The Department of State warns against all travel to Somalia. On Sept. 17, 2009, terrorists launched a suicide-bomb attack on an African Union peacekeeping base. On Dec. 3, a suicide bomber killed 24 people during a graduation ceremony for Banadir University medical students in Mogadishu.

Terrorist operatives have shown their capability to attack air operations at the Mogadishu airport.

Kidnapping, murder, illegal roadblocks, banditry and other violent incidents and threats to...

Ethiopian Airlines flight No. 409, heading from Beirut to Addis Ababa, crashed into the sea off the coast of Lebanon shortly after takeoff on Jan. 25, 2010, with 90 people aboard. No survivors were found. Investigations on the cause are underway. The plane had been inspected one month prior and declared fit to fly. 

Russia and Georgia agreed to reopen the Verkhny Lars border crossing, 30 kilometers south of Vladikavkaz, Russia, in March. The Russia-Georgia border points were closed in July 2006 after a dispute over the regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and this mountain pass is the only border crossing that does not go through either region.

Regular flights between the countries were stopped following military action over South Ossetia in 2008 and have not resumed, though a Georgian Airways...