From Jigjiga to Sudan: Uncovering the Mercenary Pipelines of the Horn of Africa

What the report says

Watchdog Uganda reports that the detention of hundreds of Somali soldiers in Ethiopia’s Jigjiga has drawn attention to a wider military-recruitment network tied to Somalia and, potentially, Sudan. According to the article, the detainees are linked to a larger Saudi-funded training program that has been operating in Somalia, with recruits trained for more than a year at Hanano camp in Galmudug state. The piece says the episode has raised questions about who is financing the program and what becomes of graduates after training.

The report says the detained group may be part of a batch of about 3,000 recruits, while other information cited in the article suggests the program could include more than 5,000 Somali trainees. It also attributes claims to the “Voice of Horn” account that foreign military contractors from Romania, Ukraine, South Africa and Colombia have been involved in training. The article says some recruits are allegedly being prepared for later deployment in Sudan to support the armed forces there, though it stresses that the Jigjiga detainees themselves were not proven to be headed there.

Mogadishu, the article adds, said the soldiers were on authorized leave and used Ethiopian territory to reach their families while avoiding roads controlled by al-Shabaab. The report notes that neither Ethiopian authorities nor the Somali embassy had issued an independent clarification at the time. It also places the case in a broader regional context of youth recruitment and wartime mobilization across the Horn of Africa, while cautioning that some claims in the wider discussion have not been independently confirmed.