Dr. Gedion Timothewos, Ethiopia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, gave an unflattering speech about Eritrea. Where did he speak, in which language, to whom? are all clues to the message itself. We will get to all of it in good time, but for those of you who would like to receive your messages in micro articles, it is this: the Minister’s speech, like most Ethiopian developmental launches, was an EPRDF product, with a Prosperity Party Polish. (I am sure some ribbon cutting was involved.) This is not surprising given that the speech was the product of Redwan Hussein, Ethiopia’s National Security Director and Getachew Redda, the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy to East Africa (Tigray, Eritrea)–both handpicked by Meles Zenawi for their policy wonkery. In some cases, the speech included exact statements from 1998-2000, replicated word for word. The Foreign Minister, a constitutional scholar, was brought forth to deliver the message, Seyoum Mesfin style, to the international community. And the message is: “Eritrea is not a State, not being a State, it has no sovereignty, and not having sovereignty, it cannot be violated. So when we violate it, please understand.” His arguments are a termite mound built by blind ants: impressive from a distance, but absurd when seen up-close. That’s the purpose here: to look at the mound up-close:
I. The Venue, The Host & The Audience
The venue was Addis Abeba University’s Ras Mekonen Hall, named after Mekonen, a man who played a pivotal role in operation “Make Ethiopia Expansionist Again (MEEA)” in the late 19th century during the reign of Emperor Menelik II. We will say more about him when we discuss his son, Emperor Haile Selassie, later in this article. The host was Horn Review, a “premier Independent Research and Publication” which has been think-tanking its way to being a “leading independent research and publication platform” since 2021 I think it would provide readers some context to read Horn Review’s Eritrea Unraveled article which used the Montevideo Criteria for Statehood, i.e., (1) Permanent Population, (2) Defined Territory, (3) A Government and (4) Capacity to enter into international relations, to reach the absurd conclusion that Eritrea is not a State. No state, no sovereignty. No sovereignty, no violation of it. In other words, the Host had made the same argument that the invited guest would make. Horn Review is the “think tank” behind many classic lines including: Ethiopia’s recognition of Eritrea is “neither permanent nor irrevocable”, as if Ethiopia’s nullification would compel the UN to reverse its recognition of Eritrea’s Statehood, like some political UNO Reverse Card. Eritrea’s Setit Media and Mesob Journal adequately addressed this shockingly obtuse argument that tells us Somalia, Afghanistan, DRC and Syria are States but Eritrea isn’t. (You can read those responses here and here.) As for the Foreign Minister’s audience, it was the Addis-based international community, the same “community” Seyoum Mesfin used to go to get a green light to do whatever dreadful thing he had in mind. Thus the address in English.
II. The Message of the Prosperity Party
Whether the messenger is a Prime Minister, an Army Chief, an Ambassador, and now a Foreign Minister, the message is the same. The difference is only in style. Less than a month ago, at the House of Peoples’ Representatives, Eritreans were described by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed as pitiful people. Less than a month ago, in an unabashed espousal of expansionist nationalism, Chief of General Staff of the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF), Field Marshall Berhanu Jula said that a nation of 200 million shouldn’t be frustrated by a nation of 2 million, To achieve this contrast of 2 million vs 200 million, he shrank Eritrea’s population by 45% and inflated Ethiopia’s by 47%, treating people like a rounding error. Yeah, I know, said his boss the Prime Minister: when I went to Assab, I saw a sea, I saw homes, but I saw no people. Meanwhile, he bragged, Ethiopia’s population is growing by “producing an Eritrea every year,” to chortles from the People’s Representatives of One Party, as they applauded 21st century Lebensraum.የተከበሩ ምክር ቤት
So, it was expected that Foreign Minister Gedion Timothewos would use Argument 1: “No Permanent Population” to deny Eritrea its qualification for Statehood. Of course, “No Permanent Population” does not mean what these honorable gentlemen from our Giant Southern Neighbor claim it means. You noticed I said “claim” not “think” because, surely, they–the politicians, generals, and policy wonks–know “No Permanent Population” means land unoccupied by anyone, just transient societies.
