Somali Headlines from Feb.11, 2009

Somalia: Five Killed in Fighting Between Clan and Islamist Militias
source:Shabelle Media Network
Feb.11, 2009
Jowhar — At least four people have been killed and some others have been injured in fighting between al-Shabaab insurgent group, and local clan militias in Masagaway town in central Somalia, eyewitnesses said on Wednesday.

Residents say, the fighting started after the clan militias attacked the town. The dead were all combatants.

The clan militias have taken control the town from the al-Shabaab group, the Islamists have been controlling the town for a year.

Clan elders in Masagaway town requested from the two sides not to fight again in the town. The fighting stopped and the situation in the town is calm now.

In other news one person was killed and two others were wounded in fighting between clan militias in Warsheekh town in Middle Shabelle region.

The militias fought in a borehole in the town.

Somalia President Promises ‘Peace and Dignity’
source:BBC
Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed Vows to Quell Violence, Curb Piracy — a Difficult Assignment
By LARA SETRAKIAN and DANA HUGHES
Feb. 11, 2009

A soft-spoken former schoolteacher is Somalia’s new president, tasked with calming one of the bloodiest, most brutal conflicts on the global map.

In his first interview with American media, he told ABC News about his plans to curb piracy, quell the violence and give Somalia back its “peace and dignity.”

To do that, President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed will need to defeat a culture of piracy that has taken root in the country in the last several years and temper the threat from Islamist group Al Shabaab, which controls most of southern Somalia.

Sheikh Sharif was elected last month by a parliament in exile; the threat of violence in Somalia is so dire that voting took place in the neighboring country of Djibouti.

He is a man with a political past, a moderate Islamist who held power for six months in 2006 before being ousted by U.S.-backed Ethiopian forces. During his time in office, he quieted the capital of Mogadishu and curbed acts of piracy off the coast of Somalia, an accomplished history fueling the hope that he can, once again, calm his country and its waters.

On piracy, which has surged since he left office, Sheikh Sharif said the Somali navy would patrol the coast while state security forces address the issue on land. Somali pirates are holding seven vessels with 123 crew members hostage, according to the International Maritime Bureau. Sheikh Sharif called on those pirates to release the captive ships and pledged to work with the international community on counter-piracy efforts.

“Fighting piracy is inevitable but cooperating as two states, Somalia and the United States, would be a good solution,” he told ABC News.

But the piracy problem he has inherited is much different than the one he had nearly solved. Piracy began with Somali fishermen hijacking boats under the pretext that they were protecting their waters from illegal fishermen. In time it grew into a lucrative criminal enterprise, bringing in millions of dollars in ransom money.

“The problem is in 2006 the stakes were low; it was very easy to move into those coastal areas and say, ‘Stop it,’” said Ken Menkhaus, a professor of political science at Davidson College in North Carolina who’s worked on Somalia issues for 25 years. “It’s a mafia economy now. The stakes are higher.”

Working Relationship With Obama
Most of the piracy stems from Puntland, a semi-autonomous region in Northern Somalia that’s home to former president Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, Sheik Sharif’s rival. So far, the region refuses to even accept the president. Even if he wants to stop piracy, Menkhaus said, Sheikh Sharif may not have the influence to do so.

“It would be an unreasonable expectation that this fragile new government shut down piracy in the coming year,” Menkhaus said. With so many problems facing Somalia, “it’s not a good benchmark to measure the effectiveness of the new government.”

One asset the president is cultivating: a warm, working relationship with the Obama administration. Despite America’s role in his ouster, Sheikh Sharif sees U.S. policy as supportive of his efforts toward a stable Somalia. He told an Egyptian newspaper last week that the United States is a “force for peace” in East Africa.

“America has been honest in pushing the peace process ahead, and they encouraged us to get involved in this process,” he told ABC News. “And they have remained steadfast; that’s why we have a new goodwill toward America.”

Congratulating Sheikh Sharif on his appointment, the U.S. government commended him on working “diligently on reconciliation efforts in Somalia.” In a press statement, the Obama administration said it looked “forward to cooperating with President Sharif and his broad-based government on these efforts to establish democracy and achieve peace in Somalia.”

Somalia has not had a functioning government since 1991 and the country lacks any real infrastructure or criminal justice system. Nearly 1 million people have been displaced and about 16,000 civilians have been killed in the last three years.

