Nobody yet knows whether the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and President Muse Bihi Abdi of the breakaway state of Somaliland is any more than a ‘memorandum of misunderstanding'...

The two five-person delegations were present but did not meet face-to-face while Turkish diplomats shuttled between them (AC Vol 65 No 14 Abiy Ahmed's sovereignty deal with Muse Abdi risks more regional turmoil)...

Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed annoyed the other parties by claiming that his team was present only at the behest of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan although it was Abiy who had requested mediation between Addis and Mogadishu...

Some analysts see a deeper game and the hand of Ethiopia and its current ally Somaliland in setting up an action designed to discredit Hassan Sheikh possibly as revenge for his opposition to the MoU between Addis and Hargeisa or simply to undermine him politically ahead of the next presidential elections (AC Vol 65 No 14 Abiy Ahmed's sovereignty deal with Muse Abdi risks more regional turmoil)...

When Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed decided in 2020 to use military force to bring the defiant Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) into line he turned to allies from Amhara...

He dislikes Hemeti because he is close to Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and another of Issayas's bogeymen the UAE...

' The Eritrean organisation was set up in the early 2000s in Addis Ababa but appears to have been sidelined as relations warmed between Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Eritrea's President Issayas Aferwerki in 2017...

Regional concerns are mounting over the mooted quid pro quo between Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and President Muse Bihi Abdi in which Ethiopia gets a port in the Gulf of Aden in return for recognising the independence of Somaliland which broke away from Somalia in 1991 (AC Vol 65 No 2 Why Abiy and Muse signed a 'memorandum of misunderstanding')...

According to our sources Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and President Muse Bihi Abdi of Somaliland deliberately spread a rumour on X and other social platforms that Ethiopia would formally recognise Somaliland on 1 July as a way of putting pressure on the negotiators at the Istanbul meeting the day before...

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's political shapeshifting has cost him popular support in the Amhara Oromia and Tigray regions leaving only those in power in Addis Ababa and the regional capitals closely tied to his fortunes...

ABIY AHMED AND HIS ALLIES The most powerful allies of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed hail from the Oromia region where he rose to prominence before becoming the national leader in 2018...