Somalia Airport

69 AIR TRANSPORT A bdullahi Mohamud, Somalia’s most senior immigration official, was working at Mogadishu’s Aden Adde International Airport before the outbreak of civil war in 1991, and he still works there today . Flicking between CCTV cameras on a huge widescreen display in his airside office, Mohamud said the airport has undergone radical change s for the better in recent years. The introduction of biometric passports was among the most noticeable improvements. When Turkish Airlines launched flights between Mogadishu and Istanbul in March 2012, Moha mud’s staff would seize fake travel documents on almost every Europe-bound flight. That flow of asylum see kers has since run dry , with the federal gover nment’s new E- passports proving too hard for human traffickers to forge. Airport security has also improved dramatically sinc e the days of Siad Barre, Somalia’s Soviet-backed militar y dictator. Troops from the African Union Mission Mogadishu’s new airport terminal will give the Somali capital a welcome facelift when it opens this year; just one of several projects reinvigorating the country’s transport infrastructure. to Somalia (AMISOM) deserve most of the credit for this, erecting rings of steel around the gateway and defending them with their lives. But while Aden Adde Airport is in better shape today that at any point i n recent history, it is far from glamorous. The gateway’s crumbling terminal building and cramped immigration halls convey the gloomiest of welcomes to international visitors. Little wonder, then, that Mohamud and all his colleagues are waiting with bated breath for the demolishment of the entire building. Turkish airport management specialist Favori began a 20- year contract at Aden Adde AIRFIELD OF DREAMS Continued on Page 70 The new terminal will, in the words of Somalia’s president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, “change the face of Somalia.” SOMALIA FOCUS ON

Somalia Airport

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