THE REPUBLIC OF Somaliland, which, as a recognized sovereign entity, entered the new state of Somalia in 1960, reverted to its independent status in 1991 with the disintegration of the state of Somalia. It still awaits, more than a decade later, international recognition of its status as a sovereign state.

The failure of the international community to recognize Somaliland's return to independence does not stem from the old Organization of African Union (OAU; now African Union: AU) stricture that African states must adhere to former colonial boundaries. Indeed, Somaliland does that; it reverted not only to its sovereign (and recognized) boundaries at independence in 1960, but also to the borders established for its existence as the colony of British Somaliland.

The international community in large part waits upon the verdict of the regional bodies to acknowledge sovereignty. Despite the fact that even the rump administration in Mogadishu - the former Italian Somaliland capital - acknowledges, de facto, the independence of Somaliland, the African Union does not.

This largely reflects the fact that, on this issue, the Government of Egypt - in particular - is determined to deny sovereignty to Somaliland, fearing that Somaliland's elected and secular Government might use its strategically significant position on the Gulf of Aden, at the Eastern egress of the Red Sea, to dominate the vital Red Sea/Suez sea lane of communication (SLOC) in a possible alliance with Israel.

Somaliland, as a Muslim state, has not, in fact, entered any such alliance with Israel, and yet Egypt has used its influence in the AU and the Arab League - the other regional body of import - to keep Somaliland isolated. So, too, has Saudi Arabia, which has resented Somaliland's rejection of Saudi Wahabbist proselytization in the country.

Somaliland's geopolitical position is critical. The US, and Soviet, use of Berbera naval and air base facilities were key elements of the Cold War era. The Red Sea/Suez SLOC remains critical today. But more importantly, Somaliland is a key regional player in the intelligence arena in the "war on terror", particularly given the use by Islamist terrorists and support elements of the territories of Somalia and Yemen.

Djibouti, which trades with neighboring Somaliland, is also cautious about recognizing the revived independence of the state, largely because Somaliland could take a share of the Ethiopian trade which flows through Djibouti.

And yet Somaliland remains, with Ethiopia, a key to the counter-terror war and the security of the Red Sea.

1. History

Somaliland is located on the eastern Horn of Africa, with 900km (460 miles) of coastline on its north, facing the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden (Indian Ocean), and bordering Djibouti (58km) to the north-west, Ethiopia (800km) to the west and south, and Somalia (500km) to the east.

Somaliland, which lies between the 08ø00' -11ø30' parallel north of the equator and between 42ø30' - 49ø00' meridian east of the Greenwich, occupies the same land area controlled by the British colonial rulers before 1960. The country became independent on June 26, 1960. The seat of government was moved from Hargeisa to Mogadishu for the first time on July 1, 1960, after the union was announced between the former British Somaliland and the former Italian Somalia, however Somaliland withdrew from that failed union on May 18, 1991, and the national capital was once again moved back to Hargeisa.

The country has a tropical monsoon type of climate. However, there are four distinct seasons: a main rainy spring season from April to June, followed by a dry Summer season from July to September. Then there is a short Autumn rainy period from October to November, and finally a long dry Winter from December to March. The latter is the most difficult for the animal herding rural population and to the farmers to a lesser scale. If the April-June rains fail, the result is a draught that could kill most animals which have already been weakened by the December-March dry season, which also severely hits the country's economy. Annual average precipitation ranges from less than 1,000 mm on the coast to 500 mm inland except for limited areas where it may reach 900 mm. Rain variability is very high. Hargeisa, the capital, for instance, with a long term average of some 400mm has recorded variations from 209 to 810mm per annum.

Temperatures also show some seasonal variations. The winter months are normally cool with average December temperatures in the range of 15 - 26øC, while the summer months are the hottest averaging 26 - 32øC in June.

