Ethiopian Press Agency (EPA) has interviewed Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Demeke Mekonen. Demeke has dwelt at length on the diplomatic journey of the country, the challenges faced in recent decades as well the future plan of its foreign relations. Excerpts:
Would you tell us about the purpose and importance of celebrating Diplomacy Week?
The Diplomacy Week is focused on three key issues. It has been 116 years since the first Ministry of Foreign Affairs was organized as an institution. Therefore, our diplomatic journey of the past years has left a mark in every age. It will explore that diplomatic journey by looking at the stories we have and the lessons we learn.
Secondly, what is our current situation in the field of diplomacy? What are the possibilities? What challenges are there? What should be done to protect our national interests? It is very useful to see that.
The third focuses on the diplomacy of the future: History, current situation, future era. By linking all three issues together, we celebrate this diplomacy week with exhibitions, panels and various other events, we are holding the event called our diplomacy in the hope that it will be possible to create a better national movement for the future.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs was established as an institution on October 15, 1923, 116 years ago. It does not mean that there were no diplomatic relations in different forms before. Early relationships are religious or Economical in nature. Cultural and security aspects; There were economic, commercial, diplomatic activities in various forms. Exploring the highlights from that time; it will benefit this generation.
What is the current situation of Ethiopia’s foreign relation?
In the last few years, following the framework of reform, there are clearly defined national issues in foreign affairs, as well as in our foreign relations. The main focus areas of the diplomatic nodes are first, focused on economic diplomacy. Second, politics in general focuses on a multilateral, bilateral political framework. Thirdly, they are the focus areas of foreign relations policy, which includes citizen diplomacy as a major framework.
Our foreign relations policy is based on national interests, national realities, and ensuring national interest in terms of foreign affairs or foreign relations. It is to uphold sovereignty. Since it is a matter of ensuring our interests in all fields, it means that it arises from the national and internal situation. From here on, priority will be given to neighboring countries. Despite the attention and balance with neighboring countries, it will cross over to the African continent and then to the world square. What is called multilateral means that it is a framework of diplomatic communication that expands in bilateral relations.
Based on the positive experiences of previous years’ systems, various change packages were prepared in the framework of the change. It was prepared based on the premise that Focus on these frameworks; Jump to the continent and make Ethiopia’s influence on the international level, Ethiopia’s national interest and our advantage in the world competition become a reality.
Could you mention some of the major achievements of our diplomacy thus far?
It would be better if we see the journey in these years, the challenges faced, the results achieved and what can we learn for the future. So, in the history of diplomacy in Ethiopia, the leaders of every era, the stakeholders of every era have faced many challenges. They have crossed that with the main power of the people and our country has left many traces and reached here. We can look at the historical role played by Ethiopia in the “League of Nations” as the only representative of the black people during the colonial period. In connection with this, when we see many details in the history of black people, it is better to take a good look at the role that Ethiopian diplomacy has played in bilateral relations not only for Ethiopia and the people of Ethiopia, but also for Africans and black people.
There is a journey of 116 years where we have left traces of how challenging the incidents were. In these journey, in this era of change, especially when we look at the diplomatic activities of the last three years, perhaps the worst and most severe pressure was placed on Ethiopia. It is a time when Ethiopians, the government and its friends fought hard to overcome that. It is very important to give recognition and respect to the many challenges that have existed in each age and to the wisdom that have been applied to overcome them.
At the onset of the reform various reform agenda came into operation, during which Ministry of Foreign Affairs improved the communication frameworks and continued with citizen diplomacy, economy, politics and related issues. For example, if we look at the Renaissance Dam, it is a project that has been going on for years before the change and the people of Ethiopia were being hustled from side to side. The era of change is taking over this and solving the obstacles that are there, which facilitates it to enter into a better movement. In the era of change, Ethiopia has gone through many challenges especially external pressure or meddling.
First, the pressure on Ethiopia due to the Renaissance Dam had decreased. Second, due to the resistance on the reform and various reasons, there was a major war at home and a problem that challenged the country. There was a situation where various pressures related to this fell like avalanche over Ethiopia.
