Turkey to Map and Develop Somalia's Uranium and Critical Minerals

Somalia is seeking Turkish support to map and develop its uranium deposits and other critical minerals, widening a fast-growing energy partnership that has already handed Ankara sweeping rights over the Horn of Africa nation's oil and gas. The push, signalled by officials in Mogadishu and Ankara in late May, would extend Turkey's reach from hydrocarbons into the strategic minerals that underpin nuclear fuel and advanced manufacturing.

Details of the mineral plan remain thin. Officials have described an arrangement under which Turkey would help survey and develop Somali uranium and other critical minerals, but no public estimates of reserve size, grade or value have been released, and the specific deposits involved have not been named. The framing positions Somalia as a resource partner for Turkey rather than a junior supplier, with Mogadishu stressing that it retains sovereignty over whatever is found.

The minerals talk builds on a deepening energy relationship. In 2024 the two governments signed a hydrocarbons cooperation agreement alongside a maritime security and defence pact, under which Turkey agreed to help patrol and protect Somali waters. Turkey's seismic survey vessel Oruc Reis later began offshore exploration. In April 2025, Turkey's state energy company secured an onshore oil and gas agreement covering three land blocks spanning some 16,000 square kilometres, with terms reported to give Ankara a 90 percent share of output while Somalia keeps formal ownership of the resources. Turkey's first offshore drilling off the Somali coast began in April 2026.

The expansion deepens Turkey's footprint along the Red Sea and the Horn of Africa, a corridor where Gulf states have invested heavily in ports, military facilities and food-security projects. Ankara's combination of security guarantees, naval presence and resource access in Somalia gives it leverage in a region that sits astride the shipping lanes feeding Gulf trade.

The arrangement also carries risk. Somalia's resource sector is largely untested, security across much of the country remains fragile, and offshore boundary questions with neighbours have complicated past exploration. Analysts caution that mapping and developing uranium is a long, capital-intensive process subject to international non-proliferation oversight, meaning any production lies years away. For now, the announcement signals intent — a bid by Mogadishu to convert Turkish security backing into long-term investment, and by Ankara to anchor itself in a resource frontier on the Gulf's southern doorstep.