In-Depth: Sudan and Ethiopia's Border Conflict Intensifies

Mar 17

Mar 17 In-Depth: Sudan and Ethiopia's Border Conflict Intensifies

By Faisal Ali

As talks over the Nile and Ethiopia’s dam project stall, border clashes between Sudan have intensified. Regional and domestic political developments have caused a deadly flare-up in violence.

Tensions have escalated in al-Fashqa, a region on the Ethiopia-Sudan border, as Sudan’s armed forces have reported capturing an Ethiopian militia leader who they say crossed into Sudan. .

Sudan has also accused Ethiopia for the first time of arming a rebel group to reoccupy Kurmuk, a small town in southeastern Sudan and has sent reinforcements to Blue Nile State border with Ethiopia, which Ethiopia denies. Ethiopia and Sudan have now been clashing at their shared border for over three months. The clashes come as Ethiopia's own war in Tigray passes its third month, driving over 60,000 refugees into southeast Sudan.

When clashes picked up, Sudan recalled its ambassador and released a harshly worded statement, saying that Ethiopian allegations of Sudan working on behalf of a third party - a veiled reference to Egypt - are a “grave and unforgivable insult.” This reaffirms its position that the Sudanese military and civilian leadership view al-Fashqa as a part of Sudan.

The al-Fashqa triangle is an agriculturally rich plain northwest of Ethiopia’s highlands. Farmers from Ethiopia’s adjacent Amhara region have settled in and cultivated the land for the last few decades. Under Meles Zenawi’s rule, Ethiopian militias entered the al-Fashqa region to provide security to farmers working across the border. While Sudan did not formally permit the presence of Ethiopian militias on its territory, it took very little direct action to expel them.

The Sudanese border with Ethiopia was always porous, says Kholood Khair, a managing partner at Insight Strategy Partners, a Khartoum-based think tank. A formal compromise was reached in 2008 between Zenawi and Omar Bashir, allowing farmers to remain and work in al-Fashqa. In exchange, the Ethiopian government recognized the boundary, and said it would cooperate in its demarcation. The agreement prevented any disruption of people’s livelihoods, but Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has since said that border negotiations are conditional upon a Sudanese retreat from territories it captured, signaling Ethiopia’s willingness to go the distance on this issue. However, Sudan maintains that, in accordance with a 1902 colonial era agreement, the al-Fashqa Triangle is part of Sudan, and there’s nothing to negotiate; Sudanese troops are merely enforcing their border.

Before the war in Tigray, Ethiopia had a more cooperative attitude toward Sudanese demands, despite occasional clashes, viewing the dispute as one to be resolved through diplomacy. Sudanese state news agency SUNA recently released footage of former Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn confirming Sudanese sovereignty in 2013. With the Ethiopian army deployed heavily in Tigray however, Sudan’s military has now opted for a different approach, forcefully expelling Ethiopian militias and villagers from al-Fashqa. They claim to have recaptured 50,000 acres of agricultural land.

Birhanu Jula, the Ethiopian military’s Chief of Staff, said Sudan “took advantage” of the situation in Tigray. Dina Mufti, Spokesperson for Ethiopia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, called on Sudan to leave the area it has occupied “forcefully” and to stop “plundering and displacing Ethiopian citizens that it has started as of November 6.”

Early on in Ethiopia’s conflict in Tigray, Sudanese troops had begun the process of taking back positions from Ethiopian forces embroiled in conflict with the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). However, the Sudanese presence there was requested during a visit by Abdel Fatah al Burhan, former Chairman of the Transitional Military Council ruling Sudan, to Ethiopia before the conflict in Tigray started, says Khair. Ahmed reportedly asked Burhan to close the border with Ethiopia and deny the TPLF an external supply route to fuel its war effort with the Ethiopian government.

Whilst there have been consistent reports of violence against Ethiopian farmers, provoking protest from Ethiopia, it wasn’t until an ambush by Amhara militiamen on Sudanese forces in mid-December that the conflict began to heat up. Four soldiers were killed and almost thirty wounded, pushing Sudan to boost its troop presence that week.

Tensions even spilled over into an IGAD summit that month when Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok raised the issue with Ahmed. Ahmed got what he wanted out of the summit when IGAD showed solidarity with Ethiopia in its conflict in Tigray, while Hamdok left without a solution to the border conflict, but an agreement to negotiate the border.

As a senior Ethiopian delegation attended talks in Khartoum, Sudanese forces went back on the offensive, prompting Ethiopia to accuse Sudan of looting and vandalizing the property of Ethiopian farmers. In response, Sudan has since begun investing in improved roads & infrastructure near its border region and placed its troops on high alert.