The US had also levied economic and various sanctions against Ethiopia. All the agendas that are full of challenges were imposed on Ethiopia. Hundreds of thousands of our citizens from some countries were expelled at once to put a lot of pressure on Ethiopia to accommodate them. During the war at home many believed that Addis Ababa, the capital of Africa is not suitable for diplomacy and is a security threat. So they were prepared to leave the country and some even tried to close their embassy and make everything dark. Coupled with other issues that I have not included in detail here, these years have been issues that have tested Ethiopia greatly and put Ethiopia in a great challenge.
There were also attempts to divert the GERD talks out of Africa with the pretext of peace negotiations. Humanitarian support activities and other service agendas were used as a tool to bring Ethiopia to its knees and twist its hands, along with other diplomatic and economic interests. In general, there were endless attempts of meddling.
Could you tell us briefly as to how we managed to overcome these pressures?
The major back up of the victory is the perseverance of the Ethiopian people, the strength of Ethiopia as a country and the wisdom and ingenuity of the actors and the synergy of our friends. As a result of the combination of these four pillars, Ethiopia overcame this challenge without abandoning its main stance. This should be taken as a great victory and success and it should be emphasized that the main owner is the people of Ethiopia.
From the resistance against the meddling we have drawn a lesson that when the diplomacy is moving within the capacity of the public, first, Ethiopia must define the real agenda of itself. This means reminding different parties about its position.
Secondly, it is seen as a great wisdom to calm down things that come out of emotions and various pressures.
Thirdly, it is necessary to make more friends during such challenging times so that they understand and take our side. One can ease the pressure, not through rigidity but by following the wisdom that helps you leap forward. The tactic of re-engagement was laid out to overcome this through the work done at every level by the communication skills of the country, in order to restore the diplomacy. When the situation moves to a better phase, we should complete the relationship that has passed and go to a better relationship.
We were under intense pressure from Washington DC during the era of President Trump that intended to withdraw GERD talks from Africa. Bringing it out of that box and making African and Ethiopian-African negotiations take place means that it is a very successful work. It means that works that can be mentioned in other profiles are also done in the same way.
The strength of our people in all this work was wonderful. As the Diaspora fought and campaigned with the #Nomore movement, every citizen threw away what they had to safeguard the country. It was through these campaigns that this result was achieved. As we continue, we have put it in the global arena to remove the strangulation devices that were designed against us. In fact, beyond that, there is a situation where Ethiopia has become a member of new cooperation frameworks like BRICS and we have entered into better relations and activities in various fields in the UN and the European Union.
What is our national preparation for our diplomatic work in the future, what are the works being done, what are the hopes and opportunities for Ethiopia?
In various forums we have participated in history I have realized that many African countries have a great respect and regard for Ethiopia. Sometimes, when issues that test the world come up, positions are taken elsewhere in the United Nations, despite being busy in its own domestic agenda Ethiopia’s stance and influence are multiplicative. They give us tip of ideas that they want us to resound like what position we have to take, or what action we have to take. By the way, in such cases many want to know “What is Ethiopia’s stance?” Africans, Latin American countries and many countries of the world have a very high view of Ethiopia. This happens because they know Ethiopia’s place through history and various experiences.
There is this great opportunity and wealth. Ethiopians also have a legacy of standing as a manifestation of the freedom of the black people in this challenging time, in every era, and how much they persevered for their freedom and dignity. This is the achievement of our people.
To pave the way for a successful diplomacy in the future we should consider the current world situation, geopolitics and the needs of countries, what they are saying and reading. As we see it now, the geopolitical situation will change in unpredictable ways. We see more rapprochements between countries that we say are not close.
Cooperation frameworks that used to be known as frameworks are changing their appearance and are perceived differently. And in order to map the diplomacy of the future era, it is necessary to start from the current dynamic situation. When we say diplomacy, we need to face the changing situation in the future and stand competitively. With the advent of new technology, diplomacy has ended, replaced by another and many literatures show that. It means that as long as there are different fields of communication, world competition and countries, diplomacy will continue to change and prepare accordingly.