This argument that there is no Population Permanence in Eritrea, that Eritrea is a plot of land without people, resource wasting away and therefore ready for the trespasser, is morally bankrupt, legally indefensible and ignorant about Eritrea. The curious can educate themselves by reading the late Seyoum “Harestai” Ogbamichael, an executive with the Eritrean Liberation Front, including a stint as chief of the Eritrean Peasants Association who is intimately familiar with Eritrea’s Land Laws: he explained to Eritreans, via awate.com in the early 2000s, that every square inch of Eritrean land is linked to an Eritrean. I guess now he can educate Ethiopians too: land is very permanent in Eritrea. It’s one thing for an Eritrean (and only an Eritrean) to say Eritrea’s exile rate is astonishingly high for a country not in a state of war,; it makes no sense to say Eritrea is a land without people, except in a new world where the hegemon claiming benevolence says he is merely being God’s Custodian of the Sea to save Assab from itself.
III. Minister Gedion Timothewos’s Speech
Unlike Abiy Ahmed and Birhanu Jula, who get so animated in their oratorical self-stimulation you fear they will faint on you, Dr. Gedion Timothewos speaks in monotone, not raising his voice for emphasis, because if he raised his voice, it would probably crack. (He is young, for a politician.) In his speech, he first told us that he had come to address Ethiopia’s Policy on the Horn of Africa but “for understandable reasons”, he was focused on Ethiopia-Eritrea relations.
Haye!
If you are counting, he is the 4th Ethiopian official to do it in a month: Prime Minister, Military Chief, Ambassador to Kenya, now Foreign Minister. Operation Make Ethiopia Expansionist Again is on course. Sorry, I have no link to the video by Ethiopia’s Ambassador to Kenya: he was too close to the camera and was yelling something about TPLF and Assab.
Gedion Timothewos decided to categorize Eritrea-Ethiopia’s post-World War II history as follows
1952-1962: Federation, followed by dissolution
1962-1991: Annexation, followed by “civil war”
1993-1998: Independence, followed by peace
1998-2000: War (and Eritrea was “adjudged aggressor”!)
2000-2018: No War But No Peace Stalemate
2018-2019: Rapprochement
2020-2025: Hostility, with Eritrean troops in Ethiopian territory
He then identified Five Eritrean Obstacles In The Way of Ethiopian Greatness:
(1) The Decaf Coffee Paradox: Eritrea wants sovereignty without the responsibilities that come with one. It likes the taste of coffee without the caffeine (?) It treats Ethiopia as an extension of its polity. It says “What is mine is mine, what is yours is ours.”
(2) Eritrean Instrumentalization: Eritrea is always a proxy for Ethiopia’s enemies; Eritrea’s survival is tied to Ethiopia’s weakness.
(3) Isaias Doctrine: the belief that Eritrea’s security can only come about from Ethiopia’s insecurity.
(4) Nakfa Syndrome: Eritrea is a totalitarian state and change from within is not coming. There are no people, just servants of the State.
(5) Lamentation: Ethiopia made a terrible decision in 1993 by letting Eritrea go and Eritreans are being impossible about it now.
2025 Proposal: Ethiopia gets Assab through a new configuration: economic integration, free trade area, customs union, joint infrastructure modeled after the European Union. Or, Ethiopia gets Assab through non-diplomatic means. Either way, we are taking it: it is a matter of existence for us.
IV. An Open Letter to Ethiopian Foreign Minister Dr. Gedion Timothewos
One of the many issues you lamented about Eritreans, including social media commenters, is that they exhibit an unhealthy obsession with Ethiopia’s affairs and Eritrea’s narrative has disproportionate focus on Ethiopia. But as a well-read man, you must know that this is not unique to Eritrea and Ethiopia, it is what every small country experiences about a giant neighbor. Whether it is Estonia about Russia, Vietnam about China, it is the same sentiment expressed by Canadians referring to America: it is “like living next to the elephant.” And when your Prime Minister says “Why did the elephant trample the forest? Because nobody told him he can’t”, any reasonable person would conclude that Ethiopia is governed by those who believe Might Makes Right and thus, vigilance is the minimum requirement of an Eritrean citizen. You can’t fight for your right to be a citizen, unless there is a State.
Instead of complaining about Eritreans’ interest in Ethiopia, I wish Ethiopia had taken some time to understand Eritrea and Eritreans. If the intent is to understand why Eritrea and Ethiopia go through ritualistic killing spree of one another, it is important to understand the other’s perspective, and you don’t do that by omission. I strongly recommend Alemseghed Tesfai’s canonical book on the period you described, and more, from an Eritrean perspective.
Let’s begin with your narration of the two countries’ joint history, with a focus on what you left out. I say this not to add unnecessary details but to make the point that if you don’t want to be mystified by your neighboring country, you have to make an effort to understand their psyche and their wounds.