Like Hadhramaut and Dhofar in the eastern area of the Arabian Peninsula, Somaliland was a producer of incense for centuries. Somaliland was believed to be part of the ancient Land of Punt, known to the ancient Egyptians. Arab traders settled the area from the fourth to the seventh centuries CE, founding the cities of Seylac and Berbera, and waging war against the Christian Ethiopians of the interior of the Horn of Africa. In the Seventh Century, an Arab sultanate was established by Yemenites in Zeila, on the Somaliland coast of the Gulf of Aden. This settlement was the center of the Audel Empire of the 13th Century. It was in the 13th and 14th centuries that the populations of South Arabia immigrated to Somaliland in order to slowly drive back the gallas who lived in the territory previously.

By 1886, Britain had established a protectorate over the north coast of the Horn of Africa - British Somaliland - opposite its strategically-vital naval and maritime coaling station at Aden, on the Arabian Peninsula. The Muslim leader, Sayyid Maxamed Cabdulle Xassan began a war against the British in 1899 and maintained his hold over the territory until his death in 1920.

In World War II, Italian troops based in Italian-ruled Somalia overran British garrisons in British Somaliland protectorate. The British recaptured the protectorate and seized all of Somalia in 1941. The British occupation of Italian-held colonies, although brief, left behind the legacy of Greater Somalia "irredentism". In 1943, a movement was formed in the Ogaden region, at that point under British military occupation, dedicated to unifying all Somalis under a single government. Such a goal meant, in practice, the foundation of a state incorporating British, French, and Italian-ruled Somali lands; the Ogaden, claimed by Ethiopia; and portions of northern Kenya. The United Nations General Assembly ruled in 1949 that Italian Somaliland should be placed under an international trusteeship for 10 years, with Italy as the administering authority.

In British Somaliland, the United Kingdom authorities took a series of steps to prepare the protectorate for independence. By the late 1950s, a series of constitutional meetings took place in Hargeisa, Burao and Erigavo, attempting to achieve a balance of power between regions and their clans, and during the same period, political parties coalesced along regional lines. The eastern region (Daarood), along with the Dir clans of the far west, were soon dominated by the United Somali Party (USP). The leading political entity in the central areas, was the Somali National League (SNL), and was the basic political organization for the Isaaqs. In 1958, the British instituted universal suffrage and gave the Somaliland Protectorate a significant share in executive power. The predominantly Habar Awal-supported SNL, formed from progressive elements of the Somaliland National Society and led by a young British-educated businessman, Mohamed Haji Ibrahim Egal, emerged as the strongest party.

Somaliland became independent from Britain on June 26, 1960, as the State of Somaliland, and on the following day was recognized by 35 states, including Egypt, Ghana and Libya. On June 27, 1960, the State of Somaliland's legislature passed the Union of Somaliland and Somalia Law, but it was never signed by Somalia, which meant that the law remained without legal effect in the territory of the former Italian Somaliland.

Instead, on June 30, 1960, the legislature of Somalia (former Italian Somaliland) approved the Atto di Unione, which was significantly different from the Union of Somaliland and Somalia Law, and, indeed, the Atto di Unione, passed in Mogadishu, had been created with considerable input from Italian officials, who drafted a constitution for the new Union, to which the northern politicians of Somaliland could make few changes. A referendum, six months later, reflected northern resentment of southern power, and the north overwhelmingly rejected the Mogadishu constitution. Thus the unification effort fell short of international requirements mandated by domestic and international law. This referendum verdict was to be mirrored by a British judge, presiding over a case of treason in the Mogadishu Supreme Court in March 1963.

On January 31, 1961, the National Assembly of Somali Republic had, meanwhile, proclaimed a new Act of Union, repealing the Union of Somaliland and Somalia Law, and the new Act was made retroactive as from July 1, 1960.

