Competition or Cooperation: The Horn of Africa and Broader Red Sea Basin at a Crossroads

As Ethiopia begins filling the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, Africa’s largest hydroelectric power plant, tensions have increased with Egypt, which fears losing control over a waterway that has shaped its destiny for millennia. These developments have refocused attention on the Horn of Africa and wider Red Sea basin, a strategic area that has become a magnet for regional and global powers, including the Gulf states, China, Turkey, and the United States. While these states have invested billions of dollars in ports, airports, railways, agriculture, and education, they also have injected their own rivalries into a region with deep, long-standing divisions.  

What risks accompany the competition for influence by external actors in a fragmented region already struggling with weak institutional capacity and insecurity? Can the countries of the Red Sea basin turn deepening foreign engagement into opportunities for increased economic and political cooperation? What is the status of the political transitions in Ethiopia and Sudan, two key countries for the Horn of Africa’s stability? Will the recent formation of the Saudi-led Red Sea alliance establish the foundations of a sustained and, eventually, more inclusive regional dialogue?  

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