Siad Barre, Mohamed

(born c. 1919, Ganane, Italian Somaliland—died Jan. 2, 1995, Lagos, Nigeria) President of Somalia, 1969–91. He attended military school in Italy, and when Somalia achieved independence in 1960 he was made a colonel in its army. He seized power in a bloodless coup after the president's assassination in 1969. Under Siad Barre, Somali forces invaded a disputed area in southeastern Ethiopia in 1977, but they were eventually repelled. His government was charged with widespread human rights abuses, and from 1988 government forces repeatedly clashed with rebels. With Somalia in a state of civil war and on the brink of mass starvation, he fled into exile in Nigeria in 1991.

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