- 1941-1952: Pre-Federation
Your narration starts in 1952, but our story started in 1941, the year colonial Italy was defeated by allied powers (British) in World War II, ending Italy’s rule of Eritrea since 1890. This period is extremely important for the Eritrean psyche, because it created two lasting impressions: the World Powers only understand what is in their best national interest, damn the Little Guy. And Ethiopia is a violent country. This is why every answer to every question President Isaias Afwerki gives starts with 1941.
The Brits, who were already in neighboring Sudan, kicked the Italians out and, this is important, the same year, Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie, returned to Ethiopia, after a five-year exile in Great Britain. He entered from Sudan though its common border with Ethiopia in the Benishangul-Gumuz area in (NOT via Eritrea), trekking through Gojjam, to his seat in Addis Abeba, accompanied by his FANO Arbegnoch and Gideon Force, a special op commanded by General Wingate. You know all this: it is in your history book. What you may not know is that in Eritrea, the Mahber Fiqri Hager–Association of the Love of Country, an anti-colonial political party–was formed at the same time. Within a few years, this association splintered further into the Muslim League and the Unionist Party which, with Ethiopian funding and shifta mercenaries, adopted its slogan of Ethiopia Or Death. It wasn’t saying, New Hampshire-style, “Give Me Ethiopia or Give Me Death” but “Give Me Ethiopia or I Will Kill You”, a threat it delivered on many, including one of the co-founders of the Muslim League, Abdulkader M/Saleh Kebire, who would be the first among tens of thousands to follow: Eritrea’s martyrs. Not just the martyrs but the survivors: there were seven assassination attempts on a key figure in Eritrean history, Weldeab Weldemariam, forcing his exile to Egypt.
Lesson Learned: Ethiopia is a violent State.
- 1952-1962: Federation
This was a period when the world’s smartest people (UN) decided that Federation is the best arrangement for a highly centralized feudal monarchy whose official religion was Christianity (Ethiopia) and a new multi-faith republic experimenting with political pluralism (Eritrea). It would be based on an ideal power-sharing: Eritrea would have its own parliament, its own laws and cultural identity and Ethiopia would handle foreign policy and defense. By the end of the period, Ethiopia had destroyed the parliament and said, actually, our culture is better for you: learn Amharic, what will you do with Tigrinya and Arabic anyway?
Lesson Learned: Ethiopia can never be trusted with Treaties and Agreements.
- 1961-1991: Annexation
I believe the Foreign Minister called this period “Unity.” The PP People love metaphors particularly those involving talking animals. Calling Eritrea’s annexation “unity” is like a lion devouring a gazelle and telling her mom her baby gazelle is taking a tour of her stomach. The Eritreans rebelled because nobody told them if you are outnumbered 20:1 you shouldn’t rebel. Eritreans had begun to learn about the Ethiopian rulers and, so far, what they had learned was they don’t much care for internationally recognized treaties and they are a bit violent. The Ethiopian rulers said, “Correction! We are very violent. And we don’t think lying is a sin.” They massacred civilians, dropped chemical bombs on fighters, and cluster bombs on cities and throughout, they lied, and lied, and lied that the goal of Eritrean fighters was in the service of Arabs, many of whom (South Yemen, Libya) were openly supporting Ethiopia or were entirely indifferent to Eritrea.
Lesson Learned: Ethiopia may love select parts of our land, but it doesn’t care about us. When we complained about the atrocities, we were told: “you are not special: our rulers are just as brutal to us.”
Your address at Addis Abeba University was at Ras Mekonen Hall. For nosy Eritreans, this begs the question: who is Ras Mekonen and why is he celebrated? History says that he was Ethiopia’s first governor of Harar, which had become part of Ethiopia just three years before Italy colonized Eritrea in 1890. Harar was part of something that no longer exists and nobody mentions: the Emirate of Harar, an independent Islamic emirate with its own rulers, institutions, culture, and international ties. It was not “invited” to join Ethiopia. No, fresh from his victory in Adwa, Emperor Menelik II was discharging with his kingly duties to Make Ethiopia Expansionist Again (MEEA) and he attacked them (at the Battle of Chelenqo) to join the Empire. That’s Harar, in the East. Going further south, you know better than me how your home region became part of Ethiopia: it was conquest.
Lesson Learned: The Big overwhelm the Small unless the Small are vigilant.
