Somalia’s prime minister, Hassan ali-Khaire, said his government had demanded the U.S. briefly suspend aid to much of Somalia’s armed forces in an effort to improve transparency and accountability following corruption concerns.
Speaking Saturday to reporters in Mogadishu, Khaire blamed former Somali governments for U.S. concerns about corruption.
“In the first month in office, my government stood for the need for Somalia to be governed on transparency principles,” he said. “To ensure such principles, Somalia and the U.S. government have agreed to this aid suspension.”
He said that the pause in assistance was part of his government’s effort to fight corruption by tackling misconduct and opening the door to accountability.
“We have done a study that made it possible to find out the challenges against rebuilding our national army, including diversion of soldiers’ salaries, lying about the list of the active and alive military personnel, and as a result, we have jointly decided to suspend the U.S. aid to parts of Somalia’s military for a few weeks until we improve and fix the errors,” Khaire said.