I will be speaking shortly about the importance of Horn of Africa, the significance of the Turkish Somali Defense Pact, and the implications; opportunities; and limitations of this pact.
Concerning Horn of Africa, this region is important mainly because of three factors: First, its proximity to the Red Sea; Bab al-Mandab; Gulf of Aden, as well as Strait of Hormuz. These are main trade gates and routes where, which means this area is critical for the international trade, international maritime routes, and global energy transit.
Secondly, the geographical factor. The dynamics of this area are shaped by other regional countries such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Israel, and Turkiye. These heavyweight regional actors have influence and interest in this area as well. They had rivalry relations in the past.
Thirdly, the internal dynamics in the Horn of Africa’s countries. These countries have vast natural resources but they have internal problems too. They are unstable and some of them are failed states already, which threatens their neighbors with spillover effects such as terrorism, refugees, and other problems.
These three factors make the Horn of Africa region very significant to regional and international players. Concerning the recent defense pact between Somalia and Turkiye, this is a very significant agreement. Some of the observers and experts portrayed it as a direct response to the Ethiopian- Somaliland recent agreement. Somaliland is a breakaway region of Somali. The international community does not recognize Somaliland.
Ethiopia is the biggest, wealthiest, and most populous country in the Horn of Africa. It's a land locked country. Historically, it has always aspired an access to the Red Sea, directory or indirectly. This is one reason why smaller countries in the Horn of Africa have always looked suspiciously to Ethiopia, its territorial ambitions, and regional aspiration. Through its recent agreement with Somaliland, Ethiopia managed to realize its goal to have access on the Red Sear. This agreement between Ethiopia and Somaliland triggered concerns among regional countries in the Horn of Africa and beyond.
Egypt, for example, although a little bit far to the North, has a great interest in this agreement because until now, Egypt has been the most powerful country -military wise- on the Red Sea. Allowing Ethiopia to have access to the sea means, the balance of power could be changed in the future.
As for the recent agreement between Somalia and Turkiye, we should consider it as a continuation of a long period of Turkish engagement in Somalia that goes back to more than a decade ago. The Turkish heavy engagement in Somalia has been focused on nation building capabilities. When Somalia was almost a forgotten nation worldwide, only Turkiye played a significant humanitarian, political, economic role to assist Somalia in building its institutions and help it overcome the chaotic situation.
I think that the recent pact opens new opportunities for both Somalia and Turkiye to realize their shared interests, whether it be on the political, economic or even security level. We know that this pact is comprehensive. It's not only about helping Somalia to build its naval forces and cooperate with it in countering terrorism, but it is also about economic cooperation and mutual benefits.
So what this pact would mean to other countries is also important. We know that for example there has been cooperation between Turkiye and Qatar and Somalia for a long time, especially on the economic and humanitarian level. Although UAE has strong relations with Somaliland, Abu Dhabi is trying to strengthen its relation with Somalia now. It has a direct presence in Somalia, which is mostly concerned about the economic interests and ports.
As for Egypt, I think Cairo is concerned about the Ethiopian-Somaliland agreement. As a result, Egypt also is basically aligned with Somalia and we will see a closer relations in the near future.
Turkey with its influence and long-term relations with Somalia can build a coalition of nations willing to help and assist Somalia and at least try to cooperate on countering terrorism and security issues. This can be done either collectively by inviting countries such as Qatar, UAE and Egypt or bilaterally, meaning Turkey and each of these countries work together to enhance the security situation and strengthen the economic relations with Somalia.
I think that such design not only proves that Turkey can introduce a successful model of rebuilding a nation out of its failed-state situation, but also a successful model of how to try to utilize the regional efforts to achieve the stability and security for all involved countries.
Ethiopia will look at the Turkish-Somali Defense Pact negatively because part of this defense pact is meant to ensure the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Somalia. AS we already know, the Somaliland - Ethiopia agreement is a threat to Somalia. So these two agreements actually run against each other as they are contradictory to each other.
As I said, many observers saw the recent Somali Turkish agreement as a response to the Ethiopian Somaliland agreement. But I have to say that we should not forget that Turkey has good relations with the Ethiopia also. And in fact, during the last couple of years, Ethiopia faced an internal threat. Internal forces revolted against the central government and Turkey played a central role in helping the government in stabilizing the situation by providing the Ethiopian government with TB2 drones. Of course this relation with Ethiopia came at the background of the Egyptian-Greek alignment at the time. You know, 3-4 years ago the relations with Egypt were not good and Egyptians were trying to form an axis with Greece against Turkiye. So in order for Ankara to balance this axis, it established good relations with Ethiopia, which had problems with Egypt.
Therefore, it is a very complicated network of relations. But I think that despite the recent agreement between Turkiye and Somalia, Turkiye could play important diplomatic role utilizing its relation with Ethiopia to try to reach an agreement that takes into consideration the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Somalia.
Having said this, I really doubt that Ethiopia would agree on such formula given that it seeks an access to the Red Sea waters, and the only way to do this is either by war with one of the countries of the Horn of Africa or by making a deal with the Somaliland breakaway region. It is a complicated situation of course.
Concerning your question about the relations between the UAE and Turkiye, I do not think that Abu Dhabi converged its policies with that of Ankara during the last few years. During post 2021 period, all regional countries had to adjust their foreign policies in order to come close to each other in a way that would enable normalization of relations.
Egypt, Turkiye, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, etc , all these countries changed their foreign policy orientation to move forward in a normalization process between each other. Moreover, of course this process was triggered by new dynamics, new regional and international dynamics. This process started at the end of Trump first round of presidency when Joe Biden won. It also came following the COVID-19 pandemic. All these countries were economically tired and they suffered from severe regional fatigue due to the rivalry between each other.
Since none of them won completely in any of the face-off stands, they tried to reorient their foreign policy to adapt with the new situation. Now in the new situation, we have good relations between Turkiye and UAE, we have good relations between Qatar and Saudi Arabia, we have good relations between Turkiye and Egypt, and we have good relations between Egypt and Qatar. So all these countries are trying to build on the shared interests between each other and avoid conflict and competition.
So given this situation and given the fact that the UAE is currently present in Somalia and has economic interests in the country, the Somali-Emirati relations is improving. Moreover, Turkiye has extensive relations with Somalia. Ankara has the largest overseas embassy in the world in Somalia and the first overseas Military Training facility in Somalia. Therefore, I think that there is an opportunity for Turkiye and the UAE to cooperate. Maybe they will not agree, but the opportunity is currently there and it is good to check whether they can build on the shared interests, which is to stabilize Somalia, protect its sovereignty and territorial integrity, and to counter terrorism. Besides, of course, to try to integrate Somalia into the international community.
I think that everyone will benefit from such formula, not only and UAE, but the whole region, GCC countries, and other players. Of course, some countries might not like such development such as Ethiopia and Israeli. But generally speaking, this is an opportunity and it should be tested. At the end of the day, you cannot please all the players and actors.
My last point is that of course currently there are normalization between these countries as we said, but the situation might change in the future due to regional or international factors as the region is very fluid. If Trumps win the next Presidential elections in the US, for example, the regional dynamics might change. The Israeli war against the Palestinians and Gaza might also trigger a regional war and thus change the dynamics. Therefore, you cannot anticipate in the Middle East because it is very unstable. But for now, we have these normalizations and I think it’s worth to try to build on them and explore the opportunities.
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