There are estimates that more than 3 million people are on the verge of starvation and the unsafe security conditions make it nearly impossible for aid organizations to operate. The United Nations has called the country “the worst humanitarian crisis in Africa.”

The daunting task of pulling Somalia together is not lost on the new president.

“The surest way to get stability in Somalia is to resolve the differences through negotiation,” he said, hoping that among the various warring factions in the country there is “common ground … a widespread feeling for peace and stability, hunger for reconciliation.”

Al Qaeda, Al Shabaab Threat
His biggest threat comes from the Islamist group Al Shabaab, which launched an intense insurgency after the Ethiopian invasion three years ago. The group’s leadership has sworn allegiance to al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden and is now in control of most of Southern Somalia.

Initially, Al Shabaab declared war on Sheikh Sharif’s government-in-waiting. But meetings were held in Mogadishu during the weekend to start negotiating an agreement, according to the new president and a spokesman for Al Shabaab.

“I went back to Somalia& to consult with them and to woo those who have, until now, been against peace to come into the fold,” the president said. “I haven’t directly met with Shabaab, but I have sent some people, emissaries, to talk to them, to stop the bloodshed and to put down their arms.”

Abu Massor, who refers to himself as the spokesman for Al Shabaab, told ABC News through a translator that nearly all the leadership has agreed to accept the new president if he meets the group’s conditions. The three most important of those conditions are that the country be ruled under traditional Shariah; that foreign forces, including the African Union and the U.N. peacekeeping troops, not be allowed on Somali soil; and that Al Shabaab members have significant roles in the new government.

“If he recognizes our presence on the ground, and he is going to accept Shariah law to be applied in the country, we are going to accept him,” Massor said.

The president has not said whether he will meet Al Shabaab’s demands, which could complicate his desire for better relations with the United States.

But forming a government that includes individuals who refuse to renounce their allegiance to al Qaeda and other extremist groups will not be acceptable to either Ethiopia or the United States. Al Shabaab is likely facing its own demands from Sheikh Sharif, who is walking a fine line between forming a government acceptable to Somali people of all clans and to the international community.

“He has to reach out to his own constituency and he has a lot of constituents to please, including the United States and Ethiopia,” Davidson’s Menkhaus said. “He also has to reach out to other factions for the government to work. It can be done but only if Al Shabaab adjusts its position to address the legitimate security concerns.”

“If they don’t, Somalia is going to plunge into new levels of trouble.”

Kirit Radia contributed to the reporting of this story.

Displaced migrants live in fear, despair in SAfrica
Source: AFP, Feb 09, 2009
Jeanine fled her home in her adopted country of South Africa in May, when anti-immigrant attacks erupted across the nation, to live under a tent of plastic bags and blankets.

“They treat us like animals in South Africa,” the 32-year-old said, in a makeshift camp outside Pretoria.

About 600 other migrants are living here, even though authorities officially closed down the camp, taking away tents, toilets and electricity that the displaced people had relied on.

Jeanine and the others here fled their homes when anti-immigrant attacks broke out across South Africa for the first time since the end of apartheid in 1994.

In a nation where 43 percent of the population lives in poverty, poor South Africans struggling to survive turned against their foreign neighbours, accusing them of stealing jobs and committing crimes.

More than 60 people were killed and tens of thousands fled their homes, mainly in Johannesburg, Pretoria and Cape Town.

Researchers at the University of the Witwatersrand estimate that up to 40,000 people were living in camps opened after the violence. Some 100,000 were seeking refuge elsewhere, or in neighbouring countries.

“We don’t know what happened to a lot of people who were displaced,” said Loren Landau, director of Forced Migration Studies at the university.

“Our impression is that many of them went to communities near where they were before but not in those communities. A significant number moved for example from the townships into the city centers where there is a more migrant area where they would be protected to each others,” he said.

Authorities in Gauteng, South Africa’s richest province that includes Johannesburg and Pretoria, insist that all the victims have been reintegrated into the communities.

“All of them have come back to their communities because no one is in shelters now,” provincial spokesman Simon Zwane said.

“The situation is normal,” he said. “There have been no attacks in Gauteng.”

Zwane said the provincial government has reached out to communities to re-establish trust on the streets.

“Our response was to send teams to those communities to talk to the people … to give a message of tolerance,” he said.

But migrants in the ramshackle camps say that tensions remain.

