Ethiopian Foreign Minister Demeke Mekonnen was in Moscow on Wednesday for an official visit and a meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov. Ethiopia and Russia took the opportunity to multiply the signs of friendship, while Addis Ababa is increasingly isolated and put under pressure by the European Union and the United States.
According to Demeke Mekonnen and Serguei Lavrov, Ethiopia and Russia agree on everything: on an exclusively African mediation in the issue of the Great Renaissance Dam, on the indispensable non-interference of the international community in the war in Tigray, on the “satisfactory” character of the Ethiopian elections of last Monday for which Russia had sent observers. And also on the positive role that Moscow can play on the continent, as Addis Ababa will host the next Russia-Africa summit next year.
This demonstration of friendship is of course a signal sent to the West. Ethiopia, isolated by Europe and Washington because of the crimes committed in Tigray, but also by the Arab League which supports Egypt and Sudan in the dam issue, needs a powerful ally, especially in the Security Council. And Sergei Lavrov has provided it: Moscow, he said, intends to deepen their “cooperation” and their “mutually beneficial coordination in international organizations, first and foremost in the UN, where we actively support each other and propose joint initiatives.
But according to analyst Andrew Korybko of the Russian Council for International Affairs, Russia also serves Ethiopia as a counterweight to China, with which Addis Ababa has strong economic ties. It is better for Ethiopia,” he says, “to preventively balance its potentially disproportionate geostrategic dependence on China with another partner.