'Tea Lady,' Ethiopia's Intelligence Weapon to Strike Sudan

The Sudanese security services were able to seize Ethiopian gangs in the state of Gedaref, east of Kassala region, holding 63 Ethiopian girls of local nationalities, who are likely to have infiltrated into Sudan under intelligence purposes that threaten the national security of the country.

Sudanese media reported that thousands of Ethiopian women are selling tea and coffee in the streets of Sudan, in what is called “Tea Lady” in Sudanese popular culture. 

The relationship between Khartoum and Addis Ababa is witnessing an advanced stage of the crisis, starting with the problem of the Renaissance Dam to the raging conflict on the borders, which the Sudanese armed forces resolved by recovering the occupied lands there.

The Ethiopian government led by Abiy Ahmed did not give up in turn, and developed the border skirmishes into a remarkable intelligence incursion, aimed at gathering information and causing confusing, to represent the face of the Ethiopian Emperor, the dictator Haile Selassie, 6 decades ago, when he sent his intelligence in the past to Sudan as well, under a system of  corruption : liquidations and violations for years.

Ethiopian Girls Spy

On June 17, 2021, the Sudanese newspaper Al-Akhbar published, according to an unnamed military source, that the Sudanese armed forces had spotted Ethiopian women spying on Sudan under the cover of immigration.

The newspaper said: "The Sudanese army views with suspicion the increasing smuggling of Ethiopian girls across the militarily tense borders, with the possibility that they will engage in espionage activities against the spread of Sudanese forces inside the liberated lands of Al-Fashga." 

According to the military source, "the increase in smuggling of Ethiopian girls in the border strip under the cover of human trafficking comes according to an Ethiopian intelligence scheme to abort plans for the redeployment of the Sudanese armed forces in their old sites in Al-Fashga."

The military source considered that "the Ethiopian army includes girls. This motivates its leaders to spy and receive information through the spread of Ethiopian girls under the pretext of human trafficking."

It  pointed out that "the girls pass through military areas and sites, while in light of the current military turmoil and expected battles, an increase in human trafficking activity is excluded."

On March 31, 2021, the Sudanese Anti-Smuggling Police and Customs in Gedaref State were able to arrest two gangs engaged in human trafficking and arms and ammunition smuggling, with 63 Ethiopian girls with "Amhara, Coment, Oromo and Qemz" nationalities.

Dozens of gangs are active in the eastern regions of Sudan in human trafficking, especially the smuggling of Ethiopian, Eritrean and Somali women to the country, which is a gateway for illegal immigration to European countries. Moreover, it has become a nest of spying and threatening Sudan as a whole, in the face of Ethiopian ambitions.

Tea Sellers

Sudanese writer Bakri Al-Sayegh spoke about the matter in an article entitled “As in the Sixties: The Ethiopian Fifth Column  Spreads and Activates Inside Sudan” on January 15, 2021, for the Sudanese magazine “AlRakoba”. 

Al-Sayegh published his testimony on the era regarding the history of the Ethiopian intelligence targeting Sudan for more than half a century.

The Sudanese writer said: "Among the Ethiopians who entered Sudan recently after the Ethiopian invasion of the Tigrinya region, as well as among the hundreds of thousands of them who previously entered and settled in several Sudanese cities, there were tens of thousands of coffee, tea,and  kasra sellers."

He continued, "Many of them are agents belonging to Ethiopian security cells, and some of them constitute a force within the Ethiopian fifth column in Sudan."

He added: "The repercussions of the events and the nature of the situational and demographic environment in that border region (Fashga) create great challenges, foremost of which are intelligence work, due to the presence of a large number of Ethiopian refugees and citizens in most parts of Sudan."

Some of them work in restaurants, cafeterias and hair-cutting places, in addition to tea sellers who are widely spread even in places not far from the military areas, according to the source.

"Despite these challenges, the Sudanese army is able to conquer these conditions and make the required difference in any confrontation between the two parties, as happened during the last period when it was able to expel the Ethiopian militias from the usurped lands on the borders between the two countries," he said. 

He concluded his speech: "The Amharic militias and the Ethiopian army use this  trick to spy, by sending girls working in the army and passing through our military points and knowing where our forces are stationed and arming them through their work as tea sellers."

The phenomenon of tea sellers is spread throughout Sudan, and Khartoum in particular. Large numbers of citizens gather around them throughout the day. 

Because of wars, displacement and poverty in conflict areas, many women have been forced to go to major Sudanese cities to sell tea to support their families, which is exploited by the stalking state of Ethiopia, which is involved in multiple disputes and conflicts with Sudan, in creating intelligence gaps through which it can obtain information as much as possible.

Old History

The Ethiopian intelligence work inside Sudan is not the result of the immediate period, but has been going on for decades, specifically since the early 1960s, during the era of the Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie, the dictator who ruled his country with bloody grip.

Because of the emperor’s system of corruption  and the suppression of hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians and Eritreans, many of whom were mercilessly exterminated. Hundreds of thousands fled and sought asylum in Sudan, and their entry to the country at that time was very easy in the absence of a clear border between the two countries.

But the Haile Selassie intelligence service  followed them in the neighboring country, as it sent experts in the field of assassinations and physical liquidations, to spread with great intensity inside Khartoum, especially in the cities of Kassala, Gedaref and Port Sudan, where most of the opposition activists and pursuers were stationed.

During that period, the intelligence was able to build broad ranks in what was known as the Ethiopian “fifth column” inside Sudan, which facilitated the process of liquidating hundreds of Ethiopian activists with ease, and carried out multiple operations such as planting explosive bombs in the refugee areas, kidnapping dozens and transferring them to the horrific detention centers of Addis Ababa.

The successive Sudanese governments at that time did not care about the Ethiopian intelligence "fifth column", considering that the matter concerned the Ethiopians, not taking the risk of losing relations with Addis Ababa.

But what Ethiopia sowed continued over time, and used it in other tasks related to the Sudan itself, the government and the people, as these cells became maliciously active, transmitting the most accurate information, and threatening the security and stability of Khartoum.

This was evident in the current crisis with the faltering negotiations of the Renaissance Dam, and the war that raged in the border area of Al-Fashga. Ethiopia is trying to regain its strategic position on the border with Sudan.

Abe's Intelligence

As for Sudan now, it is facing a more sophisticated Ethiopian intelligence version than the previous one. Since the Ethiopian Prime Minister Abi Ahmed took office on April 2, 2021, he has sought to restore the intelligence service, as he was a member of the Intelligence and Communications Unit. In the Ethiopian army, he was a colonel in 2007.

On December 24, 2019, he announced the preparation of a 10-year strategic plan to change the working methods of the apparatus, restructuring it by excluding the old guard, and seeking its independence away from politics.

On the other hand, Abi Ahmed used Israel and the intelligence agency (Mossad) to support his plan, which was revealed by the Ethiopian Fana Radio, on January 18, 2021.

The radio said: "The Ethiopian intelligence and security service agreed with the Israeli intelligence service Mossad to cooperate in various fields of peace and security and combating terrorism."

According to the official radio, this came during a meeting between the Director General of Ethiopian Intelligence, Timisgen Tirona, and the special envoy of former Mossad chief Yossi Cohen to Ethiopia and East Africa.

He stated that during the meeting, the two sides agreed to enhance cooperation in the field of information exchange and capacity improvement," according to a statement by the Ethiopian intelligence.