Somaliland withdrew from the union with Somalia after 10 years of warfare waged by the Somaliland National Movement (SNM) in May 1991, five months after the late Somalia leader, Mohamed Siad Barre, was overthrown, plunging Somalia into anarchy. Somalia, by late 2003, still had no effective central government and remained riven by clan warfare. There had been, in any event, virtually nothing to hold the two former colonies together as a single state; the original expectation had been that the Italian, British and French Somalilands would unite to create a greater Somalia, along with the Ogaden Province of Ethiopia and the Northern Frontier Province of Kenya (hence, the five-pointed star on the flag of the new Somalia, in 1960).

During the war, the Somaliland capital, Hargeisa, was virtually destroyed in 1988 by Siad Barre's forces; some 50,000 people died in that offensive, and some 750,000 civilians fled to Ethiopia, not to return until 2002. Significantly, two squadrons of Hawker Hunter fighters given to Siad Barre by the UAE flew sorties out of Hargeisa airport to attack the city of Hargeisa in the offensive which was supported by artillery. The air strikes were flown by former Rhodesian mercenary pilots who were paid a reported $20,000 per sortie.

The drive for a Greater Somalia - for which the 1960 merger of the two sovereign states of Somaliland and Somalia was an interim measure - arose indirectly from two events. The first was a proposal by UK Foreign Secretary Ernest Began in 1946 that the former British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland should unite with the Ogaden Province of Ethiopia under a single Administration. Emperor Haile Selassie I, of Ethiopia, refused to agree to the annexation, however, of the Ogaden from the Ethiopian Empire.

The second event was the 1954 Anglo-Ethiopian Agreement which effectively ceded large parts (some 65,000 sq.km) of Somaliland territory to Ethiopia. The Greater Somaliland initiative was intended to counter that, but never did so. What had led to Somaliland's agreement to the union was the fact that people in the newly-independent State of Somaliland in 1960 had initially reacted favorably to the British Military Administration of the former Italian Somaliland, and British Administration of Ethiopia's Ogaden Province following the Ethiopian-British defeat of the Italians in the area in 1941.

The civil war in Somalia caused a major refugee problem for Somaliland. After the independent state of Somaliland merged with Somalia on July 1960, Mohamed Ibrahim Egal had became the Somalia Union's first Minister of Defense and later its Minister of Education. He resigned in 1963 to form an opposition party, the Somali National Congress (SNC). In 1964, Egal was re-elected to Parliament and then became Somalia's Prime Minister from 1967 to October 1969. His Government was toppled by Gen. Siad Barre on October 21, 1969, and the Siad Barre military Government imprisoned him for 12 years. Then, on May 18, 1991, Somaliland won its 10-year-old liberation struggle against Barre's military Government in Somalia, and proclaimed its independence. In doing so, it recognized the then-Organization of African Unity (OAU; now African Union: AU) stricture which said that former colonial boundaries were sacrosanct.

Abdirahman Ahmed Ali (Tur) was the first President of Somaliland and Egal was elected President of the new Republic at Boroma's National Reconciliation Conference on May 3, 1993. He was returned to office on February 23, 1997, in the wake of another National Conference held in Hargeisa from October 1996 to March 1997 for a term of five years. A referendum was conducted on May 31, 2001, on a new constitution and results announced on June 14, 2001, overwhelming endorsed it.

In January 2002, his term in office was extended for a period of one year, but he was not to live long enough to see through that extension. Pres. Mohamed Ibrahim Egal, at age 74, died at the end of April 2002 in a military hospital in Pretoria, South Africa. He reportedly died from a complication arising from pressure on his heart and lungs. He was buried near his father's grave in the port city of Berbera.

Vice-President Dahir Riyale Kahin was sworn in on May 3, 2002, to replace the late Pres. Egal.

