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Rabat – Ethiopia is closing down a number of its diplomatic posts and removing diplomats from operational missions.
The move comes three days after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announced that Ethiopia will reduce the number of its overseas diplomatic missions.
The Prime Minister addressed the House of People’s Representatives (HoPR) during an open-door question and answer session, discussing his country’s economy, security, as well as the eight-month civil war in Tigray and last month’s general election.
“Ethiopia would need to close at least 30 of its embassies,” he said while explaining the move to members of parliament by asserting that it was purely due to economic reasons.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs emphasized in a letter dated July 7, that the Ethiopian government has to restructure its institutions overseas, citing the COVID-19 pandemic and the recession that followed as main factors. .
Reports say that 18 staff members of the Ethiopian Embassy in Washington DC were recalled.
Another five staff members of Ethiopia’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations were also recalled, reducing the total staff at the mission to three.
Ethiopian Consulates in Los Angeles, Frankfurt and Minnesota will be closed and staff members will be recalled home.
The Ethiopian embassy in Rabat was not included in the mass repatriation and remains operational until further notice.
However, Ethiopia’s embassy in Algiers will suspend all consular activities starting August 30.
As of this date, no official statements from either side have been published, apart from the information issued by the Ethiopian embassy in Algeria this Friday.
The Algerian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ramtane Lamamra, had made an official visit to Ethiopia on July 28.
The latter had taken advantage of this trip to propose Algerian mediation in the Renaissance Dam dispute between Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt on the issue of management and distribution of Nile waters.
The Ethiopian government is facing a rebellion in the Tigray province, a region where the local party in Addis Ababa is in open conflict with the federal government.
