“Being in Mogadishu will allow us to work far more closely with the Transitional Federal Institutions, the UN agencies and NGOs already based here, civil society and ordinary Somalis,” said Augustine Mahiga, the UN representative for Somalia.
During a surprise visit to Mogadishu in December, the UN chief Ban Ki-moon said the office would return to the Somali capital.
The last UN representative to work in Mogadishu left in 1995.
Somalia remains one of the world’s most dangerous countries. The capital has seen an increase in bomb attacks despite the withdrawal of Islamist militia from fixed bases there last August.