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Conflict With Al-Shabaab in Somalia

Suspected Al-Shabaab IED Kills Three Kenyan Soldiers

  • The explosion in eastern Kenya comes days after a similar attack, as Al-Shabaab continues to target Kenyan security forces in border areas (VOA)

African Union Draws Down Troop Presence in Somalia

  • Two thousand soldiers will depart this month, and the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS) will complete its withdrawal in 2024; with an ongoing UN arms embargo against Somalia, there are concerns that the Somali government will fall without outside support (VOA)

Somali Army Claims Airstrike Killed Forty-five Al-Shabaab Fighters

  • A senior army official said the operation, conducted in concert with international forces, was the “most significant victory” for the Somali National Army and killed a top militant commander (Garowe; VOA)

Suspected Al-Shabaab Bombing Kills Eight Kenyan Police

  • An improvised explosive device destroyed their vehicle in Garissa, an eastern Kenyan county bordering Somalia; Al-Shabaab has commonly launched retaliatory attacks on the country throughout Kenya’s more than decade-long involvement in the fight against the armed group (Al Jazeera)

UN Urges Efforts to Eliminate Unexploded Ordinance in Somalia

  • The statement follows an explosion that killed twenty-seven civilians, including twenty-two children, and injured fifty-three (UN News)

Al-Shabaab Militants Kill Nine in Mogadishu Hotel Attack

  • Security forces rescued over eighty guests after a six-hour siege of the beachside hotel (BBC)

Al-Shabaab Attacks Ethiopian Base in Dollo, Somalia

  • Ethiopia’s foreign ministry claimed the Ethiopian army neutralized suicide bombers and seized their weapons before they were able to enter the compound in the border town (Al Jazeera)

Al-Shabaab Attack Kills Fifty-Four Ugandan Peacekeepers

  • Fifty-four Ugandan soldiers who were serving in an African Union force battling extremist group Al-Shabaab in Somalia were killed last week when militants attacked their base, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said (AFP)

Scientists: Climate Change Made Horn of Africa Drought One Hundred Times More Likely

  • The calculation was announced by World Weather Attribution, an international initiative to analyze the links between climate change and weather; the ongoing drought left around twenty-three million people in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Somalia facing extreme food insecurity at the end of 2022 (WaPo)

UN Chief Visits Somalia to Highlight Food Crisis, Insurgency

  • In a report to the UN Security Council in February, UN Secretary-General António Guterres stated that 2022 was the deadliest year for Somalians since 2017, largely because of attacks by Al-Shabaab insurgents; the United Nations has only raised 13 percent of the $2.6 billion it has requested to address the humanitarian situation in Somalia, which is also suffering from severe drought and food insecurity (RFI)

African Union Short on Somalia Peacekeeping Funding

  • An African Union official said that the bloc’s peacekeeping force in Somalia is $90 million short of the funds it needs to battle extremist group al-Shabaab, in part due to the European Union redirecting its contribution toward other interests (AP)

2022 Drought Caused Forty-Three Thousand Deaths

  • An estimated forty-three thousand people died during Somalia’s drought last year, half of them likely children, according to a study that the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine conducted for the United Nations (AP)

Al-Shabaab Recaptures Base

  • A Somali officer and a local resident said that Al-Shabaab fighters overran and recaptured a military base in the southern Jubbaland region (Reuters)

Thousands of Somali Refugees Flee to Ethiopia

  • After an escalation in fighting in Las Anod in Somalia’s Sool region, more than sixty thousand Somali refugees have fled to Ethiopia; the conflict between the town of Las Anod and governing authorities in Somaliland has killed at least eighty-two people and involved shelling of civilian areas, according to the UN (The Guardian)
  • Meanwhile, U.S. Africa Command stated that it killed seven Al-Shabaab militants in a strike in Somalia at the request of the Somali government (CNN)

Somali Forces End Al-Shabaab Siege

  • The Somali government said its security forces ended a more than seven-hour siege of a residential building by Al-Shabaab militants; ten people were killed and seven were injured (VOA)

Somali Government: Hundreds of Al-Shabaab Militants Killed

  • The Somali National Army, backed by international partners and local clan militias, killed more than 350 Al-Shabaab militants and wounded dozens more across Somalia’s south and central region; VOA Somali was not able to verify the death toll (VOA)

U.S. Killed Twelve Al-Shabaab Fighters

  • U.S. Africa Command said it killed twelve al-Shabaab fighters in a remote area of Somalia (CNN)

UN, Partners Call for $2.6 Billion in Aid to Somalia Amid Famine Risk

  • The United Nations said roughly 8.25 million people, nearly half of Somalia’s population, need immediate aid amid a prolonged drought (UN News)

Somalia Hosts Regional Summit to Discuss Al-Shabaab

  • Somali leader Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and leaders from Kenya, Ethiopia, and Djibouti are expected to discuss a coordinated military offensive against Al-Shabaab (Al Jazeera)

U.S. Military Says It Killed Senior Islamic State Leader in Somalia

  • A U.S. operation earlier this week killed leader Bilal al-Sudani and ten other members of the self-declared Islamic State in Somalia, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said (CNN)

Al-Shabaab Attack Kills Five in Somalia

  • The ministry of information claimed Al-Shabaab set off a bomb and fired shots in a government building in Mogadishu, killing five civilians (Al Jazeera)

World Food Program: Threat of Famine Has Slowed, Not Ended

  • Aid from donors including the United States and Germany has postponed, but not eliminated, the threat of famine in Somalia, the World Food Program’s chief said (AP)

Somali Troops Return From Eritrea

  • The Somali government said the first of some five thousand Somalis who had been sent to fight in Eritrea beginning in 2019 are starting to return home; some of their parents have alleged that they were recruited under false pretenses (AP)

United Nations: Somalia Not in Famine But Risk Remains

  • A UN report indicated that eight million people are food insecure, and the “most likely scenario” is that more than 700,000 people will be in famine between April and June of 2023 (AP)

Somali Forces, Clan Militia Re-Capture Town From Al-Shabab

  • Adan Yabal in the Middle Shabelle region had been controlled by al-Shabab for six years (Reuters).