By Dawit Endeshaw
ADDIS ABABA, Jan 15 (Reuters) – Ethiopian police said they had seized thousands of rounds of ammunition sent by neighbouring Eritrea to rebels in the Amhara region, escalating a feud between the longstanding foes that experts have said could lead to renewed conflict.
Eritrea’s information minister did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the allegation.
Asmara has previously dismissed assertions that it meddles in Ethiopian affairs and accused Addis Ababa of aggression, with President Isaias Afwerki telling state-run media this week that Ethiopia’s ruling party has declared war against Eritrea.
The two countries fought a three-year border war that broke out in 1998, five years after Eritrea won its independence from Ethiopia.
They signed a historic agreement to normalise relations in 2018 that won Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed the Nobel Peace Prize the following year, but the relationship has again deteriorated.
Ethiopian federal police said in a statement late on Wednesday they had seized 56,000 rounds of ammunition and arrested two suspects this week in the Amhara region, where Fano rebels opposed to Abiy have waged an insurgency since 2023.
“The preliminary investigation conducted on the two suspects who were caught red-handed has confirmed that the ammunition was sent by the Shabiya government,” the statement said, using a term for Eritrea’s ruling party.
Eritrean troops fought in support of Ethiopia’s army during a 2020-22 civil war in the northern Tigray region, but relations soured after Asmara was frozen out of the peace deal that ended the conflict.
Since then, Eritrea has bristled at repeated public declarations by Abiy that landlocked Ethiopia has a right to sea access – comments many in Eritrea, which lies on the Red Sea, view as an implicit threat of military action.
“We have no appetite for war. But we know how to defend our nation,” Isaias said in the interview this week.
Abiy has said Ethiopia does not seek conflict with Eritrea and wants to address the issue of sea access through dialogue.
(Editing by Mark Heinrich)
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