From 1862 until 1894, the land to the north of the Gulf of Tadjoura was called Obock and was ruled by Issa and Afar Sultans, local authorities with whom France signed various treaties between 1883 and 1887 to first gain a foothold in the region.

[4][5][6] The exchange of Franco-British diplomatic notes of 2 and 9 February 1888 fixed the territorial limit between the colonies of the two countries; leaving explicitly under French authority the southern coasts of the Gulf of Tadjoura, including a peninsula composed of insubmersible plateaux, Ras Djibouti as a highly strategic location, a future bridgehead for French designs in the rest of Africa and Asia.

Canbala appears in Muhammad al-Idrisi's map of 1192 on the coast of the Horn of Africa, southeast of the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, and with Cambaleh, a town where the Venetian traveler Bragadino, a thirteenth-century European visitor to Ethiopia, resided for eight years.

[9] The main purpose of the French interest in colonizing the region was to protect their trade routes to Madagascar and Indochina from the encroachment of other European powers.

The Yemeni, Egyptian, Greek, Armenian and Italian merchants and traders flock to this promise that Djibouti represents.

Additionally, the rich agricultural southern area of Ambouli continued to flourish due to an abundance of date palm farms and Orchards.

Although the initial French efforts to establish commercial influence in the region proved to be unsuccessful enough to require a government bailout,[10] the Franco-Ethiopian Railway itself was a success and allowed Djibouti's commerce to quickly eclipse the former caravan-based trade carried on with nearby Zeila in British Somaliland.

On 12 July 1926, the Fontainebleau, a Messageries Maritimes steamer loaded with cotton and heading for China caught fire while approaching Djibouti.

The captain decided to flood the holds and run aground his ship in the middle of the harbor of Djibouti, causing significant inconvenience for port traffic.

The locals named the blockade the carmii, a word for a type of sorghum usually reserved for cattle, but used as human food at the height of the famine.

The Japanese declaration of war (7 December 1941) gave the colony some respite, since the Royal Navy were forced to withdraw all but two ships from the blockade for use in the Far East.

Christian Raimond Dupont surrendered and Colonel Raynal's troops crossed back into French Somaliland on 26 December 1942, completing its liberation.

At the same time, fiscal, customs and monetary measures are put in place to promote the development of the deep-water port, to finally compete with Aden.

In August 1966, an official visit to the territory by then French President, General Charles de Gaulle, was also met with demonstrations and rioting.

However, the referendum was again marred by reports of vote rigging on the part of the French authorities, voters rejected independence by a 50-point margin.

In 1949, the plan of Djibouti consisted of four main features: a hierarchical system of streets laid out in a grid, large blocks consisting of small-scale domestic dwellings, the organization of these blocks around central open spaces, and the concentration of cultural institutions to form a civic center.

It is lowest during the rainy period, when there is some coastal fog and greater cloud coverage as warm air passes over the cool sea surface.

Djibouti City was nicknamed the "French Hong Kong in the Red Sea" due to its cosmopolitan urbanism.

[25] In 2023, the government of Djibouti has launched a major campaign to combat illegal immigration, citing security and public health concerns.

The Djibouti City Council elected members headed by the mayor, who serves a five-year term and appoints deputies.

[30] The architecture of Djibouti reflects the city's history since the early 1890s and is marked by both native Djiboutians, Yemeni, French and modern buildings.

Djibouti City has wide streets, restaurants, Plaza (town squares) and cafes while many of the boulevards are lined with trees.

[25] Since independence, the people of Djibouti have introduced new infrastructure and technology, which has led to new and innovative building concepts, ideas and construction techniques.

Open-air, in the form of an arena; with concrete bleachers, the Théâtre des Salines is a mythical place for Djiboutians who were born before the country's independence.

[34] Djibouti City is the financial hub to many entrepreneurial industries ranging from construction, retail, import and export, money transfer companies, and Internet cafés.

The financial sector of the Republic of Djibouti has grown dramatically in recent years, a process that began in the early 2000s, and that was in large part prompted by an explosion the number of exchange agencies and remittances throughout the country.

Originally a modest-sized facility, the airport grew considerably in size in the post-independence period after numerous successive renovation projects.

About 70% of the seaport's activity consists of imports to and exports from neighboring Ethiopia, which depends on the harbour as its main maritime outlet.

[3] In 2012, the Djiboutian government in collaboration with DP World started construction on the Doraleh Container Terminal,[38] a third major seaport intended to further develop the national transit capacity.

[38] There are also daily scheduled ferry services from the Port de Peche to Tadjoura, Obock also some other destinations in Yemen, Somalia and Eritrea.