Somalia: Mogadishu ‘cannot be defended’ without AU Troops, says ex-minister

On Sep 13, 2026

MOGADISHU (Somaliguardian) – Mogadishu “cannot be defended” if African Union troops withdraw from the country by December, Somalia’s former Minister of Planning Abdirahman Aynte said, adding that US diplomats have told Somali officials Washington will not reverse its decision to end logistics funding for the African Union peacekeeping mission regardless of the outcome of ongoing political talks.

The warning comes against a backdrop of confirmed fact: on July 1, the United States formally notified the African Union it would stop funding the UN Support Office in Somalia (UNSOS) after December 31, 2026 — the logistics mechanism that supplies AUSSOM with food, fuel, transport, medical care and communications. Washington has said it would not block the UN Security Council from renewing AUSSOM’s mandate itself, but would block any UN logistical or operational support for the mission — a distinction analysts say leaves the roughly 12,000-strong force operationally unsustainable without a replacement funding arrangement.

Aynte, who served as Somalia’s minister of planning and international cooperation from 2015 to 2017 under President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud’s first administration and previously worked as a journalist for the BBC, Voice of America and Al Jazeera English, said that during recent talks between the political opposition and the Somali government, US diplomats mediating the discussions delivered that message directly to Somali officials.

According to Aynte, the diplomats said that if Somalia’s rival political factions reached a settlement, Washington would not obstruct other countries from stepping in to fund AUSSOM’s logistics after the US withdrawal. But if no settlement was reached, he said, the diplomats warned that Washington would actively work to prevent other nations from filling that gap.

Aynte said AUSSOM troops cannot remain in the country without logistical support, and that Mogadishu would fall if the mission’s forces withdraw from the country. He said this assessment is not merely his own opinion but one shared by President Mohamud himself.

His account aligns with the public record of a summit Mohamud attended in Kampala on July 31, where leaders of countries contributing troops to AUSSOM concluded three days of talks by agreeing to seek 18 to 24 months of uninterrupted international support for the mission, and endorsed a phased, coordinated withdrawal. Aynte said Mohamud personally appealed to the troop-contributing countries at that summit to keep their forces in Somalia even after logistics funding ends.

“If the Somali government believes it can defend Mogadishu, why would it ask AUSSOM’s troop-contributing countries to keep their forces in the country?” Aynte asked.

He further said that if Somali leaders fail to reach a political agreement, the international community would be indifferent to who governs the country, and would not object even if Al-Shabaab took power, provided the group renounced its Al-Qaeda affiliation and expelled foreign fighters.

“I swear, if al-Shabaab accepts those two conditions and respects the borders of Kenya and Ethiopia, the international community will hand over the country’s security to the group the very next morning,” Aynte said.

His remarks follow weeks of public statements from Somali officials seeking to ease fears of a government collapse in the event of an AUSSOM withdrawal. President Mohamud, the Security Minister and the National Security Advisor have all said Somalia’s security forces are fully capable of defending the country and assuming security responsibilities if AUSSOM departs.

Mohamud went further on August 16, telling a graduation ceremony for roughly 3,000 newly trained Somali National Army soldiers in Galmudug that the country no longer needed foreign peacekeepers and that it was time to send them home “with a bunch of flowers.”

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