Recent Developments:

Incumbent Somaliland Pres. Dahir Riyale Kahin was, on April 20, 2003, declared the winner of the country's first presidential poll since it broke away from Somalia 12 years earlier, with a thin margin of 80 votes. Pres. Kahin won 205,595 votes in elections held on April 14, 2003, against 205,515 for the opposition Hisbiga Kulmiye (Solidarity Party) candidate Ahmed Muhammad Silanyo. The third candidate, Faisal Ali Warabe, of the Justice and Restoration Party (UCID), won 77,433 of the total 498,639 votes cast. Some 800,000 Somalilanders were eligible to vote out of a population of some three-million. Immediately after the announcement, supporters of Pres. Kahin's Unity of Democrats (UDUB) Party appeared on the streets of Hargeisa and other major towns in the republic to celebrate, raising both the party and the country's flags. Minutes before the announcement of Pros. Kahin, 51, as the winner, his main opponent, Ahmed Muhammad Silanyo, said that he would accept and abide by the electoral committee's verdict. Faisal Ali Warabe also accepted defeat and congratulated UDUB and its leader for winning the election.

The elections were contested by the ruling party and two opposition parties. Several organizations and countries, including South Africa, Ethiopia, the European Union, the United Kingdom, the United States, Sweden and Norway, sent observers, a sign of the growing de facto recognition of Somaliland as an independent entity. Abdulkassim Salat Hassan, the President of the Somalia Transitional National Government (TNG), which by this time still only controlled pockets of the Somali capital, Mogadishu [see Somalia section], congratulated Somaliland on its peaceful election. Pres. Salat, who, like much of the international community, had not recognized Somaliland as an independent entity, said Somalia's northern region had made considerable progress in pacifying its territory.

Incoming Pres. Kahin began his political career as Governor of the western Awdal province, before late Pres. Mohamed Ibrahim Egal appointed him Vice-President in February 1997. Trained in Russia as a security officer, Kahin is the first President to be elected popularly by the people. The country's first President Abdurahman Ali Tur and his successor, the late Egal, were both appointed by the Council of Elders. Pres. Kahin succeeded Pres. Egal on his death in May 2002.

The first directly-elected President and Vice-President of the Republic of Somaliland were sworn in on May 15, 2003, in Hargeisa. President Dahir Riyale Kahin and Vice-President Ahmed Yusuf Yasin were elected for five year terms.

The European Union (EU) in mid-August 2003 said that it was undertaking a feasibility study on its plan to rehabilitate 887km (550 miles) of road linking the Republic of Somaliland's Berbera port to the Ethiopian border town of Togwechale. The road would offer Ethiopian coffee exports, as well as importers, an alternate trade route to bypass Djibouti, which is linked by rail to Ethiopia, but which had, by mid-2003, begun using its position as Ethiopia's sole viable trade access to the sea to win concessions from Addis Ababa. The EU had in August 2003 begun shipping famine relief food supplies to Ethiopia through the port of Berbera.

As well, in August 2003, legal advisers from the South African Department of Foreign Affairs supported Somaliland's argument for independence, noting in a report commissioned by Minister of Foreign Affairs Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma: "It is undeniable that Somaliland does indeed qualify for statehood, and it is incumbent upon the international community to recognize it." The South African Government's lawyers agreed that "any efforts to deny or delay would not only put the international community at the risk of ignoring the most stable region in the Horn (of Africa), it would impose untold hardship upon the people of Somaliland due to the denial of foreign assistance that recognition entails".

The Republic of Somaliland by mid-2003 had begun facing a build-up of pressure from Islamist terrorists following the move by the elected Somaliland Government of Pres. Dahir Riyale Kahin to join the US-led "war on terror". The pressures escalated by late 2003, to include the assassination of three Europeans - two British teachers and an Italian nun - in Somaliland during October 2003.

The Government on October 23, 2003, decided to expel all illegal immigrants. Somaliland Interior Minister Isrnail Aden Osman blamed the killings on what he called "other Somalis", meaning Somalis from the rump of Somalia rather than from Somaliland. In this area, there has been extensive penetration by al-Qaida groups and by Iranians for more than a decade.

