It is a long journey from the accusation of President Hassan Sheikh Mahmoud in February 2024 during the Ordinary Session of the Executive Council of the African Union, when he alleged that he was prevented from entering the Headquarters of the AU in Addis Ababa by Ethiopian security forces, and that he was rescued by President Ismael Omar Guelleh of Djibouti, to yesterday, January 11th, 2025, when the President of Somalia was extended a warm welcome to Addis Ababa. Abiy Ahmed’s message on “X” which read “I warmly welcome President Hassan Sheikh Mahmoud of the Federal Republic of Somalia, on his working visit to Ethiopia.” Speaks out loudly on the event.

The two countries have been at logger heads on the matter of the Somali sea and Ethiopia’s continuous and constant complaint of its need for access to a sea. The illegal MoU it signed with one of the regions of Somalia was considered by the latter as a transgression on its sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity. Despite the “Ankara Declaration” pressured and worked on by Türkiye, Ethiopia does not appear to have reversed its quest for taking part of Somalia’s territory and/or sea through a lease process, much like the Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, which was leased to the USA for a specific period and which still remains in its hands.

Many Somalis are accordingly wary of the visit of the President Mahmoud to the country which, in their minds, is working hard to dismantle it and balkanize it. During the long and continuing civil war of Somalia, Ethiopia played a nefarious role encouraging many regions to pull away from the center, which weakens Somalia. A country of one people, one language, one faith and one culture, has been turned into a bad lands region and according to many Somalis,........

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