Djibouti Travel Guide - Communications

Country code: 253.

Roaming agreements exist with most international mobile phone companies. Coverage is good in and around the capital and parts of the coast, and poor to non-existent elsewhere.

Services are accessible in the main post office and some hotels. There is at least one Internet cafe in Djibouti.

Letters and parcels to western Europe can take about one week by airmail or up to three weeks by surface mail

The main newspaper, La Nation, is owned by the government, as is Radiodiffusion-Télévision de Djibouti (RTD), which operates the national radio and TV. There are no private broadcasters. All electronic media is closely controlled by the government. Private newspapers and other publications are generally allowed to circulate freely, but journalists exercise self-censorship. The official media does not criticise the government. US-sponsored Arabic-language Radio Sawa broadcasts programmes to East Africa and Arabia from a transmitter in Djibouti.

• Djibouti has no daily papers.
• A weekly newspaper, La Nation, is government-owned and published in French.
• There is at least one Arabic newspaper.
• Other weekly newspapers published in French include Le Renouveau, La République (both owned by the opposition party), Le Progrès, and Le Temps.

• Djibouti Télévision is government-owned.

• Radio Djibouti is government-owned and broadcast in Afar, Arabic and Somali.