Tensions and insecurity in the Red Sea and Horn of Africa regions are rapidly increasing due to a combination of military movements, threats to global maritime trade, territorial disputes, diplomatic maneuvers and humanitarian crises that are pushing this small but precious strategic space closer to the brink. . The risk of escalation has increased significantly after the United States and the United Kingdom launched air strikes on Houthi rebel targets in Yemen late Thursday – early this Friday in Spain – in an attempt to limit their military capabilities, according to Washington Since December, he has led an international naval force stationed in the southern Red Sea, in which Spain refused to take part. Since November, the Yemeni fundamentalist militia has been threatening ships crossing these waters, carrying around 12% of world trade through the Suez Canal.
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This military response, which has hit 60 Yemeni rebel targets, including the strategic port of Al Hodeida, comes after on Tuesday the Yemeni movement, which is backed by Iran and controls 30% of the country's territory, will launch its largest attack on ships in the Red Sea to date. Days earlier, the naval coalition dubbed the “Guardians of Prosperity” said it would impose consequences on the Houthis if maritime traffic in these waters continued to be disrupted.
Since mid-November, in response to Israel's devastating offensive in Gaza, the Houthi movement has been attacking merchant ships allegedly – sometimes falsely – linked to Israel. These measures have led the world's largest shipping companies to avoid these waters, even though it means circumnavigating Africa, which has increased freight costs by 170%.
According to the US Central Command (CENTCOM), the Houthis have carried out 27 attacks so far. The impact on maritime traffic is obvious: the average number of ships crossing Bab El Mandeb – the strait through which the Red Sea is reached – each week fell by 45% compared to the previous year, and in the Suez Canal by 28%, according to the maritime trade monitoring platform PortWatch. Traffic at the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa increased by 63% over the same period.
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The attack on Houthi targets in Yemen, which came a day after Iran hijacked an oil tanker in the nearby Gulf of Oman, has already triggered initial reactions in the region. Saudi Arabia, which has been negotiating a final ceasefire for months with the Houthi militia, its enemy in the nine years of Yemen's war, has called for restraint and to “avoid escalation.” The rebels' response was to fire a barrage of cruise missiles and ballistic missiles at US and British warships in the Red Sea, Efe reported, citing militia sources.
Pirates
Added to these attacks on Yemeni militia ships in nearby waters is the threat of piracy. On January 4, a Royal Navy-affiliated organization reported that it had received a report of an attack by a pirate group on a merchant ship off the coast of Somalia, prompting an Indian Navy contingent to intervene.
An official from the International Maritime Office of the International Chamber of Commerce in London emailed EL PAÍS about another similar incident in mid-December. Before these two events, the last pirate attack occurred in 2018. Some analysts believe that redirecting some maritime traffic to these waters could be encouraging due to the Houthi threat and the greater military attention the Red Sea is now receiving certain increase in hacking incidents.
Internal tensions have also increased across the Horn of Africa, on the southern coast of the Red Sea, after a preliminary agreement was signed on January 2 between Ethiopia, the world's most populous landlocked country, and Somaliland, an independent country. proclaimed republic northwest of Somalia, from which it became de facto independent in 1991. This territory has remained stable since then, but did not gain international recognition.
The document, pending ratification, grants Ethiopia commercial and military exit and access to the strategic Gulf of Aden, which is connected to the Red Sea via the Strait of Bab El Mandeb and Somaliland territory, in return for recognition of its independence. That commitment has raised tensions between Ethiopia and Somalia, whose federal government has called it illegitimate, void and an act of aggression to which it reserves the right to respond. The Somali executive, embroiled in a war against the al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab insurgency, has announced the withdrawal of its ambassador to Ethiopia.
The deal has also been criticized by Egypt and Eritrea, which have strained relations with Ethiopia and are wary of its ambitions in the Red Sea. Djibouti, through whose ports Ethiopia now handles more than 95% of its imports and exports for lucrative fees, has also called for Somalia's sovereignty to be respected, as have the United States, the European Union and the Arab League. Ethiopia lost access to the coast after Eritrea seceded in 1993 following its war of independence.
“Countries in the region have begun to prepare for this crisis and Somalia has asked Egypt and Eritrea for support. Given the history of proxy wars in the Horn of Africa, the prospect that this will lead to a regional confrontation is significant,” said Samira Gaid, regional analyst at Mogadishu-based consultancy Balqiis.
The war in Sudan
Crises in the region are also multiplying in neighboring Sudan, which has been embroiled in a war between the regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces since April. After taking control of almost all of Darfur's western region and the capital Khartoum, the paramilitaries captured a key province in the center of the country in December, putting them in an advantageous position to decide whether to push east or toward the coast should advance.
If they choose to go in this direction, and given the large mobilization of armed groups and civilians fearful of the paramilitaries, many fear that the conflict could degenerate into a more nuclearized all-out war, with the risk that Sudan is converted into a state. failed . The most conservative estimates already put at least 12,000 deaths, and the country is suffering from the worst refugee crisis in the world, with more than seven million.
In recent weeks, paramilitary commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo has also embarked on an unusual diplomatic trip that many suspect was sponsored by the United Arab Emirates, during which he met with world leaders. in Uganda, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, South Africa and Rwanda.
“I don't think there's anything in the Horn of Africa that can't be settled through diplomatic channels, but the problem is that no one is doing it,” said Cameron Hudson, an Africa expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “There is a lot of room for diplomacy, but there is no diplomacy in the region,” he slips.
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