The world has always experienced crisis over shared borders as far as its existence. Even-though the cross-border interaction has intensified at its highest rate into the level of creating a world that relies on a wide spectrum of factors for engagement, the essence of it still remains unchanged. In addition to that, the deeply inter-wined global complexity poses a growing probability of the issue being raised in the near future.
The issue of border disagreement in its own unique dynamics is what we observe on the Horn of Africa today between Ethiopia and Sudan. The horn encompasses states with a nationality of a cross border fusion, questionable political positions from a state failure to a regional hegemonic aspiration and ceaselessly exclusive policy engagement in between. Existence of an inter-wined complexity added to uncertain political variables shows that we are on the cross road where every move will affect the future of this globally strategic region.
Currently, the region happens to be faced with a growing refugee crisis, political positions steering towards a peaceful existence with a growing uncertainty, an unpredictably shifting hydro political conflict in between riparian states, enhanced political extremists and armed groups involved in heavily influencing balance of peace in the region in escalation and de-escalation of violent conflicts.
Amid all that, one of the regionally influential paradigms is the border crisis that holds the potential of being a fuel to almost every political dust-up, no matter how small or large it is. With a point in which the hope of peace is shed light on, its essentiality grows by the second. The growing crisis The Disputes over the Ethio-sudanese border area started when talk of settlement about demarcation started between Ethiopia and Sudan in 1993. Though it brought positive results over the course, major disagreement occurred when the deal reached the area of Al-fashaqa.
From the scope of their regional share, Ethiopia and Sudan happen to be the ones’ with the lion share in terms of economy, land, demographics and military capability in the Horn of Africa. There is no doubt that a political disagreement with the potential for an escalating tendency by every second will have an impact on the region and beyond. The continuation of tensions between them will only further exacerbate regional fragility.
Tensions between Ethiopia and Sudan have always existed including the land dispute but it also stood on a cooperative course while creating a technical committee as an oversight along the way. It has only achieved one milestone by developing a soft border policy. Though the development policy averted timely tensions for the communities on the ground for some time, it didn’t bring a longstanding solution to the matter.
It is undeniable that over time, the spill-over effects of other regional policy disagreements have ended up triggering as well as being fueled back by the matter frequently. The appearances of political Back and forth with a visible inexistence of a clear line of communication between the states often led to ending up in a volatile environment on the ground. Even though they were contained and readjusted, lately, the political escalations here and there also are growing to armed confrontations between the two.
The technical committee organized by the states and the soft border policy result can be taken as the farthest cooperative both parties have stood on, which still couldn’t avoid the re-escalation of al-fashqa into being a battleground. Recently, reports suggest the political confrontations have grown into an armed assault by the Sudanese army and an ambush like advancements with the name of preventing border infiltration to and from Sudanese border, reaching a point of border closing and a diplomatic contention.
Dimensions ahead – The sooner the better Taking a closer look at the military engagements gives us the opportunity to understand that the border dispute has only become an opportunistic political card that serves as a proxy ground of conflicts, making it a geopolitical pawn for every regional disagreement out there. While this matter grew to assimilate itself with other issues, the attempt of the Egyptian counterparts has rather succeeded in using it as an arm twister in the GERD negotiations.
With the reminder of the two countries sharing a border span of around 1600 km long, Prolonging of any conflict has never served any party involved in the long run. In addition to the already existing continuous political mistrust fostered amongst administrational policy makers, it will be leaving a window of possibility towards a costly re-escalation between the two. The democratic project experimentations in Ethiopian politics and the fragile peace in Sudan also presents itself as an additional stake in the overall significance of their relations. Let alone the effectiveness of regional stability and hydro-negotiations in the twist.
One of the trickiest parts in the middle of the prolonged ground advancements is that whoever occupies a disputed area, whether justifiable or else, will eventually have the bargaining leverage with the final negotiations. While all disputes reach a round table eventually, this particular path should be expected to affect the investigations made on the account of land claims.
The other influence it has grown to protract on is the GERD negotiations. Just as Sudan has had an unfortunate correlation with Egypt over the years on multiple matters, the current administration has chosen to align itself over that path too. Since the initiation of the 1959 bilateral agreement, Khartoum has had her stand set over her views on the use of the Abbay/Nile River. The initiation of negotiations has started to have another front as a follow-up of military attack over the disputed areas serving as the element of the political bargaining package.
Next on the list is the dependency of the political process being based upon the infamously known unstable senior leadership of the Sudanese government. The government has a globally known record for its support for trans-continental terror-group, failure to establish internal stability and acts of state-led wrongdoings against civilian protests. The widely raised suspicion over the leaderships’ meddling in internal affairs only acts as a gasoline over the spreading fire with up keeping of the recent agreement between TPLF and the central government are underway. The close geographical proximity of the two points of tension also points out to the general risk it poses.
Delicacy and carefulness in mind, diplomatic process to search for a solution is indeed important at the window of relative peace at hand. The mixture of unstable actors with a previous record of meddling in domestic affairs of neighboring countries is an additional factor to see into sooner than later. Keeping in mind how the policy dominos might exert matters to a very complicated position, with addition to the world’s reshuffling in multiple fronts, a binding outcome for a stable future is in need for a globally contested region.
With African solutions being in need for African problems, the African union led demarcation process being initiated should be the first step that requires the commitment of all. The peaceful coexistence of the two countries will influence regional issues and continental topics to rest in a place where we Africans can bring solutions for African problems. Whether we like it or not, our fates are tied together and committing to do the heavy lifting now with a non-confrontational approach to the matter will be crucial.
As far as utilizing what is at hand goes, the current regional stand offers a relatively stable window that can serve as an opportunity to cement a stable and long-lasting partnership that will allow the horn to combat its issues like drought, economic struggle, fragile political stand and geopolitical complexity together. And if done well, the region will have a chance to shift its overall focus towards cooperative projects that fast track peace and development for all. Yosef Frew – Student of Political Science and International relations department in Addis Ababa University and Research Intern at the Blue Nile Water Institute with the interest on the Horn of Africa.
Source: ISS official site
Editor’s Note: The views entertained in this article do not necessarily reflect the stance of The Ethiopian
The Ethiopian December 8/2022