“If we go back to our communities, we’ll be targetted. People are being killed, they are scared,” said Abdulahie Abass, leader of the Somali community in the camps, near a small open-air grocery store.

People here point to articles published in the tabloid Daily Sun in late January, which reported attacks in suburban Pretoria and said that South Africans had distributed written warnings telling Zimbabweans and Somalis to leave.

Congolese, Rwandans and Ethiopians at the camp told similar stories of daily intimidation.

“The South Africans who pass by here say, ‘Go back to your country,” one migrant said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“They say, ‘After the elections, when Zuma is president, we’ll chase you from our country’,” another added.

After the camps were closed, Amnesty International warned that violence could follow migrants back into their neighbourhoods, and decried the lack of planning on how to integrate them into the communities.

“The attacks have not stopped,” said Landau, who gave a damning assessment of the eight months since the attacks.

“The humanitarian response was very poorly organised, the effort to reintegrate people was very poorly organised and the long term efforts to address the source of the conflict was non existent,” he said.

“All the conditions that promoted the violence are still there.”

Somali president, police, military chiefs discuss security matters
Source: APA, Feb 08, 2009
Mogadishu, Somalia (APA) – The newly elected Somali president Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and the commanders of the police, military, and national security services held their first face-to face talks on security issues, since he arrived in the Somali capital on Saturday.
The Somali government spokesman Abdi Hajji Goob Doon who talked to reporters at the presidential palace after the meeting said that President Sheikh Sharif has formed a joint committee from the Transitional Federal Government and his Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia to prepare new ways of tightening security in the capital.

“This committee will work on ways of reuniting TFG forces and the militias loyal to the ARSa who are now based in different positions in the capital and other parts of the country,” the government spokesman said during a press conference on Sunday.

“The president has ordered the newly formed special committee to suddenly draw up plans of tightening security in the capital and then the entire regions of the country and we hope this will be a step forward,” he added.

The spokesman added that the joint forces will then be engaged in a big security operation in and outside the capital.

Sunday’s meeting on peace and security issues was the first of its kind to be held since the moderate Islamist president returned home from exile on Saturday.

“Sheikh Sharif succeeded in introducing peace and stability into much of Somalia in the second half of 2006 when he was the chairman of the Islamic Courts Union, and and as such, many Somalis are now very hopeful that he may once again bring peace to lawless Somalia,” the government spokesman told reporters.

Somalia has lacked a functioning government since the 1991 downfall of former military ruler General Mohamed Siyad Barre. Wars and famine have killed more than half a million people and displaced hundreds of thousands, while thousands more sought refuge into foreign nations since then.

A boatload of 115 migrants, mainly from Somalia, arrived in Malta yesterday evening.
Source:TimesofMalta
Feb. 6, 2009

The migrants, crammed on a 40-foot fishing boat, had sent out a distress signal that was picked up by the Italian authorities on Sunday. Since the boat was in the Maltese search and rescue area, the Italians informed the Armed Forces of Malta who immediately deployed a helicopter.

Army sources said the search was fruitless and hampered by bad weather conditions. The search continued on Monday with the help of a helicopter and a patrol boat but with no success.

At noon yesterday the rescue authorities in Rome informed the AFM that one of the Catania-based coast guard aircraft had sighted the migrants drifting with the current about 48 nautical miles off Malta.

The army reached the boat at about 2 p.m. and discovered that the vessel had a damaged propeller shaft. Accompanied by a patrol boat, the boat arrived at Haywharf at about 7.30 p.m.

The 115 migrants, who included 15 children and 30 women, are mainly from Somalia with seven claiming to be from Morocco.

This is the second group of migrants arriving in under a week after 262 migrants beached their boat in Marsaxlokk on Sunday at about 6 a.m.

Most of the migrants who arrived on Sunday were immediately repatriated after it was established that they hailed from Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Egypt, Libya, Pakistan and India. The group also included 30 Nigerians.

Video: captured ship ‘Faina’ freed

Radio chief in Somalia shot dead

Said Tahlil Ahmed was shot dead in Mogadishu’s Bakara Market
The director of Somalia’s independent HornAfrik radio station, Said Tahlil Ahmed, has been killed in the capital.

An eyewitness told the BBC a group of journalists were attacked on their way to a press conference called by the hardline Islamist militia al-Shabab.

A spokesman for the group denied to the BBC any responsibility for the killing.

