Thursday December 12, 2024
It was a great pleasure for me to host Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed in our country.
As a result of the trust that Somalia and Ethiopia have in our country, we have reached an important stage this evening in the Ankara Process that we initiated approximately 8 months ago. By overcoming some resentments and misunderstandings together, we took the first step towards a new beginning based on peace and cooperation between Somalia and Ethiopia. As a symbol of our principled stance towards ensuring the sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity of countries, our fundamental expectation is to ensure peace and stability in this distinguished corner of Africa. With the valuable contributions of both countries, we have produced the joint declaration text that we have agreed upon today. This joint declaration focuses on the future, not the past, and records the principles that these two friendly countries, which are very important to us, will build from now on. I wholeheartedly congratulate my dear brothers for reaching this historic agreement with great devotion and thank them for their constructive attitude. I believe that the joint declaration agreed upon this evening will lay a solid foundation for cooperation, economic development and prosperity in the region based on mutual respect in the coming period. From now on, we will decide together on the steps we will take and implement projects that will increase the peace and prosperity of the people of the region.