- 1991-1993: Pre-Statehood Independence
These two years did not make it to your timeline, but they happen to be perhaps the most pivotal in describing Eritrean psychology. First of all, the discipline it required to postpone, for two years, something Eritreans had been fighting for 50 years–declaration of Independent State–is exemplary, as it was focused entirely on good-faith efforts to stabilize Ethiopia which, after an escaped head of State and a collapsed army, was on the verge of being a Failed State. (We will say more about that when analyzing your “Nakfa Syndrome” or “Isaias Doctrine”, EPRDF talking points with PP polish.) Secondly, it was during this period–as we were scanning the war-littered Eritrean landscape, the loss of lives, the shattered economy–that the late Ethiopian Prime Minister (then President) Meles Zenawi told us “don’t scratch your wounds.” Let bygones be bygones. And we believed him. Because he said it in one of our languages: this is new, an Ethiopian ruler who speaks Tigrinya: what could go wrong. Everything did, but I am getting ahead of myself.
Related to the referendum, anybody who is interested in actual facts, not revisionism, is welcome to read the United Nations report on how exemplary, free and fair, the entire process was, as witnessed by the entire world.
- 1994-1998: Post Statehood, Pre-War
Believe it or not, there was a time when Eritreans never mentioned Ethiopia. I can’t give you readily available links because the Internet wasn’t invented then, so I hope you take my personal testimony from that period. Shortly after Independence, I was in Eritrea’s airport, checking in a fax machine that my father (newly returned from exile, trying to start a business) asked me to bring with me. The customs guy, a man who had been in a foxhole fighting Ethiopians all his life, asked me how much he should charge me. I told him what I paid for it. Then he assigned me (us, anybody coming from outside) to help the new country by producing a list of equipment and their value in the US so Eritrea can assess the proper customs fee. That was our priority: we had a nation to build, a referendum to vote on, a constitution to draft, an army to demobilize. Nobody had time for Ethiopia. If you don’t believe me, ask your colleague Redwan Hussein: I am sure his office can access dehai.org, a mailing list where 99.9% of the discussion was Eritrea and Eritrea only.
- 1998-2018: War & Post War
Yes, true, the Eritrea Ethiopia Claims Commission did adjudicate that Eritrea was responsible for the war, but that is more due to the five-year-old country’s diplomatic novicehood in failing to notify UN of Ethiopia’s provocations. Use your common sense: in 1998, when the war broke out, Eritrea had just started using its currency, having been using the Ethiopian currency, Birr, since 1991 and its economy totally intertwined with Ethiopia. Is that consistent with the behavior of a country that had been secretly plotting war?
You did not take any responsibility for the post-war stalemate period (2000-2018) when Ethiopia refused to abide by the terms of a treaty it had signed in the presence of African Union, the United States and the United Nations. Not only did you not acknowledge this, but you also complimented Ethiopia for reversing the mistakes of Ethiopia when it, in 2018, it unconditionally accepted terms of the Algiers peace treaty and the ruling of the Eritrea Ethiopia Boundary Commission–defining the territory of Eritrea–a treaty that you are now disavowing. Do you see a pattern here? Break the law and lean on the international community to justify your breaking of the law. You might want to revisit Item 4 of the Montevideo Criteria for Statehood –Capacity to enter into international relations–and grade Ethiopia on it, since 1962. It has been a serial violator.
- 2020-2025: Hostilities
I think you were the Minister of Justice in 2020-2022, so you know this and you talked about it at the time: to the extent Eritrea showed any hostilities to Ethiopia was at the invitation of Ethiopia, subject to their recently signed mutual defense agreement. Your boss is on video thanking Eritrea for saving Ethiopia from collapse, so I don’t know what you hope to achieve by telling such falsehood to a diplomatic community, some of whose members complimented Eritrea for showing maximum restraint when rockets were landing in its capital city. This history is so recent, it would be redundant to correct you: everybody has access to the sequence of events.
V. Ethiopia’s Obstacle To Greatness
Now, let’s address briefly what you identified as the Five Obstacles to Regional Peace:
What’s Mine Is Mine, What’s Yours Is Ours: This statement, first uttered by Meles Zenawi, and repeated by Seyoum Mesfin, has been recycled by the holdover from the Meles Era: Redwan Hussein. What is Ethiopia’s that Eritrea is claiming as its, or an unearned prerogative it is exercising? Expanding allies based on concern about a neighbor which relentlessly brags about its size and armaments? It would be extremely irresponsible for a government whose primary role is to defend the country and the people to be indifferent when the storms of war are gathering.
