Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed arrives in Kenya for a two-day trip

NAIROBI, Kenya - Embattled Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed arrived in Kenya on Wednesday for two days amid uncertainty across the Horn of Africa, where his country is hugely affected, following a military operation at Tigray region in the northern part of the country.

This is the first trip by Abiy Ahmed to Kenya in over 18 months, with his last outing coming in March 2019 when he visited with Somalia President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo, whose country was involved in a diplomatic spat with Kenya, over the controversial Indian Ocean maritime border.

He would win a Nobel Peace Prize in November last year despite the fact that his attempts to have the case settled out of the International Court of Justice, where Somalia had taken Kenya for settlement. The case will be mentioned in March 2021 after postponement by the court following the Covid-19 pandemic.

Abiy Ahmed was received by President Uhuru Kenyatta at Moyale where the two will unveil a Border Point that has been under construction for the last two years. Later, the two will travel to Lamu, coastal Kenya where they will inspect the construction of Lamu Port, which will play an important role in the development of landlocked Ethiopia and South Sudan.

Dubbed LAPPSET, the project has been under construction for the last decade and it's in the final phases of completion. Kenya has already built a durable road network which ends at Moyale, from where Ethiopia is set to construct another road that would help in the transportation of oil and other imports.

His trip also comes amid the Tigray crisis which has been condemned by the international community. Ahmed deployed Ethiopian National Defense Forces [ENDF] to the Tigray region where they unleashed against the Tigray People's Liberation Front [TPLF] whose troops had reportedly raided Northern Command.

Also, the divisions in ENDF are said to have deteriorated after it took an ethnic dimension, especially in Somalia, where the Ethiopian troops are serving in the peacekeeping mission. It's said that those of Tigray ethnicity have been disarmed, something which has triggered internal divisions.

Ahmed is also in Kenya amid another diplomatic row between Kenya and Somalia, which saw the latter expel the former's envoy from Mogadishu besides recalling her ambassador to Nairobi. Somalia insists that Kenya is meddling in her internal politics, something which Nairobi has denied.

GAROWE ONLINE