Sign up for our daily briefing
Make your busy days simpler with Axios AM/PM. Catch up on what's new and why it matters in just 5 minutes.
Stay on top of the latest market trends
Subscribe to Axios Markets for the latest market trends and economic insights. Sign up for free.
Sports news worthy of your time
Binge on the stats and stories that drive the sports world with Axios Sports. Sign up for free.
Tech news worthy of your time
Get our smart take on technology from the Valley and D.C. with Axios Login. Sign up for free.
Get the inside stories
Get an insider's guide to the new White House with Axios Sneak Peek. Sign up for free.
Catch up on coronavirus stories and special reports, curated by Mike Allen everyday
Catch up on coronavirus stories and special reports, curated by Mike Allen everyday
Want a daily digest of the top Denver news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Denver
Want a daily digest of the top Des Moines news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Des Moines
Want a daily digest of the top Twin Cities news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Twin Cities
Want a daily digest of the top Tampa Bay news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Tampa Bay
Want a daily digest of the top Charlotte news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Charlotte
A woman looks for clams on a beach in Eritrea. Photo: Eric Lafforgue/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images
Eritrea is in dire need of economic development, but it has isolated itself from regional neighbors and the international community and doesn't trust or accept any foreign aid.
The bottom line: Without aid, Eritrea has to find other ways to make money, and one big asset is its coastline. The strip of land — just 200 miles from the Arabian peninsula where deadly conflicts between Gulf nations are playing out — is available to the highest Arab bidder.
Decades of mistrust
The backdrop: Eritrea's fight for independence, in which the small nation overcame Ethiopian forces backed by the West, shaped the worldview of Isaias Afwerki, the country's dictator since its founding in 1991.
"This perception that Eritrea must go at it alone in confronting a fickle, and often hostile, international community, continues to define Afwerki’s mindset," a senior Western diplomat, who served as ambassador in Eritrea in the early 2000s, tells Axios.
- Afwerki is deeply suspicious of Western intentions and aid and cuts his country off from the globe, the ambassador says.
- The repressive government has blocked development and pushed scores of its citizens to flee to other African nations, Europe and the U.S., says Meressa Kahsu Dessu, a regional expert at the Institute for Security Studies in Addis Ababa.
The bidders
- The Saudi-led coalition waging war in Yemen "now uses a base in the Eritrean port of Assab, close to Djibouti, as a key spot from which to attack Houthi positions in Yemen," reports the Economist.
- The league of Arab allies — including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain — sanctioning Qatar for alleged funding of regional terrorists have also won Eritrea's support.
- That support has had its consequences. Eritrea is engaged in a territorial dispute along its border with Djibouti, but things quieted down when both parties agreed to let Qatar send troops to the region and serve as a peacekeeper and mediator. After Eritrea pledged support to the allies against Qatar, the Arab nation pulled its troops, sending the region into chaos once again, Dessu says.
Where things stand
Eritrea's neighbors have tried to get along. One semi-successful effort was the creation of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a trade organization which includes Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Uganda, Kenya, Somalia and Sudan.
- Yes, but: Eritrea's membership in IGAD has been inconsistent. In 2007, it pulled out of the bloc for four years to protest Ethiopia's decision to send troops to fight al Shabaab in Somalia. Ethiopia remains Eritrea's biggest enemy, and it opposes nearly everything Addis Ababa supports.
- "There's not an active conflict [between Ethiopia and Eritrea], but we call it 'no peace, no war," Dessu says.