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Somalia

Somalia

Population: 16.5m
GDP: $12.8bn
Debt:

news from Somalia

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Found 295 articles.

Displaying 161-170 out of 295 results.

New president, new laws and old enemies

The election of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud is seen as a sign of stability but the new government’s foundations are far from strong. Meanwhile, Kenya’s military policy is worrying other members of the Amisom alliance. The election process was marred by vote-buying but Western commentators welcomed the outcome, often warmly. However, Ethiopia has concerns about the Islamist background of the new leader

Somalis welcomed the election of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, an outsider with a better reputation than his predecessor, as the first critical test of the new constitution. The...


Monitoring on hold

Britain’s Department for International Development has taken no step towards setting up the Joint Financial Management Board promised at February’s London Conference on Somalia, Af...


August will be hot

The elders are warming to their constitutional role, while Kenya weighs up the taking of Kismayo

The 135 Somali elders whose role is to appoint a Constituent Assembly have responded to the warm international welcome they have received by showing they want to take at least one ...


End of transition looms

While Al Shabaab suffers reverses, the government that replaces the TFG in August may turn out to be little different

There is a mood of broad optimism among many commanders from the African Union Mission in Somalia (Amisom) about recent military successes. Al Haraka al Shabaab al Mujahideen, howe...


Turkish aid

Turkey is underscoring its engagement in Somalia through development projects in Somaliland and Puntland. It sees the projects as proving to the United States and European Union th...


Al Shabaab’s waiting game

Regardless of the recent defeats of Al Haraka al Shabaab al Mujahideen, senior African Union Mission in Somalia commanders privately admit that the next phase of military operations is fraught with potential difficulties. Since forcing Al Shabaab out of Mogadishu in August, five years after Amisom first came to Somalia, the Ugandan People’s Defence Force’s 5,500-strong contingent is slowly moving out to assume control of new territory beyond the capital. Any bolder moves to occupy territory further afield, however, depend on leaving currently-occupied zones to Transitional Federal Government (TFG) soldiers and police, whose competence and reliability are in some doubt. Amisom commanders also worry because communications are scant and coordination absent with the Ethiopian forces to the south. Now that the Kenyan forces have been re-hatted as Amisom, links with them should improve.

Lack of trust in the TFG forces who have to take over the Ugandan and Burundian positions when Amisom moves out of Mogadishu is making Amisom tread cautiously. The TFG forces are ...


Cashing in on chaos

The work of a former government accountant again exposes financial confusion and crime on a grand scale

While February’s London Conference on Somalia sought ways out of the military and political quagmire, a former civil servant in the Transitional Federal Government was documenting ...


Board to probe finances

Privately, diplomats in Mogadishu agree that the reports by Abdirizak Jama ‘Fartaag’ are the best source of financial information about the Mogadishu government.


Martial music plays in London

Whispers of possible negotiations with Al Shabaab were drowned out by the drums of war

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) may have been hosting the London Conference on Somalia but there was no doubting that Downing Street was in the driving seat.


Displaying 161-170 out of 295 results.