MOGADISHU: Somalia accused Ethiopia on Friday of conducting unauthorized arms shipments to the semiautonomous state of Puntland. The Foreign Ministry stated that these actions violate Somalia’s sovereignty and pose a threat to regional security.
“This constitutes a grave infringement on Somalia’s sovereignty and has serious implications for both national and regional stability,” the ministry said in a statement. It claimed to have documented evidence of two trucks transporting weapons from Ethiopia to Puntland, carried out without any diplomatic clearance, which it described as a clear breach of Somalia’s territorial integrity.
The ministry noted that this incident resembles previous unauthorized arms shipments from Ethiopia, including reports of weapons being sent to the Galmudug region and another cache flown into Baidoa.
Mogadishu has demanded an immediate halt to these actions. The alleged shipments come amid heightened tensions between the two countries, particularly concerning Ethiopia’s sea access deal with the breakaway region of Somaliland, which Somalia has rejected as “illegitimate.”
Somalia views this deal as a threat to good neighborliness and a violation of its sovereignty, leading to the recall of its ambassador to Ethiopia.
Meanwhile, Türkiye has been attempting to mediate the tensions between the two Horn of Africa nations, but recent talks in Ankara have not produced any significant results.
