diff --git a/exe/metanorma b/exe/metanorma
index a25361ad..33468daa 100755
--- a/exe/metanorma
+++ b/exe/metanorma
@@ -17,4 +17,18 @@ end
 
 # start up the CLI
 require "metanorma/cli"
-Metanorma::Cli.start(ARGV)
+metanorma_cli = proc { Metanorma::Cli.start(ARGV) }
+if ENV["SOCKS_PROXY"]
+  require "socksify"
+  require "uri"
+  begin
+    proxy = URI.parse(ENV["SOCKS_PROXY"])
+    Socksify::proxy(proxy.host, proxy.port, &metanorma_cli)
+  rescue URI::InvalidURIError
+    warn "Value of ENV.SOCKS_PROXY=#{ENV['SOCKS_PROXY']} is invalid! Droping it"
+    ENV.delete("SOCKS_PROXY")
+    metanorma_cli.call
+  end
+else
+  metanorma_cli.call
+end
diff --git a/metanorma-cli.gemspec b/metanorma-cli.gemspec
index 9acccc82..5e46eb0b 100644
--- a/metanorma-cli.gemspec
+++ b/metanorma-cli.gemspec
@@ -58,4 +58,6 @@ Gem::Specification.new do |spec|
   spec.add_runtime_dependency "metanorma-ogc", "~> 1.3.0"
   spec.add_runtime_dependency "metanorma-un", "~> 0.6.0"
   spec.add_runtime_dependency "relaton-cli", ">= 0.8.2"
+
+  spec.add_runtime_dependency "socksify"
 end