Al-Shabab does not support the new president – Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, a moderate Islamist – recently elected by MPs as part of a peace process.

Civilians and journalists gathered outside the HornAfrik station in Mogadishu after Wednesday’s killing.

And fighters belonging to the Union of Islamic Courts – who are loyal to the new president – turned up to provide security.

Since the announcement of the murder, all radio stations in the capital have been playing Koranic verses.

Analysts say this may be out of respect for Mr Ahmed or possibly because they are frightened of further attacks.

Mr Ahmed is the third senior employee of the popular HornAfrik radio station to be killed in the past two years.

Masked gunmen

A journalist, who was with Mr Ahmed when he was attacked, told the BBC Somali Service that senior members of Mogadishu’s radio stations had been called to a press conference by al-Shabab.

We are going after those who are behind the killing and will bring them to justice
Sheikh Ali Mohamed Hussein
Al-Shabab representative

New president faces tough task

He said they were nearly at the venue in Mogadishu’s central Bakara Market when masked gunmen fired on them.

Mr Ahmed fell to the ground before his attackers approached and shot him again.

Sheikh Ali Mohamed Hussein, the al-Shabab representative in Mogadishu, confirmed his group had invited the media to a meeting in the capital about the situation in the country.

But he firmly denied al-Shabab had been behind the shooting.

He blamed an unnamed “enemy” who he said wanted to “defame” them.

“We are going after those who are behind the killing and will bring them to justice,” he told the BBC’s Somali Service.

Colleagues say Mr Ahmed was a well-respected journalist who continued working in Somalia after the collapse of Siad Barre’s regime in 1991 despite extremely dangerous conditions in the capital.

He became the director of HornAfrik in 2007 after the station’s owner, Ali Iman Sharmake, was killed by a car bomb – as he returned from the funeral of a presenter at the station who was himself murdered.

Media targets

Journalists have become targets for some of the many armed groups that roam Somalia – at least a dozen have been killed since 2007, and many more have fled the country.

President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed was elected president by MPs at a meeting in neighbouring Djibouti last Friday as part of a UN-brokered plan.

A key part of that plan was the withdrawal of Ethiopian soldiers, who had entered Somalia just over two years ago to oust the UIC.

However, al-Shabab has taken advantage of the Ethiopians’ pull-out to boost its control of the south and it accuses him of selling out to the West.

Al-Shabab now even controls Baidoa, the seat of the interim parliament, taking the central town while MPs were in neighbouring Djibouti for the presidential vote.

Somalia has not had a functioning central government for nearly two decades and tens of thousands of people have been killed in successive waves of violence.

About 3,600 Ugandan and Burundian peacekeepers, from an intended 8,000-strong African Union force, are deployed in Mogadishu.

Ethiopian troops crossing back into Somalia
Feb.3 2009
Source: AFP

MOGADISHU– Ethiopian troops have crossed the border back into central Somalia, only days after Addis Ababa completed a military pullout from its neighbour, witnesses and officials said Tuesday.

An official for the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), the movement of newly-elected Somali President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, said some Ethiopian troops had crossed from the border town of Ferfer to the village of Kalaber.

“The Ethiopian forces are violating the basic integrity of Somalia again and they entered the Hiran region only days after their government announced its complete withdrawal from the country,” Ahmed Osman Abdalla, ICU commander in the nearby western town of Beledweyn, told AFP by phone.

“If they do not pull out of our country, we will fight them to death,” he added.

Local residents said that Ethiopian forces had set up a checkpoint in Ferfer and were checking trucks and other vehicles crossing the border.

“They stopped a bus I was on in Ferfer and I could see they were checking all vehicles passing in the area,” Osman Adan said.

Local elders in Beledweyn also expressed concerns over the return of Ethiopian forces in the region.

“The move shows that Ethiopia is still creating insecurity in Somalia because they sent their troops back to Somalia and they are now only 25 kilometres (16 miles) from our town,” Beledweyn elder Haji Adan Mohamed said.

Ethiopian troops completed their withdrawal from Somalia in January, more than two years after invading to remove the ICU, which had taken control of large parts of the country.

Ethiopia propped up a weak transitional government and forced Sheikh Sharif into exile, but after two years of bloodshed in Somalia, more radical Islamist groups have gained influence.

Sheikh Sharif was elected Somalia’s new president in Djibouti on Saturday and his erstwhile foe, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, described his victory as a positive step towards restoring peace in Somalia.