Eritrea As A Proxy of Ethiopian Enemies: In the 16th century, the Turks attempted their forays into hinterland Eritrea; Ethiopia was forced to fight them to protect its tax base in Eritrea. The Egyptians attempted to invade Eritrea in the 19th century, and Ethiopia had to fight and defeat them at Gundet and Gurae to protect tributes from Mereb Melash. The same century, the Italians’ offensive at Dogali and the Battle of Adwa was organized in Eritrea. Throughout the second half of the 20th century, the Eritrean liberation fronts were in the service of Arabs hostile to Ethiopia. And now, in 2025, they are again in the service of Ethiopia’s historical enemy, Egypt. This narration is not just silly; it confirms that Ethiopia never had control of the Red Sea. It is silly because Eritreans were not collaborators but fellow victims of the Turks, Egyptians and Italians. Yes, it is true, there were minor exceptions–as happens in every conflict, including the Tigray War where Getachew Redda and General Tsadkan are Prosperitarians instigating military conflict in their own homeland—but for the most part, Eritreans were merely conscripts of the colonialists’ war not just in Ethiopia, but Libya, too. And, if Ethiopia always had, as it claims, owned the Red Sea, the wars would not have been in hinterlands of Ethiopia or Eritrea. By the way, how is Eritrea a proxy state of Egypt, but Ethiopia is not a proxy state of UAE?
Isaias Doctrine: Of all the claims made, the one which says President Isaias Afwerki wants Ethiopia’s destabilization has to be the most easily refutable assertion. First of all, Isaias Afwerki is opposed to any organization, in any country, anywhere, seceding. He has spoken ad nauseum about his objection to the independence of South Sudan. He has conditioned his support for any Ethiopian, Somalian pressure group on one and only one criteria: you must fight for your country as a whole, not a subset of it. You can confirm this with your colleague Berhanu Negga; you can confirm it with the Father-and-Son team in charge of Sidama Liberation Front who were told by President Isaias Afwerki, when they met in Somalia in the 1980s, that they will have to abandon their secessionist aim if they want Eritrea’s help. You can confirm it with TPLF honchos: one of the reasons for the off-on relationship between EPLF and TPLF was because the latter claimed, “self-determination up to secession.” You can watch videos of President Isaias Afwerki lamenting article 39 of your current constitution as a time bomb that can disintegrate Ethiopia. And, lastly, if you ever talk to the surviving members of the senior leadership of EPLF–Mesfin Hagos, Ambassador Haile Menkorios, Ambassador Abdella Adem–they will confirm to you that Isaias Afwerki wanted Eritrea to be part of Ethiopia on the eve of Eritrea’s independence. They were kind enough to share this information with us in 2018 when your government was floating confederation and Isaias Afwerki was steadying his beating heart.
Nakfa Syndrome:This is probably a phrase coined by Eritrean opposition groups to describe the totalitarian nature of the Eritrean government. But when we say it, we say it to motivate our people to push for reform. We say it to restore the aim of the struggle for independence: to remind them it was not just to be free from Ethiopian suppression, but to be free from any oppression. When you do it, it is to say Eritrea is not a State, it has no domestic potential to bring about change, so we have to do it. This Habesha Man Burden is a colonial mindset. If every time you are dissatisfied by a smaller neighbor’s behavior you go to war, you will be in a constant state of war with all of them. Nothing in international law permits you to do that.
Lamentation: In 1993, a transitional, unrepresentative Ethiopian government made a terrible mistake by greenlighting Ethiopia’s land-locked-ness. OK, if you say so. If so, it appears that that is a discussion you Ethiopians should have among yourselves. If testimonies are required from us that Ethiopia of 1991-93 was in no position at all to defy our heavily-paid for independence, we can provide it. But it would be wrong to involve ourselves in the internal affairs of Ethiopia. Domestic grievances are no justification for international adventures.
Your Excellency,
Given all of the above, can you hear how your no-choice choices–give us joint sovereignty of Assab or we will be forced to take it–sounds like? Option A, we get Assab. Option B, we get Assab. To use a familiar Prosperity Party trope of talking animals, your story will remind Eritreans of this:
“ንብላዕ እንተልኩም ንብላዕ: ንኺድ እንተልኩም ንብላዕ” በለ ዝብኢ: ንኺድ ዶ ንጽናሕ ምስተሓተተ
A hyena was asked by his pack if they should stay or leave and he answered: “if you say, ‘let’s eat’, then let’s eat; and if you say, ‘let’s go’, then let’s eat.” We are not willing to be eaten, thank you.
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