Even now, when we see it, it is not only the conventional diplomacy that we used to have, but now the struggle, digital diplomacy has been added to it. The landscape of social media has also changed. Simply scheduling long appointments and face-to-face engagements are not enough right now. It’s an age where all information is delivered simultaneously with the fast, mobile technology we hold in our hands, where every leader, ambassador of foreign affairs all tweets and communicates through different devices. If we do not manage this, the diplomatic work would slip out of our hands and others will continue to define it in the way they want. Therefore, it is necessary to build the capacity of a suitable digital diplomacy system and be competitive.
The emerging geo-digital economy is becoming more and more demanding to use diplomacy as the future mode of communication in economic transactions and communication. It is not just about establishing a mission for a country. In the security, technology, and other communication contexts in the world, where is the market where I can work to protect the national interest? With revolutions such as artificial intelligence now coming and spreading, it is necessary to think about what will happen to the diplomacy and competitiveness and prepare already. It is necessary to make proper use of the opportunity provided by the technology, to build and work on the national capacity to support the negative pressure that it creates, to answer the question of how the negotiation agreement and other engagement conditions can continue. Furthermore, the overall dynamics of the digital economy’s innovation infrastructure should be explored and linked to the foreign policy framework.
Our diplomats need the right armor: they need professionalism, they need the ability to use technology. Ethiopian youth engaged in the context of technology are expected to act to make a positive contribution to Ethiopia’s national interest. A highly unpredictable diplomatic context is likely to emerge in the future. When it comes to diplomacy, opening an embassy or consulate somewhere, appointing an ambassador, assigning a diplomat, or a diplomatic journey that only goes one way is not enough. It requires the alignment and deployment of the times that will allow us to be accessible in the world. Informal diplomacy is increasingly important. Perhaps, sometimes, being an ambassador somewhere on behalf of Ethiopia, to deliver a leader’s message, to implement some issues, for that country, that agenda, an influential person, who is not engaged in the field of diplomacy, but another citizen may be found more useful. It is necessary to create a situation where all those who are known in the field of athletics, known in the field of business, and who have influenced other agendas work as ambassadors of Ethiopia.
The campaign, the siege, the battle, is not only flowing in one narrow way, but deployments and activities are needed to ensure our benefit in all directions. There is a need to increase the use of technology. It is very important to have the skills and technology required for the times. Our diplomacy week gave a great place and consideration on how we should prepare for the diplomacy of the future, what the current indicators look like, and in this regard, by understanding what the developed countries are already doing using artificial intelligence and others, we should not always be using it and following it. We don’t have to be followers, it should be an era where everyone swims in an equal line, leaves us, moves to protect their interests.
Over the years, other technologies have moved their country to another level. We followed this after a long time. But we cannot shoulder the future in this way. What this country deserves and what we need to do is to quickly learn all the new world combat, deployment contexts, build national capacity, and deploy and implement that will honor our interests at that level. And the new diplomacy is directed in this direction; the roadmaps needed for this, should be well calculated and lined up. What’s more, it means that Ethiopians from all over the world need to act as ambassadors of a common country and be there. This is where the future should be explored.
Our diplomacy has a long history. As I said earlier, it has 116 institutional diplomatic activities. So we have to comprehend this correctly; It is necessary to calculate correctly and to know and use the values. The problem in our country is that the speakers, leaders and front actors who come every day try hard to start from a new foundation by tearing down the old and throwing it like rubble. But it is worth learning from the past, taking the lessons. Therefore, it is necessary to take lessons from veteran diplomats, ambassadors and actors.
Diplomacy, foreign relations work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. There is always a need to learn. It always requires being prepared. It always requires readiness to serve the national interest.
Diplomacy always requires being prepared in this sense. What was said about Ethiopia? What does Ethiopia share? It means that it needs to know what it is that allows her to overcome her own influence. Such readiness needs to be operationalized in a wider context and ensure usability. In this sense, the work of diplomacy needs to take advantage of the past months and strengthen internal solidarity and unity. It is important for Ethiopia to continue its diplomatic work in the world, befitting its history, its positive role, and its people. In that case, the national interest will be ensured. Sovereignty is held in high esteem everywhere Ethiopia’s influence and Ethiopia’s significant role. To make that a reality, I say it is necessary for all stakeholders to play their role.
Thank you very much!
BY ZEKARIAS WOLDEMARIAM
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SATURDAY13 JANUARY 2024
