As Somalia struggles with a devastating famine, Need to Know takes a rare look inside Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, a city struggling from decades of civil war, Islamist militants famine and piracy, to learn more about how the nation came to be in the state it’s in today.
Somalia

Insurgency and famine in Doolow, Somalia
Women and children flee famine and an Islamic insurgency in southern Somalia, escaping to refugee camps already overflowing with the victims of the first famine of the 21st century.

Famine in Somalia: ‘This is a race against time to save lives’
This week, the U.N. declared a state of famine in parts of Somalia. Need to Know speaks with Adrian Edwards of the U.N.’s Refugee Agency about the unfolding humanitarian crisis in the region.

Photo: Famine declared in parts of Somalia
The U.N. says that nearly half of the Somali population is now in crisis.

Rice and baguettes: dispatches from a Tunisian refugee camp
Jesse Hardman ruminates on the meaning of home for transmigrated communities going about their daily lives in a Tunisian refugee camp.

The trouble with pirates: Part 2
Just who are these Somali pirates who are bringing the shipping world to its knees? How do they operate? And why do we negotiate with them?

The trouble with pirates
Need to Know presents an excerpt from “The Trouble with Pirates,” including the story of a French family who were abducted by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean.

Global piracy map
Piracy incidents around the world Early on Thursday morning Somali pirates seized a Panamanian tanker called the Hannibal II 900 nautical miles from the Somali coast, closer to India than to Somalia. Though the greatest number of ships are seized in the notorious Gulf of Aden, or “Pirate Alley,” off the coast of Somalia, the […]