Kismayo

The city is situated 528 kilometres (328 miles) southwest of the capital Mogadishu, near the mouth of the Jubba River, where it empties into the Indian Ocean. According to the United Nations Development Programme, the city of Kismayo had a population of around 89,333 in 2005.

During the Middle Ages, Kismayo and its surrounding area was part of the Ajuran Empire that governed much of southern Somalia and eastern Ethiopia, with its domain extending from Hafun in the north, to Qelafo in the west, to Kismayo in the south.

In the early modern period, Kismayo was ruled by the Geledi Sultanate and by the later 1800s, the Boqow dynasty. The kingdom was eventually incorporated into Italian Somaliland in 1925/6 after the death of the last sultan, Osman Ahmed. After independence in 1960, the city was made the center of the official Kismayo District.

Kismayo was the site of numerous battles during the civil war, from the early 1990s. In late 2006, Islamist militants affiliated with Al-Shabaab gained control of most of the city. To reclaim possession of the territory, a new autonomous regional administration dubbed Azania was announced in 2010 and formalized in 2011.