Playing for Domestic Audiences?

While the two countries spoke often late last year of the importance of dialogue to resolve their differences, domestic considerations appear to be influencing their postures at the border, says Tiziana Corda, a PhD researcher at the University of Milan who follows the border dispute. The value of the agricultural land is a factor, argues Corda, but “this in and of itself cannot explain the militarization seen in the past months.” Recent changes in domestic policy in both countries also must be taken into account.

The Sudanese military “wants to signal to its domestic audience that, unlike Bashir, they are ready to protect those lands through the use of force,” says Corda. In Ethiopia, PM Ahmed’s primary constituency is made up of ethnic Amhara, causing Ahmed to “see major risks in changing the status quo of the Amhara farmers, whom he benefits from.” This is why Ahmed has not backed down from the al-Fashqa conflict, argues Corda.

Ahmed’s position at home has weakened, Khair suggests, as his support base in Oromia has dwindled. Given the importance of al-Fashqa to Amhara farmers, and the support that Amhara nationalists have given Ahmed’s operation against the TPLF, they are unlikely to cede their demands in al-Fashqa.

According to Khair, Abdel Fatah Al Burhan finds himself in a complicated transitional scenario, and the border conflict has presented the military with an opportunity to increase his influence in government. Khair notes, “Burhan doesn't actually want war, he simply wants to assert his position as a relevant actor in civilianizing Sudan, and a military victory in claiming back al-Fashqa is, he thinks, the best way to do it.” Burhan, he explains, has shown rare restraint despite the uptick in violence, which was not traditionally shown to internal rebel groups. He won’t pass up an attempt to use the opportunity to bolster himself domestically at Ethiopia’s expense.

Egypt & the Nile Dam

The positions of Sudan and Ethiopia have also begun to diverge on Ethiopia’s Nile dam project, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), with Egypt joining Sudanese calls for the United States, United Nations, European Union and African Union to mediate negotiations on water management between the two countries. Ethiopia has rejectedthese suggestions, insisting that African Union presence is sufficient. Egypt and Sudan want a binding, enforceable agreement that protects their share of the Nile, while Ethiopia has offered Sudan technical cooperation and data exchange but has not accepted Cairo and Khartoum’s demands. Talks were put on hold a number of times throughout 2020. They resumed in 2021 with a heated exchange between Ethiopia and Egypt, before breaking down again shortly after, as the tensions at the border began to escalate once again.

Sudan has strongly voiced its objections to any attempt by Ethiopia to continue filling the dam this summer, with Sudan’s Irrigation and Water Resources Minister describing it as a direct threat to Sudan’s security, fearing that filling the dam without an agreement could harm its own dams. He more recently said Sudan would defend its interests if talks fail.

All involved countries have blamed one another for the breakdown in negotiations, but the border conflict and dam negotiations have impacted one another says Khair, with Ethiopia blaming Egypt for encouraging Sudan’s belligerent posture at the border to increase pressure on Ethiopia on the Nile. Ethiopia’s concerns are not unfounded, as Sudan concluded a defense pact with Egypt earlier this month with both countries agreeing to come to each other's aid in the event of an “emergency,” with Egypt vowing to meet all of Sudan’s military needs. Sisi visited Khartoum a few days after the agreement was concluded.

According to Mada Masr, Egypt has also been lobbying Sudan to support the TPLF, citing an unnamed Egyptian official. So far, Sudan has generally complied with Ethiopia, closing its border and returning TPLF fugitives to the Ethiopian government. However, Egypt’s influence in the region remains minimal, despite more recent attempts to court South Sudan, these developments have alarmed Ethiopia which queried the type of support Egypt was prepared to give Sudan.

As a result, Ethiopia has become increasingly vocal about Egypt’s role in the region. As early as mid-December Ethiopia was referring to unnamed “enemies” acting as a spoiler in the al-Fashqa region. Birhanu Jula, Ethiopia’s chief of staff said, “Sudan needs to choose dialogue, as there are third party actors who want to see our countries divided.” The third party Jula refers to is widely thought to be Egypt.

Talks often stalled and the Trump administration didn’t help when he said Egypt would “blow up” the dam, Khair says, as the countries have competing interests on the Nile. In the meantime, Sudan and Egypt have recognized that Ethiopia’s internal conflict makes it vulnerable, and the border conflict presents an opportunity to push negotiations on the Nile in a direction more favorable to Cairo and Khartoum. For PM Ahmed however, the stakes are also high given the importance of the GERD on Ethiopia’s future, says Khair.

“At the heart [of this problem] is Ethiopia's desire to grow and secure livelihoods for its 100 million citizens and Abiy's legitimacy [depends on] that.”