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Ethiopia appears to be sliding back toward full-scale civil war, raising alarm across the Horn of Africa and beyond. According to a France 24 panel discussion aired on September 30, 2026, unresolved grievances between the federal government in Addis Ababa and authorities in the Tigray region erupted last week into renewed fighting, shattering the fragile calm that had held since the 2022 Pretoria agreement. The prospect of a second devastating conflict in Africa's second-most populous nation has fueled fears of a domino effect that could destabilize the entire region.
The latest violence follows the collapse of dialogue between Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's government and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF). The Pretoria agreement, signed in 2022 to end a two-year war that killed hundreds of thousands, was always viewed by analysts as a ticking time bomb rather than a durable peace. Its core provisions—disarmament, territorial disputes, and the reintegration of Tigrayan forces—were never fully implemented. Four years later, the unresolved issues have resurfaced with a vengeance, and the fragile trust between the two sides has evaporated.
The regional context has shifted dramatically since the last war. During the 2020-2022 conflict, Eritrea fought alongside Ethiopian federal forces against the TPLF. Now, Eritrea is no longer aligned with Abiy Ahmed, a significant realignment that complicates any potential military calculations. Meanwhile, Addis Ababa has accused both Egypt and Sudan of supporting the TPLF rebels—a charge that, if true, would transform an internal Ethiopian dispute into a broader proxy conflict involving some of the region's most powerful militaries.
Sudan's involvement adds another layer of complexity. The country is itself mired in a vicious civil war, and Abiy Ahmed has been accused of siding with the United Arab Emirates, which is documented as arming the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militias fighting Sudan's army. This tangled web of alliances means that any Ethiopian escalation could interact explosively with Sudan's own conflict, drawing in external patrons and turning the Horn of Africa into a multi-front battleground.
The discussion on France 24, hosted by François Picard alongside Rebecca Gnignati, Juliette Laffont, Ilayda Habip, and Charles Wente, brought together a panel of regional experts to assess how the crisis might unfold. Guests included Meaza Gidey, an international relations researcher and activist; Roland Marchal, a researcher at CERI/Sciences Po; Jalale Getachew Birru, a senior analyst for East Africa at ACLED; and Nada Abou el Amaim, a journalist with Africa Intelligence. Their collective assessment pointed to a volatile mix of domestic grievances and shifting regional alliances.
One critical concern highlighted in the discussion is the question of how—and by whom—a return to all-out war might be stopped. With the African Union's credibility weakened and the international community distracted by the Middle East and Ukraine, mediators face an uphill struggle. The Horn of Africa has few functioning mechanisms for conflict resolution, and Ethiopia's neighbors are either entangled in their own crises or have actively taken sides.
The Strait of Bab el-Mandeb, a vital chokepoint for global shipping, looms large over the strategic calculations. The debate referenced former U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to invade Iran, which drew Saudi Arabia back into Yemen, and questioned whether recent threats over the strait may have lit the fuse in Ethiopia. While Ethiopia's internal tensions did not need external pressure to ignite, the Red Sea's geopolitical stakes have a way of inflaming local disputes, with global powers and regional rivals each pursuing their own interests.
The humanitarian stakes could hardly be higher. The 2020-2022 Tigray war was marked by widespread atrocities, mass displacement, and famine conditions. A renewed conflict would likely produce another catastrophic humanitarian emergency, overwhelming aid agencies that are already stretched thin across the region. Neighboring countries such as Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, and Kenya—each facing their own challenges—would struggle to absorb new waves of refugees.
Economically, the implications are equally severe. Ethiopia has been pursuing foreign investment and infrastructure projects designed to position itself as a regional powerhouse. A return to war would scare off investors, disrupt trade corridors, and potentially unravel years of economic planning. The damage would not be confined to Ethiopia; landlocked and coastal economies alike depend on stability along key trade routes.
The panel also examined the question of who could prevent a wider regional war. With Eritrea now estranged from Addis Ababa, Egypt and Sudan accused of backing the TPLF, and the UAE deeply involved in Sudan's civil war, the conflict has the potential to draw in multiple outside actors. Each additional player makes de-escalation more difficult, as local disputes become entangled with external rivalries and proxy agendas.
Diplomatic efforts so far have shown little sign of gaining traction. The Pretoria agreement's architecture lacked robust enforcement mechanisms, and the parties never resolved the fundamental political questions that caused the war in the first place. Without a renewed and genuinely inclusive negotiation process—one that addresses Tigray's political grievances, territorial disputes, and the status of its forces—the cycle of violence is likely to continue.
Analysts on the panel made clear that Ethiopia's descent into civil war is not inevitable, but the window for prevention is narrowing rapidly. Every day of renewed fighting deepens mistrust, hardens positions, and creates new facts on the ground that will be difficult to reverse. Once full-scale war resumes, the human and political costs would be staggering, and the conflict could take years to contain.
For the broader Horn of Africa, the fear is not simply that Ethiopia will suffer another civil war, but that the conflict will spill across borders. The region is already home to multiple intertwined crises—Sudan's civil war, instability in Somalia, tensions over Nile waters, and the lingering effects of past conflicts. A new Ethiopian war would compound these challenges and could set off a chain reaction that no single mediator or institution is equipped to manage.
The international community's response will be a critical test. So far, there is little evidence of a coordinated strategy to pull Ethiopia back from the brink. The United States, the European Union, the African Union, and Gulf states all have stakes in the outcome, but their attention and leverage are limited. Without urgent, high-level engagement, the drift toward war may continue unchecked.
As the panel discussion made clear, the road back from civil war is far harder than the road to it. Ethiopia's leaders and their regional counterparts must decide whether to pursue a negotiated settlement or risk a conflict that could consume the Horn of Africa for years. The coming weeks will determine which path they take—and whether the region's worst fears are realized.
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