http://mondediplo.com/2016/09/07hornofafrica
http://mondediplo.com/2016/09/07hornofafrica
> September 2016
Horn of Africa, pivot of the world
Brothers and enemies
by Gérard Prunier
Brothers and enemies
↑
The Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF) fought a war of
independence against Ethiopian government forces between 1961 and
1991. The struggle continued through the fall of Haile Selassie’s
Ethiopian empire in 1974 and the seizure of power by Mengistu Haile
Mariam (known as the ‘Red Negus’ or ‘emperor’) in 1978.
During this long confrontation, the EPLF developed close military ties
with the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which was fighting
Mengistu from Tigray province. After the EPLF-TPLF coalition’s victory
in May 1991, Eritrea’s secession was achieved consensually in 1993;
the EPLF assumed power in Asmara (Eritrea) and its TPLF allies did so
in Addis Ababa.
Both fronts were led by Tigrayan Christians, which made their alliance
seem more natural.
The subsequent tensions have often been seen as a big brother-little
brother quarrel. In the struggle, the EPLF claimed it was the older
and better run organisation, and also had wide international support,
while TPLF support was purely regional. Yet despite governing a much
smaller country (6 million compared to Ethiopia’s 94 million), the
EPLF did not conceal its sense of superiority. Though the initial
post-independence period was calm, Eritrea became vocal in its
economic demands: currency parity with Ethiopia and an end to
industrial investment in Ethiopia’s Tigray province.
Meles Zenawi, the TPLF leader, became Ethiopia’s president and tried
to impress upon his former allies that, as leader of a large country,
95% of which was non-Tigrayan, he was under far greater constraints
than during the war. But in May 1998 Eritrea attacked Ethiopia over
territorial claims on tiny parcels of land with no strategic or
economic value. The war, in which around 70,000 fighters died, cost
over $2bn.
The guerrilla fighting of the independence struggle was followed by a
conventional conflict like the first world war in Europe — trenches,
bloody frontal assaults, heavy artillery bombardments — all for no
real gain. An armistice was signed in Algiers in June 2000, but no
peace treaty followed. There is still much bitterness on both sides,
with tensions always ready to boil over into open conflict whenever
there are problems in either camp.
Gérard Prunier
Gérard Prunier is a researcher at the CNRS in Paris and director of
the French Centre for Ethiopian Studies in Addis Ababa
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Rivalries in the Horn of Africa
Agnès Stienne, September 2016
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Received on Wed Sep 07 2016 - 19:10:19 EDT