
Other outside actors are also active. China has announced that its Horn of Africa envoy, Hu Changchun, will visit Eritrea in early November, though CERHA has found no report yet that the visit has taken place. In written answers to the House of Lords on 3 November, the UK government said ministers had urged both governments to show restraint.
CERHA found no public Eritrean government response to Adeoye's remarks. The information ministry's website, Shabait, showed no new statement on the subject when CERHA checked.
Image: Bankole Adeoye, AU Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security, in Mogadishu, 2022. AMISOM Public Information, via Wikimedia Commons, CC0.