Interior Minister Ismail Aden Osman noted: "They are destabilizing our security and the peace that the country has", and would be expelled, along with Ethiopians and Kenyans. He said that 10 people had now been arrested in connection with the October 20, 2003, shooting of British teachers Richard and Enid Eyeington in the country. Two more had been arrested for the killing of renowned Italian charity worker and nun, Annalena Tonelli, earlier in October 2003. On October 21, 2003, a senior United Nations humanitarian official expressed "profound sorrow" at the killing of two British aid workers in northern Somalia but said that no new UN workers would be sent to the area until it stabilized.

Significantly, Italian, Egyptian and Saudi influence continued to work for the isolation of Somaliland even as, by late 2003, the Republic of Somaliland had succeeded in restoring its colonial-era borders and in restoring law and order, while the rest of Somalia continued in a state of anarchy.

2. General

- Area: 137,600 sq km.
- Coastline: 900km.
- Territorial waters claimed: 12nm; economic zone 370km (200 nm).
- Major cities: Hargeisa (capital: 600,000+), Berbera (40,000), Borama (100,000), Burao (350,000), Erigavo (200,000), Lasanod, Sheikh (40,000).
- Population: 3.5-million (2003 est.). Predominantly Somali clans (Gadabursi and Issa subclans of the Dir, in the West; Warsengelli and Dulbaharte subclans of the Darod in the Eastern regions of Sool and Sanaag; Isaaq [largest], Grhaxjis, Habr Jallo and Habr Awal in the Center).
- Religions: Islam (Sunni), 99%; other 1%.
- Languages: Somali, English, Arabic.
- Literacy rate: NA.

3. Political

- Country's legal name: The Republic of Somaliland.
- Type of government: Republic, with a directly-elected executive presidency.
- Political subdivisions: Somaliland is divided into six administrative regions: Awdal, Hargeisa, Sahil, Sanaag, Sool, and Togdheer.
- Branches of government: Executive presidency and bicameral parliament; six regional administrations.
- Executive: Directly-elected Executive Presidency, supported by an appointed Cabinet.
- Legislative: Bicameral, with elected upper chamber, the Council of Elders; and lower chamber, the House of Representatives.
- Judiciary: Independent judiciary and a Supreme Court.
- Suffrage: Universal at age 18.
- Elections: Direct Presidential elections last held April 14, 2003.
- Political parties: Unity of Democratic Alliance (UDUB) (ruling); Justice and Restoration Party (UCID); Hisbiga Kulmiye (Solidarity Party). Voting Strength: Presidential elections (2003): Pres. Kanin won 205,595 votes; 205,515 for opposition Hisbiga Kulmiye (Solidarity Party) candidate Ahmed Muhammad Silanyo. The third candidate, Faisal Ali Warabe, of the Justice and Restoration Party (UCID), won 77,433 of the total 498,639 votes cast.
- Other groups: Not known.

