The interplay of geopolitical factors and the ambitions and rivalry of the Big Powers that blocked Eritrea’s quest for decolonisation while appeasing Ethiopia’s claims by using the UN to impose a federal union with Ethiopia against the wishes of the Eritrean people, are considered in Chapter 4: Transition From European to African Colonialism. The chapter describes how the UN violated the principle of self-determination, facilitated Eritrea’s continued domination by an oppressive power with an African face that damaged long-term Ethio-Eritrean relations. Further, it underscores Ethiopia’s systematic and reckless subversion of the Federal Act and the tacit complicity of the UN in the incorporation of Eritrea into the Ethiopian Empire, fuelling popular indignation and fomenting the Eritrean armed struggle for self-determination.