The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a United Nations agency mandated to aid and protect refugees, forcibly displaced communities, and stateless people, and to assist in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to a third country. It is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, with over 18,879 staff working in 138 countries as of 2020.
Stephen Kalonzo Musyoka is a Kenyan politician who was the tenth Vice-President of Kenya from 2008 to 2013. Musyoka served in the government under the late President Daniel arap Moi as the Secretary of Kenya African National Union party (1980-1988), Assistant Minister for Works (1986-1988), Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly (1988-1992), Minister for Foreign Affairs from 1993 until 1998, Minister of Education (1998-2001); and subsequently, under the late President Mwai Kibaki, he was Minister of Foreign Affairs again from 2003 to 2004, then Minister of the Environment from 2004 to 2005. He was an unsuccessful candidate in the 2007 presidential election, after which he was appointed vice-president by Kibaki in January 2008.
Dadaab is a semi-arid town in Garissa County, Kenya. It is the site of a UNHCR base hosting 302,805 registered refugees and asylum seekers in three camps as of 31 October 2023, making it one of the largest in the world behind Kutupalong refugee camp. The centre is run by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and its operations are financed by foreign donors. In 2013, UNHCR, the governments of Kenya and Somalia signed a tripartite agreement facilitating the repatriation of Somali refugees at the complex.
The North Eastern Province is one of the former provinces of Kenya. It had a land area of 127,358.5 km2, with its capital at Wajir. The North Eastern Province was carved out of the then Northern Frontier District (NFD) prior to independence.
The Dir is one of the largest and most prominent Somali clans in the Horn of Africa. They are also considered to be the oldest Somali stock to have inhabited the region. Its members inhabit Djibouti, Somalia, Ethiopia, and northeastern Kenya.
Hussein Ali Duale, commonly known as Awil, is a Somali diplomat and politician who served as the Finance Minister of Somaliland, and former ambassador of the Somali Democratic Republic to Kenya and Uganda. Duale was appointed as presidential advisor on Foreign Affairs and International Recognition to Somaliland to former President Ahmed Mohamed Mohamoud and Senior Adviser to the President Muse Bihi Abdi to negotiate with Somalia. He is considered a great expert on the affairs of the Horn of Africa.
Various international and local diplomatic and humanitarian efforts in the Somali Civil War have been in effect since the conflict first began in the early 1990s. The latter include diplomatic initiatives put together by the African Union, the Arab League and the European Union, as well as humanitarian efforts led by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), UNICEF, the World Food Programme (WFP), the Puntland Maritime Police Force (PMPF) and the Somali Red Crescent Society (SRCS).
Bruno Geddo is an Italian national, born in Novara in 1959. He has served with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for over 30 years in Sub-Saharan Africa, North Africa and the Middle East.
Aden Keynan Wehliye is a Member of the National Assembly of Kenya. He served Wajir West constituency from 1997 to 2002 and 2007 to 2013. He then moved to Eldas constituency which was carved from Wajir West. Keynan served as the MP of Eldas in the 11th and 12th parliaments. He represented the Orange Democratic Movement until 2017 when he switched to the Jubilee Party. Keynan was re-elected on the Jubilee ticket in the 2022 elections. He is the longest-serving MP of the 13th Parliament of Kenya.
Nicolas Bwakira was a Burundian diplomat, international civil servant and pan-africanist. During his long and exemplary career, Bwakira took on senior roles and responsibilities at various institutions, including the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), the University of South Africa (UNISA), the African Union, the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) and the Crisis Management Initiative (CMI). Bwakira fought the good fight as a pan-Africanist and international civil servant in the service of Africa and its people, especially for those in Namibia, Angola, Somalia and, more recently, the Lake Chad Basin. The quest for peace was his lifelong passion. From the time of his posting in Angola in 1976, he developed a special connection with southern African countries, among which Namibia. From 1976 to 1990, Namibian refugees and Namibia’s independence featured prominently in his professional career. In his role as Coordinator for the return of Namibian exiles, he was instrumental in negotiating a total blanket amnesty with the apartheid government as a condition for the return of Namibian exiles. Later, as Director for Africa, he negotiated a total blanket amnesty with the apartheid government, as a pre-condition of the return of South African exiles members of liberation movements.
Abdiweli Mohamed Ali Gaas, also more known as Abdiweli Gaas, is a Somali American economist and politician. He served as the Prime Minister of Somalia from June 2011 to October 2012, and briefly afterwards as an MP in the newly formed Federal Parliament. During his time as premier, Ali is credited with having devised the formal "Roadmap for the End of Transition", a political process that provided clear benchmarks leading toward the establishment of permanent democratic institutions in the country. On 8 January 2014, he was elected the 5th president of Puntland.
Mahad Abdalle Awad is a Somali politician. He is the second deputy speaker of the Federal Parliament of Somalia.
Kenya–Somalia relations are bilateral relations between Kenya and Somalia. Both countries are members of the African Union and Non-Aligned Movement.
Yusuf Hassan Abdi is a Kenyan politician, diplomat, social activist and former journalist. After working many years with the United Nations, he joined the Kenya parliament as a legislator in 2011.
Kipruto Rono Arap Kirwa is a Kenyan politician.
Jubaland, the Juba Valley or Azania, is a Federal Member State in southern Somalia. Its eastern border lies 40–60 km (25–35 mi) east of the Jubba River, stretching from Gedo to the Indian Ocean, while its western side flanks the North Eastern Province in Kenya, which was carved out of Jubaland during the colonial period.
Sir Nicholas Peter Kay is a British diplomat. He has served as the British ambassador to Afghanistan, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. From 2013 to 2016 he was the United Nations Special Representative for Somalia.
Mahboub Maalim is a Kenyan diplomat. He was the executive secretary of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (2008-2019). He was appointed by the 12th Summit of IGAD Heads of State and Government that was held on 14 June 2008 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He was reappointed for a second term on 11 July 2012.
Mohamed Ali Nur, popularly known as "Ambassador Americo", was the Somali Ambassador to Kenya from October 2007 to April 2015. He was also a candidate in the 2017 Somali presidential election.
Bashe Awil Omar is a diplomat and politician. He served as the Somaliland Representative to the United Arab Emirates (2015-2018) and Kenya (2018-2021) as President of the Somaliland Liaison Office.