4. Economic

- GDP: NA.
- Balance of trade: NA.
- Budget: Revenues $20- to $22-million (2003); Expenditures $16,140,804 according to the official exchange rate at the time (US$ 1 = 6,300 Somaliland shillings).
- Fiscal year Calendar year.
- Monetary conversion rate: US$1 = 7,000 Somaliland shillings (SlSh) (November 2003).
- Aid: Limited aid from US, UN agencies.
- Major trade partners: Ethiopia, Arabian Peninsula states.
- Major imports: Annual imports exceed $200-million. Principal imports include food commodities, apparel and footwear, fuel, building material,
- Machinery, vehicles, and chemicals.
- Major exports: The backbone of the economy is livestock. The total livestock in the country is estimated at 24-million. In 1996, 3-million heads of livestock were exported to the Middle Eastern countries. The country also exports hides, skins, myrrh and frankincense in smaller scale. Labor is a key Somaliland export: much of its foreign exchange earnings - estimated to be as much as $300-million a year - come from citizens living abroad, remitting funds into the country.
- Major industries: Subsistence farming (sorghum, corn, citrus); livestock farming for export; light industry; mining (confirmed deposits, but little development as yet, of: oil, gas, gypsum, lime, mica, quartz, lignite coal, lead, gold, sulphur).
- Agriculture: Subsistence farming (sorghum, corn, citrus); livestock farming for export.
- Railways: None.
- Roads: Not known.
- Inland waterways: None.
- Ports: Berbera, Maid, Zeila.
- Civil air: Daallo Airlines (registered in Djibouti, but operating as a Djiboutian and Somaliland airline) with 10 aircraft including at least 1
- Boeing 757-200, 1 Tu-154M, 1 Il-18, 1 AN-24, 1 L-410, 1 Il-76 and 1 An-12. Serves Middle Eastern, African cities, plus London.
- Airfields: Principal, major airfields at Berbera, Hargeisa (Egal International Airport).
- Telecommunications: Good level of telecommunications access; some satellite uplinks.

5. Major News Media

- Newspapers: Dailies: Maandeq (Somali); Jamhuuriya (Somali); Haatuf (Somali); Houriya (Somali). Weeklies: Somaliland News (English); The Republican (English); The Horn Tribune (English); al-Qarn al-Efriqi (Arabic).
- News Agencies: NA.
- Radio and television: Radio Somaliland (State-owned), Hargeisa TV (private).
- Clandestine and unofficial broadcasts: None known.

6. Defense

Overview:

Somaliland was essentially born, in its newly-independent form in 1991, as a result of the civil war in Somalia, which led to the effective dissolution of the unworkable 1960 union of Somaliland and the former Italian Somaliland. However, during the period of the union of Somalia's existence, Somaliland was, because of its key geostrategic location, the subject of intense interest by major military powers. The United States committed extensively to the development of the port and airfield at Berbera, for example, in order to tain dominance over the Gulf of Aden and the entrance to the Red ea. When Somalia, under Gen. Mohamed Siad Barre, aligned with the Soviet Union, the USSR took over control of the Berbera facilities.

Today, much of Somaliland's strategic importance remains connected with its dominant position over the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea egress. However, because of this strategic location, it is also a source of great concern to other regional powers, particularly Egypt, Libya, and to a degree, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia, which question Somaliland's resistance to Saudi-funded Wahabbist Islamism. Egypt, which dominates the African Union to some extent, and the Arab League to a significant degree, has concerns over the possibility that Somaliland's secular approach to government might lead it to enter into a strategic alignment with Israel, thereby threatening Egyptian security and control of the Red Sea sea lanes. There has, however, been no evidence that Somaliland has entered any such alliance with Israel. Saudi Arabia in 2002 moved to embargo Somaliland, cutting completely its imports of livestock from the country, thereby seriously impacting the Somaliland economy and therefore its political stability.

As well, Somaliland's withdrawal from its union with the former Italian Somaliland diminished the ability of pro-Wahabbi and proIranian Islamist factions in Somalia to control the Horn of Africa.

As a result of refugee problems caused by the decades of civil war in Somalia, the rise of clan-based warlords in Somalia and the relatively autonomous Puntland area of northern Somalia (to Somaliland's east), and the strong interests of Egypt, Iran and Saudi Arabia, a considerable focus of Somaliland's efforts remain concentrated on internal security and defense. Radical Islamist terrorism and assassinations began in the second half of 2003, because of Somaliland's commitment to supporting the US-led "war on terror".

Structure:

The President is the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, but effective operation of the Armed Forces is through the Minister of Defense, a member of the Cabinet, and the Ministry of Defense, to whom the uniformed service personnel are responsible. The Armed Forces operate as a unified command, with a naval element consisting of several old, former Soviet patrol vessels in Berbera; there is no separate Navy, nor is there an Air Force. Key Armed Forces officers have been trained in the UK, and elsewhere.

