2842. 🇸🇴 Somaliland Finally Receives International Recognition (By Israel) But Still No Stamps.

 

🇸🇴 Somaliland Recognised By Israel.

  The former British protectorate of British Somaliland which declared itself to be the independent state of Somaliland on 18 May 1991 and since then, apart from a functioning postal service, has been a fully operative de facto sovereign state, has finally received its first recognition as an independent state by the government of Israel (also of course a former British protectorate, then known as Palestine).

  Somaliland had previously been a sovereign state from 26 June 1960, when it received its independence from the United Kingdom, until 1 July 1960 when it was absorbed into the Republic of Somalia, after Italian Somaliland had received its independence from Italy. A rebellion against the communist dictator of Somalia, Siad Barre, began in Somaliland in May 1988 and Barre was overthrown in January 1991 and the result was violent chaos right across Somalia and Somaliland’s secession from Somalia on 18 May 1991 as mentioned above. Since then, Somaliland has remained separate and relatively peaceful and sought international recognition but without success until 26 December 2025 when the Israeli government announced its formal recognition of Somaliland as a fully independent sovereign state. Given Somaliland’s strategic location at the mouth of the Red Sea, Israel doubtless sees influence with the breakaway state as being highly advantageous to it but this represents an important step in Somaliland becoming Africa’s 55th country and, who knows, developing a postal service which actually issues postage stamps. Will any African states now follow? Look out for recognition by Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates.

Independent Somaliland’s only 3 stamps (issued 26 June 1960) -

post scriptum - the flag emoji shows the flag of Somalia, no emoji of Somaliland’s flag is available. This is also true of Turkish Cyprus, Alderney (but one exists for Sark), British Antarctic Territory, Tristan Da Cunha and Ascension.

🇮🇴 Chagosians form a government in exile.

With the British Indian Ocean Territory (the Chagos Islands) still not yet under Mauritian sovereignty (though if the Starmer government has its way, it soon will be despite the objections of those of Chagossian descent) the Chagossians formed a ‘government-in-exile’ on 17 December 2025 with Midley Mandarin as interim First Minister. Philatelically, it will be interesting to see where this one goes - will, for instance, the Chagossian government-in-exile issue propaganda stamps to highlight its cause as the Tibetan government-in-exile did after the Dalai Lama was exiled in India (two sets of four - the first issued in 1972 and the second in 1974)? They were very collectable and historically interesting even though their significance as postage stamps was highly questionable. The story of the Chagos Islands may not yet have reached the final page, even in the stamp album.

Midley Mandarin, interim Chief Minister of Chagos government-in-exile

Commonwealth countries which are not known to have issued, or had issued on their behalf, any legitimate postage stamps during 2025 -

Anguilla

Antigua and Barbuda 

Belize 

British Indian Ocean Territory 

British Virgin Islands

Cameroon

Cayman Islands

Cook Islands including Rarotonga 

Cook Islands Aitutaki 

Cook Islands Penrhyn

Dominica

Gabon

Ghana 

Grenada Carriacou and Petite Martinique 

Kingdom of eSwatini 

Lesotho 

Montserrat 

Nauru

Nevis

Nigeria

Niue

Papua New Guinea 

Rwanda

St Kitts or St Kitts and Nevis

Saint Lucia

St Vincent and The Grenadines

Solomon Islands

Tokelau 

Tonga

Tonga Niuafo’ou

Turks and Caicos Islands 

Tuvalu

Uganda

United Republic of Tanzania 

Vanuatu 

Zambia

Therefore at the end of the year 36 out of 89 (40.5%) Commonwealth philatelic entities are not known to have issued, or had issued on their behalf, any legitimate postage stamps during 2025. This compares with the figure for 2024 at the end of that year of 28 out of 89 or 31.5%.

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2236. Are these Somaliland postage stamps?

 

Somaliland.

As detailed originally in the Blog published on 10 July 2010, Somaliland was established as a British protectorate in 1884. On 26 June 1960 the British granted independence to its former protectorate and Somaliland became a sovereign state. On 1 July 1960, its larger neighbour, Italian Somaliland, was also granted independence becoming the republic of Somalia and Somaliland merged with Somalia to become a single sovereign state and gave up its own sovereignty in doing so. 

