Source: Horn of Africa Simple Map

While foreign policy circles in London are focused on Ukraine, the Middle East/Iran and now Venezuela, as well as the dramatic new US National Security Strategy,  a set of interconnected lower key conflicts around the Red Sea are escalating. This has global ramifications, especially in relation to the two Red Sea ‘pinch points’ for Europe; the Suez Canal and the Straights of Mandeb.

These conflicts involve Saudi Arabia, UAE, Sudan, South Sudan, Somalia, Turkey, Israel, Yemen, Egypt, Ethiopia, Libya … and Eastern and Western land gateways to the resources of the Sahel Region. It is a complex game likened to a ‘jigsaw puzzle with mystery pieces’, but it is nevertheless important for UK Parliamentarians to follow during 2026.

YEMEN

Following the Western and GCC-supported Saudi attacks on Yemen from 2015, Yemen broadly reverted to the old North/South Yemen divide extant before the fall of communism in 1989-1991. Then, South East Yemen was a Soviet-backed communist country, and the North West was a Nasserist Arab nationalist state. This dividing line also reflected the earlier divide between 19thC Ottoman and British rule (the ‘Violet Line). The modern 2026 iteration is the so-called Ansar Ullah ‘resistance’ in the NW and the UN-recognised SE, divided into Saudi influenced ‘Homeland Shield’ forces, and UAE influenced forces (STC).

In December 2025 Saudi-backed forces clashed with UAE-backed forces. This surprise conflict is allegedly mirrored in relations between the Saudis and UAE over Libya and Sudan. After removing STC forces from the southern capital, Aden, Saudi Arabia claimed victory over the UAE in early January 2026. Ansar Ullah is an opponent of the GCC Gulf monarchies, and of Israel.

SUDAN

The conflict between the RSF and Sudanese Armed Forces had created the world’s biggest humanitarian catastrophe of 2024-5. RSF forces emerged from the infamous Janjaweed militia known for its massacres in Darfur; including those under the RSF following the two-and-a-half year siege of El Fasher in late 2025, around which hundreds of thousands have likely died. The Saudis appear to accept the accusation that the RSF is armed and funded by the UAE, (and ‘reluctantly’ supported by the UK), partially in return for control of gold mining and other resources.

The Saudis are also disquieted by such a major conflict just across the Red Sea from its coast, and more so since the RSF have driven the main Sudanese armed forces (SAF) towards support from Russia and China; a Russian base on the Red Sea in Sudan (across the waters from Saudi Arabia) has been under discussion for two years. The Saudis accuse UAE of supplying the RSF from Basaso Airport in Puntland, Somalia. The Puntland authorities accuse the UAE of backing a private militia to ‘protect’ the airport.

SOUTH SUDAN

Western-backed South Sudan, immersed in internal and external conflict before and since independence from Sudan in 2005, survives on oil revenues. A pre-independence, 2000km pipeline, Chinese-built in 1999, delivers oil to a Sudanese refinery on the Red Sea at Port Sudan. The flow has been interrupted many times due to conflict and commercial disputes.

In 2025 the RSF took control of the (also oil-rich) area around the pipeline in Sudan near the border with South Sudan, but this has not interrupted the recently-resumed flow of oil. South Sudan has been seeking additional pipeline routes to the Red Sea, including via Djibouti, Ethiopia and Somalia.

ERITREA

Eritrea was annexed by Ethiopia in 1962, following quasi-independence from the Italians and British after WW2. Soviet-supported Eritrea gained its independence from Ethiopia in the period 1991-3 after a long conflict. However Eritrea has more recently participated in internal regional/ethnic conflicts in Ethiopia on behalf of the Addis Ababa government.

Eritrea is a one party state, deploying anti-colonial narratives, significantly less prosperous that Ethiopia, and has close relations with the Russian Federation. Widely-applied military conscription has fuelled mass emigration, especially to the EU.

TURKIYE

Turkiye has good relations with Somalia (especially South-Central Somalia and Puntland), and has provided large quantities of aid, particularly medical aid.  Egypt, Somalia, Ethiopia, Yemen, Sudan and South Sudan were at one time part of the Ottoman Empire and there are historical links.

Part 2, tomorrow – Djibouti, Somalia, Ethiopia, Libya and CONCLUSIONS

* Paul Reynolds works with multilateral organisations as an independent adviser on international relations, economics, and senior governance.