Chauvinist and Expansionist Forces Inside Ethiopia are Unashamedly Calling for the Incorporation of Assab- the birth place of Eritrea. Is this not like Playing with Fire?
Introduction
It’s not new for a country that has achieved its independence to have a hostile relation with the country it separated from. A good and most recent example of this is Ukraine, which became independent after the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. However, no sooner than Ukraine left the Union did disputes began to emerge with Russia over natural gas supplies, prices and debts. Russia and Ukraine went through “periods of ties, tensions, and outright hostility” for over 20 years. Following the Feb. 2014 Ukrainian “Orange Revolution”, which resulted in the ousting of pro-Russia Victor Yanukovych, Russia annexed Crimea (“a major land mass on the northern coast of the Black Sea that is surrounded by water”) triggering border dispute, ethnic conflict and the subsequent formation of the Republic of Crimea. Indeed, while there have been historic and contemporary political and economic causes of dispute, analysts believe that Ukraine’s flirtation with EU and NATO came as the final blow to a peaceful coexistence between the two countries and the ultimate showdown. John Mearsheimer, a professor at University of Chicago, points out: “It was EU expansion, the central element of a larger strategy to move Ukraine out of Russia’s orbit and integrate it into the West coupled with the February 22, 2014, coup that ignited the fire … [and] fear is at the root of Russia’s opposition to the prospect of Ukraine becoming a Western bastion on its border. Great powers always worry about the balance of power in their neighborhoods and push back when other great powers march up to their doorsteps.”
Mdre-Bahri 