Eritrea – from ancient Red Sea port to independence in 1993
The highlands and coast of today's Eritrea have been home to settled communities for thousands of years. In antiquity the region formed part of the Kingdom of Aksum, whose port of Adulis linked the Horn of Africa with Egypt, Arabia and India, and Christianity took root here early. In later centuries the highland kingdom of Medri Bahri held sway inland, while the Ottomans and later Egypt controlled the port of Massawa.
In 1890 Italy united these lands as its colony of Eritrea. Asmara grew into a modern colonial capital, but Eritreans were largely excluded from power. After Italy's defeat in the Second World War the territory came under British administration. In 1952 the United Nations federated Eritrea with Ethiopia; ten years later Ethiopia dissolved the federation and annexed it.
What followed was a thirty-year armed struggle for independence, which ended in 1991 with the defeat of Ethiopian forces. In a UN-monitored referendum in 1993 an overwhelming majority voted for independence, and Eritrea became a sovereign state. A bloody border war with Ethiopia from 1998 to 2000 and a long standoff followed until a peace agreement in 2018.
Today Eritrea is shaped by its nine ethnic groups, the legacy of its independence struggle and the remarkable modernist architecture of Asmara, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
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