MOGADISHU (Somaliguardian) – Turkey has deployed modern battle tanks to Somalia, deepening its military footprint in the Horn of Africa nation as the threat from the insurgent group Al-Shabaab intensifies.
Videos circulating online on Saturday showed transporters carrying the tanks after they were offloaded from a Turkish Navy vessel at the port in Mogadishu.
The Somali government has not commented on the purpose of the tank deployment. The move comes just one week after Ankara sent several F-16 fighter jets to the capital, underscoring a rapid expansion of Turkey’s military presence in the country.
Analysts say the tanks appear aimed at securing a planned spaceport and missile testing facility that Turkey intends to build near Mogadishu, in an area where Al-Shabaab insurgents have been encroaching despite repeated efforts to push them back.
Some local outlets, including Caasimada Online, reported that the tanks were delivered for use by the Somali National Army. The government has not confirmed those reports.
When Turkey deployed F-16 jets last week, Somali media similarly reported that the aircraft had been provided to Somali forces. Somalia’s defense minister, Ahmed Moalim Fiqi, initially appeared to corroborate those accounts. He later retracted his statement, clarifying that the aircraft are owned and operated by the Turkish Air Force after pressure from Ankara.
Turkey has steadily expanded its military, naval and economic presence in Somalia in recent years. Ankara plans to begin drilling for oil off Somalia’s central coast and to develop a spaceport and missile testing site along the coast of the Lower and Middle Shabelle regions bordering the capital.
The latest deployment further underscores Turkey’s strategic ambitions in Somalia, even as security conditions remain volatile.
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