Eritrea is, alongside North Korea, the world’s most totalitarian state. President Isaias Afwerki brokers no dissent. Fearing popular will, he allows no election but rather subjects his population to indefinite conscription to make them slaves of the state. The country hosts the continent’s worst gulags. Its transnational repression extends to the United States. Here, Eritrean diplomats extort a tax on emigres by holding relatives in Eritrea hostage under threat of torture and imprisonment. In all but formal designation, Eritrea is a state sponsor of terrorism, sowing instability across the region.

For decades, there was consensus across administrations and in the State Department: Eritrea would remain a pariah, at least until Isaias was gone. There was little Washington could do to hasten that day, however, since Eritrea’s economy is so underdeveloped. In 2022, U.S. imports from Eritrea totaled just $346,000, half the cost of an average house in Arlington, Virginia.