  Following the overthrow of the dictator of Somalia, Siad Barre, in July 1991 a state of anarchy spread across the country. Civil war had already broken out in May 1998 between the armed forces of the then central government of President Barre and the fighters of the Somali National Movement (SNM) of the former Somaliland. On 18 May 1991 Somaliland was declared to once more be a sovereign republic separate from the collapsing state of Somalia. It has maintained its independence from the troubled Somalia ever since and has sought to obtain international recognition of its de facto independent status but has so far failed to obtain recognition of it as a sovereign state from any foreign countries. The Somaliland government has held to the line that it is a thriving democratic state with a history separate from that of Somalia and it has been a sovereign state in its own right during its previous history.

  For decades after the one sided declaration of independence Somaliland had no functioning postal service. In recent years however it has set up a service within the country (see Blog 1683) and in the last few months has set up a postcode system in the capital Hargeisa to enable home deliveries to carried out more efficiently.

  Becasuse there was no postal system there was no valid reason for there to be any postage stamps. Postage stamps are of course not just useful as receipts for the prepayment of postage but also as one means of underlining a country’s sovereignty. It has been said that there are two items that a sovereign state needs to affirm its sovereignty - a national flag and national postage stamps. For most of its existence  trying to obtain international recognition, Somaliland has not had one of those prerequisites - stamps with its name printed on them.

  Now it is possible - though I might be completely wrong about this - that Somaliland does indeed have its own postage stamps, perhaps necessitated at last by the developments of recent years in establishing a national postal service. On its Facebook page, Somaliland Postal Service includes in an illustration repeated several times on the site a picture of what may possibly be 4 postage stamps (see illustration at the head of this piece). Unfortunately the text in the various segments of the illustration is all in Somali without a translation so I do not understand it. I can not find any further illustrations or news of an issue of postage stamps elsewhere.

  Certainly the illustrations are very suggestive of them being postage stamps - the illustrations are poor quality but the main features of the designs include a pictorial element (a camel, a large pot, men (perhaps farmers) with another large vessel and. Cattle. The items appear to have monetary values printed on them (in, I presume, Somaliland shillins) and clearly bear the name ‘SOMALILAND’ in capital letters as well, I think, in Arabic.

  If anyone who reads this piece is able to read Somali then a translation of the text above the four stamps would be greatly appreciated. Google translates “Samaynta tigidhada boosta” as “making tickets post” (“boosta” is “post” and “tigidhada” is ticket so I guess that post tickets are postage stamps which is consistent with the illustrated items being Somaliland’s first postage stamps. 

This is the entire post as it appears on Facebook - 

As can be seen the illustration of the possible stamps is only a small part of the item which seems to inform readers of the activities of Somaliland Postal Service. As far as I can see the item has appeared seven times on the Facebook page, the first occasion being 3 April 2021 and so if these are indeed postage stamps we might assume that they were first issued about two years ago.

So that’s something to look out for.

Post scriptum - following Stewie1980’s comment in the comments section I tracked down the photograph he mentions of the 10000 shillin stamp (if it is a stamp) which appeared in a post on the Somaliland Postal Service Facebook page dated 21 April 2022. It certainly makes this particular item much easier to assess. It looks as though it is imperforate and possibly self-adhesive. Very interesting. It appears that 10000 shillins converts to £14.69p (but see Stewie1980’s comment below). Note that the ‘stamp’ with the samedesign featured in the previous illustration is a 15000 shillin value. The stamp is dated ‘2020’ which I assume was the year of issue and this also seems to be the case with the other values though the illustration is more indistinct. Thanks to Stewie1980 for this very helpful input.

