Ethiopia Recognizes Somaliland in Exchange for Sea Access

Abiy Ahmed, Prime Minister of Ethiopia, and Musa Bihi Abdi, President of Somaliland, signed a memorandum of understanding on January 1, 2024, which will allow Ethiopia to have access to the sea. The agreement will include a 50-year lease of a 20-kilometer stretch of land around the port of Berbera on the Gulf of Aden, again giving Addis Ababa access to the Red Sea, an outlet that has been closed since 1993, the year Eritrea declared independence.

In exchange, Ethiopia would formally recognize Somaliland, a country of 3.5 million people with its capital Hargeisa that broke away from Somalia in 1991, the year the civil war began. However, Mogadishu does not recognize its independence, considering it its territory, so it immediately declared its opposition to the agreement and summoned its ambassador to Ethiopia to discuss the incident.

Ethiopia is the second most populous country in Africa, and direct access to the sea would be important for commercial reasons (today it has to rely on Djibouti), especially at this moment of economic crisis when the country is in technical default. On the other hand, Somaliland is not recognized by the international community, so it would be especially important from a political point of view if Ethiopia did this.

Abiy Ahmed has repeatedly stated that access to the Red Sea is of vital importance for Ethiopia and that peace and good relations between the countries of this region are also based on this aspect. Undoubtedly, this principle of the agreement increases tension in the Horn of Africa. According to Reuters, Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud said that “no one has the right to cede a part of Somalia. If Ethiopia claims to have given you recognition, then such recognition does not exist.”