In a significant deal, the UK and Kenya inked a new security compact to keep the two countries, peoples, and regions safe.
The agreement covers the entire scope of security cooperation between the UK and Kenya. However, it marks an essential milestone in the two countries’ security relationship.
The new agreement was signed this week in Nairobi. Kenyan Cabinet Secretary for the Interior and National Administration, Professor Kithure Kindiki, and Security Minister Tom Tugendhat MP signed the compact.
The security compact includes money for counter-terrorism projects worth £10 million annually. It pledges on defence, international cooperation, community security, law enforcement and criminal justice, cyber security, and bilateral, multilateral, and regional coordination.
In addition, the United Kingdom has established a large new stabilisation effort. Moreover, to assist local populations in Somalia’s borderlands in Kenya, Ethiopia, and Somalia in addressing the sources of instability. The Deris Wanaag, or Good Neighbourliness, plan, worth £10 million over three years, will foster collaboration. And expected progress in improving regional security and countering the radicalism of the Islamist terror group al-Shabaab.
According to UK Security Minister Tom Tugendhat MP:
Kenya matters to Britain. Seeing Kenyan troops march alongside other Commonwealth forces at HM The King’s Coronation was a reminder of our shared history and the promise of a strong future. By working with Kenya, our key security partner in East Africa, we are helping to keep both our peoples safe and strengthen global security.
Together, we’re countering al-Shabaab and tackling the growing threat from regional Daesh affiliates, fighting serious organised crime, and tackling the flow of dirty money. Our security partnership is growing ever stronger.
I’m delighted to be able to announce this comprehensive new agreement, as well as our new Somalia Borderlands programme, which will tackle the root causes of instability to help end the scourge of al-Shabaab.
Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for Interior and National Administration, Professor Kithure Kindiki, said:
The friendship between Kenya and the United Kingdom is longstanding, entrenched and long-term. We appreciate what the UK has done to support Kenya on the basis of mutual respect and reciprocity over the years.
We will make sure that we sustain this relationship so that the peoples of our 2 countries can enjoy shared prosperity as we look into the future.
The UK has remained a key partner for Kenya in the fight against corruption, and the fight against illicit financial flows.
Drought, resource conflicts, weaponry proliferation, and violent extremism plague populations in Kenya, Somalia, and Ethiopia’s Borderlands region. The UK will work with these three countries to address the core causes of instability. Moreover, an open border provides shared opportunities, including trade and tax creation. The alliance aims to minimise the drivers of instability and violent extremism in the region. Through encouraging collaboration and joint progress and developing resilience.
Minister Tugendhat was also able to see Kenya’s Transnational Organised Crime Unit. As well as the Anti-Human Trafficking and Child Protection Unit, during his visit to Nairobi.
Both units collaborate closely with the UK’s National Crime Agency. This partnership protects our two countries and the globe from major organised crime and terrorism while assisting Kenya as a regional leader in the battle against child sexual exploitation and internet abuse.
Kenya is the UK’s primary partner in East Africa for security and peace, from collaborative diplomatic efforts in Sudan to combating al-Shabaab in Somalia and throughout the region. The new Annual UK-Kenya High-Level Foreign Policy and Security Dialogue, the first of which will be held in London in September 2023, will continue this close collaboration.
