CITIZENSHIP AND STATELESSNESS IN THE HORN OF AFRICA \Y People’s Liberation Front (EPLF), which subsequently joined other regionally based armed the Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), 1974 Derg regime. groups in allied for the overthrow of the post- In 1991, when the EPRDF finally defeated the Derg, the new Ethiopian transitional government immediately approved a referendum on the status of Eritrea, as had been promised within the alliance. The referendum was held in April 1993 under UN supervision, with 99 percent of those who voted in favour of independence, and the EPLF became the ruling party of the new state the following month. Despite its small geographical Tigre, Kunama, size, there are nine major ethno-linguistic groups in Eritrea: Tigrinya, Nara, Bilen, Saho, Afar, Hedareb, and Rashaida.’ The territory of what is now the Republic of Djibouti was first ceded to France in a series of treaties from 1862 to 1885 with leaders of the Afar people (a nomadic people living in the northern part of the territory, as well as parts of modern the southern Eritrea and Ethiopia) and the Issa-Somailis (also nomadic, living in part of the territory, as well as parts of modern Somalia and Ethiopia). The territory’s location at the entrance to the Red Sea became strategic with the opening of the Suez canal in 1869, and was also intended as a stopping off point for ships travelling to French-controlled Indochina. In 1896 the French merged three separate regions, including the new city and port that they had named Djibouti (located in the southern Somalis. From part of the territory), to form what became known as the Cdte francaise des 1897 to 1917 a railway was completed to Addis Ababa. The port attracted immigration from neighbouring territories, Arabs from Yemen across the Red Sea, and French, other European, and Asian traders.® In 1958, as France restructured its relationships association with France in the French Community with its colonies, the territory voted for continued established by the constitution of the 5 French Republic. The Céte francaise des Somalis became an overseas territory with its own territorial assembly elected by universal suffrage. From 1967 until final independence as the Republic of Djibouti in 1977, the name of the territory was changed — as Afar politicians gained more representation in local politics — to the Territoire francais des Afars et des Issas. Djibouti is by far the smallest state, its population estimated today at just under one million; Eritrea’s population is estimated at 3.5 million; Somalia at close to 16 million; and Ethiopia at 115 million, Africa’s second most populous state (after Nigeria).? 7 See sources cited in Peggy A. Hoyle, ‘The Eritrean National Identity: A Case Study’, North Carolina Journal of International Law and Commercial Regulation 24, no. 2 (1999): 381-416. 8 Kassim Shehim and James Searing, ‘Djibouti and the Question of Afar Nationalism’, African Affairs 79, no. 315 (1980): 209-26; Simon Imbert-Vier, ‘Afars, Issas ... and Djiboutians: Toward a History of Denominations’, Northeast African Studies 13, no. 2 (2014): 123-49. 2 ‘World Population Prospects 2019’ UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs Population Division, https://population.un.org/wpp/Download/Standard/Population/. UNHCR — December 2021