The de facto African state of Somaliland does not rule out absorbing Gazan residents, the state's Foreign Minister, Abdirahman Dahir Adan, told Israel's public broadcaster KAN on Wednesday morning.
Somaliland's foreign minister told KAN in a written statement, "We are open to discussion on any matter, but we do not want to speculate on matters that have not yet been discussed. All countries that are interested in discussing certain issues with us must first establish working relations with us and open diplomatic missions in Somaliland."
"The most important thing for us is to receive recognition after showing the world that we are a peace-loving and democratic country, which has been independent for 33 years."
On March 14, the Associated Press reported that US and Israeli officials had reached out to officials of three East African governments to discuss the potential transfer of displaced Gazan Palestinians to their territories.
AP named the three states as Sudan, Somalia, and the breakaway region of Somaliland.
This came after US President Donald Trump proposed a postwar plan for the transfer and resettlement of citizens from the Gaza Strip.
According to AP, Sudanese officials rejected overtures from the US, while officials from Somalia and Somaliland said they had not been contacted over the matter.
Somalia's Foreign Minister Ahmed Moalim Fiqi said his country would categorically reject "any proposal or initiative, from any party, that would undermine the Palestinian people’s right to live peacefully on their ancestral land."
Political motivations
The KAN report comes just five days after the de facto state told Reuters that "there are no talks with anyone regarding Palestinians."
In his communications with KAN, Adan also reportedly hinted that if the American administration recognized Somaliland, it would be possible to talk about everything, even if the absorption of Palestinians was not mentioned specifically.
KAN claimed, "Somaliland is trying to leverage the situation in Gaza and the Palestinian arena in order to make political gains with the United States and Israel."
Somaliland is a Muslim de facto state that split from Somalia in the early 1990s and declared independence. However, most countries do not formally recognize it. Israel was one of 35 countries that recognized the state's independence in 1960, but to this date, there are no formal diplomatic relations between the two.