Bureau of Forensic Science

The Bureau of Forensic Science in Garowe is the first, and so far the only, autonomous forensic science institution in Somalia. Dr. Abdirashid M. Shire, Executive Director of Shire Scientific, built it from the ground up and led it as Chancellor and Chief Scientific Officer from October 2017 to July 2026.

Why Somalia needed it. Until 2017 Somalia had no forensic laboratory of its own. Crimes of gender-based violence largely went unprosecuted because there was no scientific proof linking offenders to what they had done. In August 2016 the Parliament of Puntland passed the Sexual Offences Act, which created the need for an institution that could produce DNA evidence.

A scientist comes home. In late 2016 a recruitment request reached Rochester, Minnesota. By March 2017 Dr. Shire had agreed to return to Somalia, for the first time in 26 years, to establish the institution.

Building from zero. He secured laboratory space, imported instruments, set up supply chains and cold storage, wrote the laboratory and financial procedures, recruited and trained Somali scientists, and negotiated support with governments and agencies in Washington, D.C., Nairobi and Somalia. The Bureau was inaugurated on September 6, 2017, thanks to a donation from the Government of Sweden facilitated by the United Nations Population Fund. Its founding act became Puntland Law Number 8 on December 24, 2019.

Firsts for Somalia. In 2019 a court in Garowe issued Somalia's first conviction founded on DNA evidence. On February 20, 2020, the Bureau produced the first DNA profiles generated entirely inside Somalia. In 2020 it helped establish Puntland's first SARS-CoV-2 diagnostic center. Since 2021 it has served all member states of the Federal Republic of Somalia.

The casework. From 2021 to 2026 the Bureau received more than 400 criminal and civil cases and analyzed more than 2,500 samples. Investigators now request DNA evidence, prosecutors use it, judges weigh it, and the public accepts verdicts that science supports.

Mentoring Somali scientists. Dr. Shire arrived as one founding scientist with a handful of donated instruments. The team he trained now runs the country's only DNA service and produces original research on the genetics of the Somali population.

Partners/Donors. The Federal Government of Somalia and Puntland State of Somalia; the Governments of Sweden and Denmark; UNFPA and UNICEF; the U.S. Department of State Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs; IGAD and the East African Community; IOM; the Nordic International Support Foundation; IDLO; the Somalia Stability Fund; and CARE International.