IRMO Brief 08/2024 - The Horn of Africa in the Face of the Changing Conditions in Ethiopia and the Tigray War

Ethiopia is a country endowed with its own unique civilization around the Red Sea since the time antiquity. Historical evidences proved that it enjoyed working relationship with the Roman Empire during its heyday and with the Ottoman Empire during the medieval period. But, it was largely detached from renaissance and industrial Europe as it was blocked by the strong presence of the Ottomans along the Red Sea and the Gulf of Eden. When European nations with colonial ambition were coming to Africa in the second half of 19th century, Ethiopia resisted fiercely and maintained its independence. The modern Ethiopia that we know today is therefore the result of thepost-Adwa victory (the war between Ethiopia and Italy in 1896) boundary agreements that Ethiopia reached with the colonizers, i.e. United Kingdom, France and Italy.

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