The US State Department on Saturday announced that it will permanently suspend all assistance to Somalia within the upcoming May, 2026 after a row broke out over food aid that the US provided to Somalia. The decision to halt aid to Somalia comes at the beginning of this month after officials of the Somali Federal Gov’t were implicated that they diverted food aid that was stored in of the warehouses of World Food Program (WFP). As stated by US officials, the move was taken to implement an order from US President Donald Trump and which was not informed to the int’l donors and is believed to be the reason for looting 76 metric ton of US aid that was earmarked for vulnerable communities in Somalia. The halting of aid also impacted 1,600 metric ton of food aid after Somali gov’t forced to relocate the warehouse from Mogadishu port. On January 7, the US State Department officially confirmed the suspension of all assistance to the Somali Federal Gov’t and termed the case as unacceptable. An officer that is part of US administration who spoke to Daily Wire Newspaper in anonymity told that the suspension will be permanent and the remaining US assistance allotted to Somalia will completely halted. Due to this, the US gov’t put on hold all US assistance programs that the Somali Federal Gov’t was the beneficiary. The US State Department said in a precondition when it comes to the resumption of food aid that Somalia must accept the responsibility of looted food aid and provide compensation in the first place.
