Comoros

Many people today have never heard of the Comoros, but these islands were once part of a prosperous regional trading economy that stretched halfway around the world. A key node in the trading networks of the Indian Ocean, the Comoros prospered by exchanging slaves and commodities with Arab and Indian merchants. By the sixteenth century, the archipelago served as an important supply point on the route from Europe to Asia. The twentieth century brought the establishment of French colonial rule and a plantation economy. Since declaring its independence in 1975, the Comoros has been blighted by more than twenty coups, a radical revolutionary government and a mercenary regime. Today, the island nation suffers chronic mismanagement and relies on remittances from a diaspora community in France. Nonetheless, the Comoros is largely peaceful and culturally vibrant-- connected to the outside world in the internet age, but, at the same time, still slightly apart. Iain Walker traces the history and unique culture of these enigmatic islands, from their first settlement by Africans, Arabs and Austronesians, through their heyday within the greater Swahili world, to their decline as a forgotten outpost of the French colonial empire.

The Comoros Islands are located in the Indian Ocean, between Madagascar and the African continent. Comoros is a small island nation composed of four islands: Grande Comore, Mohéli, Anjouan, and Mayotte. The islands are known for their rich culture and diverse history, influenced by Arab traders, African settlers, and European colonizers. The primary language spoken in Comoros is Comorian, which is a blend of Swahili, Arabic, and French. Islam is the official religion, and the islands are known for their unique brand of Sufi Islam. The Comoros economy is primarily based on agriculture, with cloves being the most important and lucrative crop. While the nation faces numerous challenges, such as political instability and economic inequality, it remains a fascinating and culturally rich destination for visitors.

Islands of stark contrasts and complex syncretisms, the comoros hold a major key to the history of the western Indian Ocean area. An invaluable resource for anyone interested in the history, economics, cultures, languages, geography, geology, or politics of the western Indian Ocean.

2011 Updated Reprint. Updated Annually. Comoros Taxation Laws and Regulations Handbook

Comoros Constitution and Citizenship Laws Handbook - Strategic Information and Basic Laws

This report provides a summary of the Antimoney Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) measures in effect in the Union of the Comoros on the date of or shortly after the onsite visit. It describes and analyzes these measures, indicates the level of the Union of the Comoros’s compliance with the 40 + 9 Financial Action Task Force (FATF) Recommendations, and makes recommendations on measures to be taken to strengthen certain aspects of the system. The authorities agreed with the mission that the Comoros is a potential transit point for international terrorism.

Union of the Comoros: Selected Issues

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Based on an ethnographic study of mobilisations of the Comorian diaspora in Marseille during political and cultural events, the book examines communitarisation in relation to three thematic areas, namely spaces, cultural markets and local politics. Drawing on Foucault’s concept of the dispositif, the author analyses mobilisations of postcolonial diaspora as part of a dispositif of communitarisation, that is, a set of discourses, practices, institutions and subjectivations of diasporic community. She argues that constructions of ‘community’ are both shaped by and shape ethnicised biopolitics, expressed by modes of governing diasporic groups along ethnicised divisions and a marking of ethnicised communities as the Other of the French Republic. The performativity of a Comorian community brought into being through political, cultural, economic and customary practices also shows how Comorian communities govern themselves along ethnicised categories, at the intersection with generation, gender, age classes, locality and class. Communitarisation processes as part of ethnicised (self-)governing reveal postcolonial power relations in France as well as practices of negotiation and contestation on the part of Comorian communities. This book will be of interest to scholars in the fields of critical diaspora studies, critical ethnography, discourse and dispositif analysis, postcolonial politics, and the African diaspora.