By Mohamed Gure - Somali writer and diplomat and Director of the Institute of Diplomatic Studies at Somalia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“Diplomacy may delay recognition of secession, but only the state can eliminate its causes and dismantle the environment that produces it.” — Mohamed Gure
On December 26, 2025, Israel recognised what it called the “Republic of Somaliland” as an independent and sovereign state, becoming the first United Nations member state to do so since Somaliland declared its secession in 1991. The two sides established full diplomatic relations and agreed to exchange ambassadors.
For more than three decades, Somaliland had failed to achieve its most important objective: international recognition. The significance of Israel’s decision therefore lies not merely in the country granting recognition, but in breaking a political barrier that had endured for more than 30 years.
The Somali government responded quickly. More than six months later, Israel remains the only country to have recognised Somaliland. Yet this diplomatic achievement cannot obscure a deeper reality: the conditions that could produce further fragmentation remain embedded within Somalia itself.
The real challenge begins not in foreign capitals, but in Somalia’s state-building process and the distribution of sovereign authority within its political system.
Breaking the Recognition Barrier#
Legally, Israel’s recognition has not altered Somalia’s internationally recognised borders. Recognition by one state does not extinguish another state’s sovereignty, redraw international boundaries or confer United Nations membership. Somalia remains, in the eyes of international law, the African Union and the United Nations, a single state within its recognised borders.
Politically, however, the consequences are more significant. The decision demonstrated that recognition of a secessionist entity can become a strategic option when connected to another state’s geopolitical, security or economic calculations.
If the recognition barrier could be broken once, what prevents it from happening again? Somalia’s challenge is to prevent an exception from becoming a precedent.
Turning the Crisis Into a Regional Issue#
Mogadishu understood that treating the crisis merely as a bilateral dispute with Israel would be a strategic mistake and sought to place it within wider African and regional frameworks.
Somalia consulted Egypt, Türkiye and Djibouti, while the Arab League, Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and East African Community rejected the recognition. On January 6, 2026, the African Union Peace and Security Council reaffirmed Somalia’s unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity. IGAD and the European Union subsequently expressed similar positions.
The response succeeded not only because of legal arguments, but because Somalia presented its territorial integrity as a regional security interest. Somalia sits at the intersection of the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean, where global trade routes meet geopolitical competition.
Its stability affects Red Sea security for Egypt, security partnerships for Türkiye and strategic balances in the Gulf of Aden for Djibouti. African governments also fear that a secessionist precedent could encourage similar claims elsewhere.
The message therefore shifted from asking others to defend Somalia’s unity to arguing that protecting that unity contributes to regional stability.
The Limits of Diplomatic Success#
Somalia’s success in preventing a second recognition cannot be attributed entirely to its diplomacy. African states have traditionally upheld respect for inherited borders and remain cautious about secessionist movements because of their possible domestic implications.
Somalia’s international partners also cooperate with Mogadishu on counterterrorism and maritime security and may calculate that recognising Somaliland would create more strategic costs than benefits.
But these constraints are external. Diplomacy can discourage recognition, but it cannot prevent political entities from gradually acquiring the functions of independent states.
Secession does not begin on the day independence is declared. It begins when a political entity acquires the ability to exercise sovereign authority separately from the state.
How a State Within a State Emerges#
Three instruments lie at the core of state sovereignty: security, finance and foreign relations.
When a region possesses security forces operating outside a national chain of command, controls revenues and strategic infrastructure outside a clear federal framework, and develops direct relationships with foreign governments and institutions, its dependence on the federal government diminishes.
Somalia has experienced variations of all three. Not every such arrangement was intended to promote secession, but their cumulative effect matters. As regions gain greater capacity to manage security, resources and external relations independently, the federal state’s practical monopoly over sovereign functions weakens.
The result is functional fragmentation: legally one state, but in practice several centres exercising elements of state authority.
Federalism: A Problem of Implementation#
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Federalism itself is not Somalia’s problem. After the collapse of the state in 1991, decentralisation offered a way to overcome excessive centralisation, regional marginalisation and weak local governance.
But Somalia’s federal system developed while the federal state remained weak. National security institutions were incomplete, the financial system fragile, and the division of powers between the centre and federal member states often unclear.
Regional centres of power consequently developed faster than national institutions, with some acquiring security structures, revenues and external relationships that provided substantial practical autonomy.
Federalism did not create Somaliland’s secessionist project. But its current implementation risks creating conditions in which elements of that experience could be reproduced elsewhere unless the imbalance between regional autonomy and national sovereignty is addressed.
External Partnerships and State Weakness#
Regional and international powers have developed direct partnerships with Somali regional administrations in security, counterterrorism, ports, investment and trade. Many serve legitimate interests, but the danger emerges when regional administrations become independent actors in foreign relations rather than participants within Somalia’s national foreign policy.
This creates a cycle: state weakness encourages foreign actors to engage directly with regions; those relationships strengthen regional authorities; the federal state becomes weaker; and the space for external involvement expands.
Secession may not be the declared objective, but it can become an unintended consequence of policies that gradually provide regional entities with attributes associated with statehood.
Israel’s recognition therefore carries implications beyond Somaliland. If it becomes a replicable model, other regions may conclude that building independent institutions and foreign relationships could eventually create a path towards international recognition.
The issue would then concern not Somaliland alone, but the future of the Somali state.
Rebuilding the State#
If the danger lies in the erosion of state authority, the response must begin with rebuilding it.
Somalia needs a national security architecture that clearly defines the relationship between federal and regional forces and establishes a unified military chain of command. It also needs a transparent federal financial system governing ports, customs and resources, supported by fair revenue-sharing.
Foreign agreements should remain within the sovereign framework of the Somali state, while federal member states should have institutional mechanisms to participate in decisions affecting their interests without becoming independent international actors.
The federal system also requires constitutional and institutional reform to resolve ambiguities over powers and transform relations between Mogadishu and the federal member states from competition into partnership.
Political dialogue with Hargeisa must also be revived. Defending Somalia’s unity does not contradict serious negotiations over a dispute lasting more than three decades. Dialogue does not mean accepting secession; it means seeking a settlement that preserves national unity while addressing the causes of the conflict.
Ultimately, unity cannot be protected by slogans alone. It requires a state that provides security, upholds the law, delivers services, manages resources effectively and gives citizens a genuine stake in its survival.
Unity Abroad, State-Building at Home#
Israel’s recognition of Somaliland represents the most serious development in the secession issue since 1991, not because it changed Somalia’s legal status, but because it broke a political barrier that had survived for more than three decades.
Mogadishu has so far prevented that recognition from becoming a wider international trend. But diplomatic success will remain incomplete unless matched by internal reform.
Somalia’s real challenge is not simply preventing another recognition. It is building a state capable of reclaiming sovereign functions, balancing decentralisation with national unity, and making secession unnecessary and unsustainable.
The strongest defence of Somalia’s unity is not merely persuading foreign governments to reject secession. It is building a state in which national unity is stronger, more credible and more attractive than any alternative.
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Mohamed Gure is a Somali writer and diplomat and Director of the Institute of Diplomatic Studies at Somalia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The views expressed in this article are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Dawan Africa.