Abdoulkader Kamil Mohamed says Djibouti's coastguard and navy are deployed to keep the strait open and that Djibouti could invoke its defence agreement with France if it were overwhelmed, as Yemen's war spills across the water.
Djibouti will "never accept" the Bab el-Mandeb strait being "confiscated or monetised", Prime Minister Abdoulkader Kamil Mohamed said in an interview with the French magazine Le Point published on 30 October and republished by Djibouti's state news agency ADI. (Quotations are CERHA's translations from the French.)
"We will do everything to keep this strait a peaceful international shipping lane. Ships must be able to pass through it in complete safety," he said. Djibouti's coastguard and navy were already positioned along its maritime borders, he added, and the 2024 renewal of the defence agreement with France meant that "if we were overwhelmed, we could invoke the defence agreement, and French forces would intervene alongside us". For now, he said, Djibouti was managing without difficulty.
War across the water
Le Point reported that Yemen's Houthi movement seized the whole of Yemen's western coast on 11 September, giving it de facto control of the Yemeni shore of the strait, and that at least 3,836 people have since sought refuge in Djibouti. The prime minister disputed that the strait was solely in Houthi hands, saying "Bab el-Mandeb is not only in their hands".
He said arrivals were being collected along the Obock coast and taken to the Markazi centre in Obock for food and medical care, and that Djibouti had spent almost $1.7 million on food, care and medicines, all borne by the host country. No Houthi fighters had been found among the refugees, he said, but about 17 Yemeni government fighters were being held separately in a military camp with temporary legal status.
Asked whether Djibouti regarded the Houthis as terrorists, he said it did not take a position, noting that the UN had not designated them as such. Some shipping companies were still choosing to go around the Cape of Good Hope, he said, but many vessels were passing, and Saudi ships, which the Houthis have declared an embargo against, faced no restrictions from Djibouti.
A consistent line
Djibouti's state daily La Nation summarised the interview on 1 November as a statement of Djibouti's determination to preserve freedom of navigation. The position echoes a 29 July statement by the presidency, which said any attempt to impose tolls on the strait from one shore would breach international law.
The issue also featured when Foreign Minister Abdoulkader Houssein Omar visited Beijing in October. A joint China–Djibouti communiqué said escalating Red Sea tensions posed "a serious threat to the global economy", The Diplomat reported. Djibouti also hosts French, US and Chinese military bases.
Photo: Prime Minister Abdoulkader Kamil Mohamed, 2023. The President's Office, Maldives, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0.