PREVIEW
AU and Mogadishu mull options as 12,000-strong force faces logistics crisis and Al Shabaab prepares to exploit the vacuum
African Union officials called an emergency meeting on 3 July on the future of the Somalia mission after the United States announced swingeing cuts to the UN Support Office in Mogadishu.
This follows serial cash flow crises for the AU Support and Stabilization Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM) over the past decade. But this crisis could suspend the mission’s logistics within weeks.
Last year, the US demanded that the UN assume responsibility for the bulk of payments for AUSSOM, after complaining that Somalia was unable to assume responsibility for its own security. That led to a standoff with AUSSOM’s other financier, the European Union (AC Vol 66 No 14, Politicians seek a way out of the impasse).
Since it took over in January 2025, the second Trump administration has lambasted the Somali government. It complains there is little to show for the nearly US$2 billion the US has contributed to successive AU missions in Somalia since 2007, along with $1.6bn in bilateral assistance to troop-contributing countries to AUSSOM.
In April, EU foreign ministers agreed to plug some of the gap by committing a further $87 million to fund the mission until 30 June. The mission's budget between July 2025 and June 2026 was $190m (Dispatches 27/4/26, Brussels bankrolls the fight against Al Shabaab – but only just).
Meeting at the AU headquarters in Addis Ababa, representatives from Peace and Security Council member states, including Somalia, Uganda, South Africa and Algeria, mulled ways to manage the funding cuts. Last year, the AU doubled the contribution from its Peace Fund to $20m last year, and the United Kingdom contributed another $30m but the EU is the most likely source of significant cash support (Dispatches 29/9/25, Slim pickings for Somalia security fund).
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