The French company, Busch Collectibles, is selling sheets of ‘stamps’ from two Commonwealth countries - Guyana and Dominica - which commemorate the late Queen Elizabeth II by depicting a portrait by Matej Gabris of The Queen as a young woman. The company states that these items are exclusive to the company and by the look of them I think they have been produced as Personalised stamps rather than being official products of the two respective postal services. They are quite attractive items though the portrait looks to me rather like a cross between the late Princess Margaret and Elizabeth Taylor rather than The Queen herself.  Each sheet contains 12 identical ‘stamps’ and are sold for €20 per sheet.

1629. 🇮🇴 New BIOT Issue Features Crustaceans.

🇮🇴 The postal service of British Indian Ocean Territory issued a set of 5 stamps on 23 March 2020 on the subject of Crustaceans of the Territory.  This is an attractive and colourful set depicting some fascinating inhabitants of the Chagos Islands which must be a place where social isolating is about as easy as possible to do apart from, I suppose, on Diego Garcia with its huge American Airforce base. Unhappily the set contains a £5 value making it quite expensive but issues from BIOT are not frequent so perhaps we can make allowances. Rating:- ****.

🇳🇿 The New Zealand philatelic service shut up shop on 25 March 2020 as detailed in this message on its website, “In accordance with the Government’s COVID-19 announcement on 23 March, the Whanganui Collectables and Solutions Centre will be closed from 25 March, and no orders will be distributed before 28 April. Our customer services team will be available during this time via collectables@nzpost.co.nz”.

  Just how much the Coronavirus pandemic is going to affect the release of new stamp issues in the course of 2020 remains to be seen. Whilst many of the well-off countries of the West currently seem to be badly affected one can only wonder about how the poorer countries with less well developed health services are going to cope in the coming months - many Commonwealth countries fall into that category. One feels particularly anxious about how the pandemic will unfold in Africa.

  I expect we will see new stamp issues from those countries in particular will tail off as the story of 2020 unfolds. Theoretically this should have been a busy year for Commonwealth countries celebrating significant anniversaries of Independence and we would surely expect stamp issues commemorating these significant national anniversaries but who can say what will happen now?

  For the record the following Commonwealth countries/former territories will be marking significant Independence anniversaries:-

Cameroon - Granted independence by France on 1 January 1960 (60th anniversary). Joined The Commonwealth on 13 November 1995, so this year also marks the 25th anniversary of Cameroon’s membership of The Commonwealth. I have not yet seen news of any stamps commemorating the 60th anniversary of Independence.

Somaliland - Granted independence by UK on 26 June 1960 as The State Of Somaliland (60th anniversary) but united with Somalia (the former Italian Somaliland) when it achieved independence on 1 July 1960. Neither the de facto Republic of Somaliland (which unilaterally declared itself independent on 18 May 1991) nor Somalia have active postal systems so there is no body in either entity currently able to release postage stamps.

 Cyprus - Granted independence by UK on 16 August 1960 (60th anniversary).

Nigeria - Granted independence by UK on 1 October 1960 (60th anniversary).

Maldives - Granted independence by UK on 26 July 1965 (55th anniversary).

Tonga - Granted independence by UK on 4 July 1970 (50th anniversary).

Fiji - Granted independence by UK on 10 October 1970 (50th anniversary).

Mozambique - granted independence by Portugal on 25 June 1975 (45th anniversary). Joined The Commonwealth on 13 November 1995.

Zimbabwe - Granted independence by UK on 18 April 1980 (40th anniversary).

Vanuatu - Granted independence by UK and France on 30 July 1980 (40th anniversary) (previously the Condominium of New Hebrides).

Namibia - granted independence by South Africa on 21 March 1990 (30th anniversary) (previously the United Nations Trust Territory of South West Africa).

So the key dates to look out for when Independence anniversary stamps may be issued during 2020 are:-

1 January - Cameroon - no news of any such issue having been released.

21 March - Namibia - no Independence anniversary issue is mentioned in the new issue programme put out by Nam Post.

18 April - Zimbabwe. ZimPost has included an issue of 6 stamps (and probably, I guess, a miniature sheet) in its new issue programme for release on 16 April.

25 June - Mozambique

4 July - Tonga

26 July - Maldives

30 July - Vanuatu

16 August - Cyprus 

1 October - Nigeria

10 October - Fiji