Presidents Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and Ismaïl Omar Guelleh did not pay attention...

Eventually Ismaïl Omar Guelleh got Muse Bihi to appoint a technical team to discuss with another team in Mogadishu led by Abdikarim Hussein Guled...

Hassan Sheikh saw that Djibouti and Eritrea would be natural allies against the Ethiopia-Somaliland deal and quickly arranged meetings with Presidents Ismaïl Omar Guelleh and Issayas Afewerki...

It also reflects the mood after the multiple meetings attended by Burhan in November with regional leaders some of whom he was at loggerheads with: Kenya's William Ruto (14 November); Ethiopia's Abiy Ahmed (on 15 November); Djibouti's Ismaïl Omar Guelleh and Eritrea's Issayas Aferwerki (26 November)...

Regionally the offensive has warmed Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to Hassan Sheikh and the marriage of the former head of the Mogadishu police Sadeeq Joon to the daughter of President of Ismail Omar Guelleh of Djibouti has done him no harm...

Neither the Somali regional government nor Djibouti President Ismail Omar Guelleh himself an Issa born in Ethiopia would find this acceptable...

Just one of the people irked by this process will be President Ismail Omar Guelleh of Djibouti where the IGAD secretariat is based on whose territory Eritrea has a claim...

(Muse Bihi's protest against the move was also a friendly gesture towards Djibouti's President Ismail Omar Guelleh who is convinced that Muse Bihi only won Somaliland's elections last November thanks to financial support from the UAE through Abdourahman Boreh Guelleh's arch-enemy – AC Vol 57 No 5 Guelleh's court shame)...