(The views expressed in this article do not represent the institution with which the author is affiliated.) The Prosperity Party won Ethiopia’s 7th national election, securing 438 parliamentary seats as declared by the National Election Board of Ethiopia. Following this victory, a key issue to consider is the Prosperity Party’s regional foreign policy ambitions for its second term. Ethiopia’s foreign policy approach in the Horn of Africa is marked by considerable ambiguity, particularly concerning its regional goals and orientation.
The government’s foreign policy is grounded in the belief that regional integration and cooperation provide the most sustainable solutions to the shared political, economic, and security challenges facing the region. While integration and cooperation are central to Ethiopia’s regional strategy, their implementation may differ across neighboring countries, influenced by specific national interests, bilateral relationships, and changing regional dynamics. As a sovereign state guided by both national interests and broader regional responsibilities, Ethiopia seeks to advance a vision of mutual prosperity, interdependence, and collective security in the Horn of Africa.
Within this framework, the pursuit of synergy among regional states remains a defining principle of its foreign policy. This commentary seeks to provide an overview of the government’s likely foreign policy priorities and regional orientation over the next five years. Particular attention is given to Ethiopia’s relations with Sudan, Eritrea, and Somalia, while also considering the broader implications for engagement with other countries in the Horn of Africa.
Eritrea: Second Rapprochement or Continued Stalemate? The Ethiopia–Eritrea relationship remains one of the most structurally constrained bilateral dynamics in the Horn of Africa. Despite the historic 2018 peace agreement that ended two decades of formal hostility, normalization has stalled.
The second term of the Prosperity Party will likely see no major breakthrough in the near term, primarily due to the nature of the Eritrean state itself: a highly centralized, ideologically rigid regime with limited institutional capacity for the kind of substantive bilateral negotiations that would be required to advance the relationship meaningfully. The absence of modern, pluralistic institutions within Eritrea creates an a…
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