Somalia Fast Facts

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(CNN) — Here’s a look at Somalia, an impoverished, war-torn eastern African country that borders the Gulf of Aden, the Indian Ocean, Ethiopia and Kenya.

About Somalia:
(from the CIA World Fact Book)
Area: 637,657 sq km (slightly smaller than Texas)

Population: 10,428,043 (July 2014 est.)

Median age: 17.7 years

Capital: Mogadishu

Ethnic Groups: Somali 85%, Bantu and other non-Somali 15% (including 30,000 Arabs)

Religion: Sunni Muslim (Islam)

GDP: $5.896 billion (2010 est.)

GDP per capita: $600 (2010 est.)

Unemployment: n/a

• Timeline:
  July 1, 1960 – The new country of Somalia is formed through the union of newly independent territories           British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland.
• 1969 – Mohamed Siad Barre leads a bloodless coup and becomes dictator.
• 1977-1978 – Somalia invades the Ogaden region of Ethiopia. Ethiopia rebels and weakens Somalia’s forces. The two countries have fought on and off since 1960.
• 1988 – Somalia and Ethiopia sign a peace treaty.
• January 1991 – President Barre is forced into exile after the United Somali Congress (USC) overthrows his military regime in Mogadishu.
• December 1992 – Faction leader Ali Mahdi Mohammed and warlord General Mohammed Farah Aidid sign a cease-fire brokered by U.S. envoy Robert Oakley.
• December 1992 – Operation Restore Hope is launched by U.N. coalition forces and led by the United States in an attempt to restore enough order to ensure food distribution to the Somali people.
• June 5, 1993 – General Aidid’s forces attack and kill 24 U.N. troops from Pakistan.
• September 25, 1993 – An American Black Hawk UH-60 helicopter is shot down over Mogadishu, and three soldiers on board are killed.
• October 3-4, 1993 – The Battle of Mogadishu: Two Black Hawk UH-60 helicopters are shot down during a raid on Aidid’s high-level staff at Mogadishu’s Olympic Hotel. Eighteen American soldiers are killed, and more than 70 are wounded. Pilot Michael Durant is captured. Hundreds of Somalis are also killed.
• October 9, 1993 – Aidid calls for a cease-fire with U.N. forces.
• October 14, 1993 – Michael Durant is freed.
• January 1994 – Elder clansmen agree to a new cease-fire. Aidid and Mohammed do not attend the talks.
• March 25, 1994 – U.S. troops complete their withdrawal after a 15-month mission.
• March 2, 1995 – The last of the U.N. peacekeepers are evacuated.
• June 27, 2005 – Pirates hijack the MV Semlow, a ship carrying U.N. food aid, and hold the vessel for 100 days.
• October 12, 2005 – Another U.N. ship carrying aid, the MV Miltzow, is hijacked and held for 30+ hours.
• October 2005 – Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohammed Ghedi calls on neighboring countries to send warships to patrol Somalia’s coast.
• November 27, 2005 – Pirates free a Ukrainian cargo ship seized 40 days prior off the coast of Somalia.
• April 4, 2006 – The South Korean ship Dongwon-ho 628 is seized off the coast of Somalia. Four months later, the crew is released after a ransom is allegedly paid.
• April 2006 – Somalia grants the U.S. Navy permission to patrol coastal waters.
• February 25, 2007 – Pirates hijack the MV Rozen, a cargo ship delivering U.N. food aid to Somalia. The ship and crew are released after 40 days.
• 2008 – The U.S. designates Al-Shabaab, a militant group in Somalia linked to al Qaeda, a foreign terrorist organization.
• June 2008 – The U.N. Security Council unanimously votes to allow countries to send warships into Somalia’s waters to combat piracy.
• September 25, 2008 – The Ukrainian ship, the MV Faina, is attacked. Its cargo consists of 33 T-72 tanks, rocket launchers and small arms. The ship is released in February after pirates claim they have received a $3.2 million ransom payment.
• November 2008 – The Saudi supertanker Sirius Star is hijacked. The ship is released in January 2009 after pirates claim to have received $3 million in ransom.
• April 8, 2009 – Somali pirates hijack the U.S.-flagged cargo ship Maersk Alabama. The captain, Richard Phillips, offers himself as a hostage in order to protect his crew.
• April 12, 2009 – Phillips is rescued when U.S. Navy SEAL snipers fatally shoot three pirates and take the fourth into custody.
• June 19, 2011 – Somali Prime Minister Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo resigns. Abdiweli Mohamed Ali is appointed as an interim leader until a new prime minister can be appointed.
• July 20, 2011 – The United Nations declares a famine in the southern Somalia regions of Bakool and Lower Shabelle.
• July 22, 2011 – Terrorist group Al-Shabaab reverses an earlier pledge to allow aid agencies to provide food in famine-stricken areas of southern Somalia.
• August 2, 2011 – The United States updates guidance so humanitarian organizations will not be penalized for aid inadvertently falling into the hands of terrorist group Al-Shabaab.
• August 8, 2011 – U.S. President Barack Obama announces $105 million in emergency funding for Somalia.
• August 11, 2011 – The United States announces another $17 million in emergency aid for Somalia.
• September 5, 2011 – The U.N.’s Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit (FSNAU) releases a report saying a total of four million people in Somalia need humanitarian aid and 750,000 people are in danger of “imminent starvation.”
• September 16, 2011 – The U.N. Interagency Group for Child Mortality Estimation announces that Somalia has the highest mortality rate for children under five in the world.
• October 4, 2011 – More than 70 people are killed and 150 injured when a truck filled with explosives drives into a government complex in Mogadishu. Most of the victims are students and their parents, who were registering for a Turkish education program. Al-Shabaab claims responsibility.
• June 7, 2012 – The United States offers $7 million for information on the whereabouts of seven key members of the al Qaeda-linked al-Shabaab, a Somalia-based terror group behind bombings and attacks in the region.
• September 10, 2012 – Somali parliament members select Hassan Sheikh Mohamud as the new president. The vote marks a milestone for the nation, which has not had a stable central government since Dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown 21 years ago.
• January 11, 2013 – French forces attempt to rescue a French intelligence commando held hostage in Somalia by Al-Shabaab. The raid leaves a French soldier dead, another soldier missing and 17 Islamist fighters dead. French President Francois Hollande later acknowledges that the operation “did not succeed” and resulted in the “sacrifice” of two French soldiers and “maybe the assassination” of hostage Denis Allex, a member of the DGSE, France’s equivalent of the CIA. Al-Shabaab claims the hostage is alive and later declares that it has killed the hostage in retribution for the raid.
• January 17, 2013 – For the first time in more than two decades, the United States grants official recognition to the Somali government.
• May 2, 2013 – A report, jointly commissioned by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the USAID-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network, shows that 258,000 Somalis died in the famine between October 2010 and April 2012. Half of the famine victims were children younger than five.
• June 19, 2013 – An attack on the U.N. headquarters in Mogadishu leaves at least 14 people dead and 15 others wounded. Al-Shabaab claims responsibility for the attack.
• May 24, 2014 – Al-Shabaab militants attack Somalia’s parliament headquarters, leaving at least 10 people dead and more than 11 others wounded.
• March 27, 2015 – Al-Shabaab attacks a hotel in Mogadishu, killing at least 20 people.