MOGADISHU – Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, the newly elected Somalia President has welcomed the decision by the United States to redeploy troops to the Horn of Africa country.
In a Twitter post, Mohamud’s office said that the president thanked and appreciated his U.S. counterpart Joe Biden for authorizing the deployment of American troops to Somalia.
Somalia has been in a state of insecurity since the emergency of al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group that has been fighting against the government and African Union peacekeepers in the country.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump pulled around 700 American troops out from the east African country during the final month of his presidency.
Biden on Monday reauthorized the deployment of U.S. forces to Somalia.
White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin had requested the redeployment “to enable a more effective fight against al-Shabaab, which has increased in strength and proposed poses a heightened threat.”
She acknowledged the inherent risk of the deployment, but said it is “manageable.”
