Somalia: Mogadishu could fall without AU troops, says ex-minister

MOGADISHU (Somaliguardian) – Mogadishu “cannot be defended” if African Union troops withdraw from the country by December, Somalia’s former Minister of Planning Abdirahman Aynte said, adding that US diplomats have told Somali officials Washington will not reverse its decision to end logistics funding for the African Union peacekeeping mission regardless of the outcome of ongoing political talks.

The warning comes against a backdrop of confirmed fact: on July 1, the United States formally notified the African Union it would stop funding the UN Support Office in Somalia (UNSOS) after December 31, 2026 — the logistics mechanism that supplies AUSSOM with food, fuel, transport, medical care and communications. Washington has said it would not block the UN Security Council from renewing AUSSOM’s mandate itself, but would block any UN logistical or operational support for the mission — a distinction analysts say leaves the roughly 12,000-strong force operationally unsustainable without a replacement funding arrangement.

Aynte, who served as Somalia’s minister of planning and international cooperation from 2015 to 2017 under President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud’s first administration and previously worked as a journalist for the BBC, Voice of America and Al Jazeera English, said that during recent talks between the political opposition and the Somali government, US diplomats mediating the discussions delivered that message directly to Somali officials.

According to Aynte, the diplomats said that if Somalia’s rival political factions reached a settlement, Washington would not obstruct other countries from stepping in to fund AUSSOM’s logistics after the US withdrawal. But if no settlement was reached, he said, the diplomats warned that Washington would actively work to prevent other nations from filling that gap.