Somalia has announced the expulsion of Ethiopia’s ambassador from the country amid rising tensions over a port deal dispute in the breakaway region of Somaliland.
Ethiopian Ambassador Mukhtar Mohamed was sent home for consultations, the office of Somalia’s prime minister said on Thursday. Mogadishu is also shutting down Ethiopia’s consulates in Hargeisa, the largest city and capital of Somaliland, and Garowe, the capital city of the semi-autonomous region of Puntland.
“The plain interference of Ethiopia’s government in the internal affairs of Somalia is a violation of the independence and sovereignty of Somalia,” Somalia’s prime minister’s office said in a statement.
In a brief statement on X, Somalia’s Foreign Minister Ali Omar added that Mohamed had been given 72 hours to leave the country. “Somalia stands firm on its sovereignty,” he wrote. “Our resolve in protecting our territory is steadfast.”
Al Jazeera’s Catherine Soi, reporting from the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, said the expulsion was a major diplomatic escalation.
“It appears that with what’s going on, it’s going to be a huge setback” in efforts to resolve the deal peacefully, Soi said.
The dispute arose after landlocked Ethiopia agreed on a memorandum of understanding on January 1 to lease 20km (12 miles) of coastline in Somaliland.
Under the deal, the coastland around the port of Berbera, on the Gulf of Aden, will be used by Ethiopia for 50 years for military and commercial purposes.
