Tiny Djibouti guards one of the planet’s busiest sea gates
Djibouti covers just 23,200 square kilometres on the Horn between Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, the Red Sea, and the Gulf of Aden. The May 2024 census counted 1,066,809 people—mainland Africa’s smallest population—yet the state sits beside shipping lanes that feed Ethiopia’s trade.
In ancient times the area belonged, with parts of Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somaliland, to the Land of Punt. The medieval Ifat and Adal sultanates ruled from Zeila, a port just across today's Somaliland border. The Bab-el-Mandeb strait next door is often proposed as the crossing where early hominins moved along a southern coastal route from East Africa toward South and South-East Asia, and people have lived here since the Neolithic.
France called the land north of the Gulf of Tadjoura Obock from 1862 to 1894. Treaties with Dir-Somali and Afar sultans produced French Somaliland, known by that name from 1897, and a railway to Dire Dawa and later Addis Ababa let its port overtake Zeila as the outlet for southern Ethiopia and the Ogaden. In 1967 it became the French Territory of the Afars and the Issas. Ten years later voters chose independence, the new republic took its capital's name and joined the UN that same year. Armed conflict over political representation in the early 1990s ended in a power-sharing deal.
French and Arabic are official, with Afar and Somali as national languages; Somalis form the majority and both groups speak Cushitic tongues. About 94 percent of people are Muslim, and Islam has dominated the region for over a thousand years. Locals call the country Gabuuti in Afar and Jabuuti in Somali. The name's origin is debated: Afar gabouti, plate, Somali gabood, plateau, or Land of Thoth, the Egyptian moon god.
The country controls a gateway between the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. It works as a refuelling and transshipment hub and handles most of Ethiopia's seaborne trade. Several foreign powers keep military bases there, and the regional bloc IGAD has its headquarters in Djibouti City.
Source: Djibouti