Chemical and biological warfare capabilities:

- Stockpiles of former Soviet Armed Forces chemical weapons still exist in and around the port city of Berbera. Some clean-up and deactivation of weapons has taken place. No operational chemical or biological weapons used by the Somaliland Armed Forces.
- Total armed forces: 17,000.
- Key Personnel:
- Minister of Defense: Ismaacill Cumar Aadan (Boos).
- Deputy Minister of Defense: Maxamed Cali Yuusuf.
- Commander of the Armed Forces: Maj.-Gen. Abdi Samad Abdullahi.
- Commander of Police: Mohamed Egge Elmi.
- Director, National Security Service: Hussein Hasan Gouled.
- Paramilitary forces: appr. 5,000 National Police force.
- Available manpower: NA.
- Annual military expenditure: $4,629,341 (2003). Police $2,287,862 (2003).
- National security-related expenditures in 2003 equaled 49% of the Government budget. Of the military budget, some 75% is earmarked for manpower.
- Alliances and organizations: Nil.
- Army Battle Order
- Manpower: 17,000.
- Reserves: None. Clans provide an informal reserve.
- Service period: Open; initial three-year enlistment.
- Organization:
- Organized along British Army structural lines.
- Equipment:
- Armor:
- MBT (unknown number operational): T-34/85, T-54/55, T-62. Recce (unknown number operational): Panhard AML-90, V-150 Commando, Ferret Mk II, BDRM-2, Fiat 6614.
- APC (unknown number operational): BTR-152, BTR-60, BTR-50, BTR-40, M113.
- Artillery:
- Guns and Howitzers (unknown number operational): D-44 85mm towed gun, M101 105mm towed howitzer, M-30 122mm towed howitzer, D-30 122mm towed howitzer, M198 155mm towed howitzer.
- MRL (unknown number operational): BM-21 122mm MRL, Type 63 107mm MRL.
- Mortars: M-37 82mm, M-43 120mm.
- Anti-tank: RCL: SPG-9 73mm, B-10 82mm, M40A1 106mm. ATGW: Sagger, Snapper, RPG-2 (PRC Type 56), RPG-TV (PRC Type 69 and 69-1), RPG-18, LAAW.
- Infantry Weapons: Pistols: .38 Enfield, .455 Webley, 7.62mm TT-33, .45 Colt M1911, 7.62mm Stechkin, 9mm Makarov.
- Sub-machineguns: 7.65mm CZ vz.61 Scorpion, 7.62mm PPSh-41, 7.62mm PPSh-43, 9mm Sterling, .45 M1 Thompson.
- Rifles: 7.62mm Mosin Nagant, .303 Lee-Enficld, 7.62mm SKS, 7.62mm AK-47/AKM, 7.62mm FN FAL, 7.62mm Oragunov, 30.06 M1 Garand, M1 carbine.
- Machineguns: 7.62mm DP, .303 Bren, 7.62mm RP-46, 7.62mm RPD, 7.62mm PK, .30.06 Browning M1918,12.7mm DShK, .50 Browning M2HB.
- Grenade Launchers: 40mm M79, 30mm AGS-17.
- Deployment abroad: Nil.
- Army Naval Section Battle Order
- Manpower No separate manpower figures available; operates as part of the Army.
- Service period: NA.
- Equipment: Some former Soviet patrol craft in various states of operational readiness in Berbera Port.
- Bases: Berbcra.

7. Major Embassies Abroad

- No formal diplomatic missions abroad, but liaison offices in US, UK, Ethiopia, South Africa, Mozambique, Yemen.
- US: 3705 S. George Mason Dr., Falls Church, VA 22041. Tel. (202) 944-5009.

8. Major Intelligence Services

- National Security Service. National-level intelligence agency. Director: Hussein Hasan Gouled.
- Directorate of Military Intelligence.
- Criminal Investigation Division (CID). Component of police.