ABSTRACT
Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries in the world. Up to mid-1991 the country was engaged in a civil war with various liberation groups challenging and fighting the dictatorship of President Mengistu Haile Mariam. Besides mainland Ethiopian liberation movements, there was the Eritrean liberation movement, struggling for Eritrean political independence and sovereignty. In May 1991 all this ended, President Mengistu was defeated and a new government took power in Ethiopia, which from then on no longer incorporates Eritrea, even though the formal declaration of Eritrean independence had to wait until May 1993.