Somali president sworn in

Moderate Islamist leader Sheikh Sharif Ahmed was sworn in as Somalia’s president on Saturday, promising to forge peace with east African neighbours, tackle rampant piracy offshore and rein in hardline insurgents.

Analysts say Ahmed has a real chance of reuniting Somalis, given his Islamist roots, the backing of parliament and his acceptability to the West. But reconciling 10 million people and stopping 18 years of bloodshed remain a daunting task.

Ahmed headed the sharia courts movement that brought some stability to Mogadishu and most of south Somalia in 2006, despite being accused in the West of Islamist extremism, before Ethiopian troops invaded and drove it out.

The conflict in Somalia will be resolved. We are urging our brothers in armed conflict to join us in peace-building,” he told parliament. “We will govern the Somali people with honesty and justice, and give them back their rights.”

Ahmed was sworn in at a hotel in Djibouti on Saturday morning after an election by legislators that stretched into the small hours.

His immediate task is to try to put together a unity government – the 15th such attempt since Somalia descended into anarchy with the overthrow of the dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.

His election was held in Djibouti due to the instability at home. But the legislators hope they have elected a man able to isolate or even possibly bring on board hardline insurgents, even if violence may spike in the short term.

Despite the withdrawal of Ethiopian troops this week, and the UN-brokered Djibouti peace process intended to reconcile the government and opposition, hardline Islamist insurgents led by al Shabaab have vowed to fight on.

Al Shabaab, which is on Washington’s list of foreign terrorist groups, said just before the vote that it would start a new campaign of hit-and-run attacks on the government – whoever came to power.

The group’s spokesman, Sheikh Mukhtar Robow Mansoor, urged jihadists to make ready in comments after prayers in Baidoa, the former seat of parliament that al Shabaab overran this week.

“Sheikh Sharif and the election in Djibouti is not something to be supported,” Sheikh Hassan Yacqub, al Shabaab spokesman in the southern city of Kismayu, told Reuters on Saturday.

Ahmed said those fighting to impose a strict version of Islamic law throughout the country had misinterpreted the religion and he would try to correct that.

He also said his government would not tolerate any abuse of power or corruption and treat neighbours with respect.

UN envoy to Somalia, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, hailed Saturday’s vote and called for a spirit of unity.

The Arab League also sent congratulations and urged “comprehensive Somali reconciliation.”

Somalia expert John Prendergast, co-chairman of the US-based advocacy group the Enough Project, cautioned that the election was just a “tiny step” towards peace.

“What lies ahead in a best-case scenario is a painfully slow political process,” he said.

“The tent that Sheikh Sharif will preside over will have to be wide and deep, and consciously include genuine representatives of all clans, ideologies and regions … (or) Somalia will continue to bleed.”

In the past two years, more than 17,400 civilians and an unknown number of combatants have died during an Islamist-led insurgency against the government and its Ethiopian allies.

A third of the population relies on food aid.

Under Somalia’s complicated clan system, Ahmed, a Hawiye, will now seek to appoint a Darod prime minister to ensure representation of the major groups.

Many Somalis doubted that Ahmed’s election would bring peace, saying the armed threat from hardliners remained, and an election brokered abroad may lack legitimacy in the eyes of some.

“Sheikh Sharif will face a security challenge from al Shabaab. These chaotic Islamists will take no heed of his election. He will never tackle Somalia’s crisis unless he is fully supported by the international community,” said a Mogadishu local elder, Abdiqadir Farah.

Islamist leader sworn in as Somali president
By David Clarke
source: Reuters
DJIBOUTI- Moderate Islamist leader Sheikh Sharif Ahmed was sworn in as Somalia’s president on Saturday, promising to forge peace with east African neighbors, tackle rampant piracy offshore and rein in hardline insurgents.

Analysts say Ahmed has a real possibility of reuniting Somalis, given his Islamist roots, the backing of parliament and a feeling in once hostile Western nations that he should now be given a chance to try to stabilize the Horn of Africa nation.

“As for the international concerns of piracy and the misinterpretation of Islam we will take concrete action,” Ahmed said after being sworn in the same hotel conference hall where a peace deal was signed to bring the opposition into government.

There is widespread recognition both within and outside Somalia that reconciling 10 million people who have been tormented by clan-fueled violence and anarchy for the past 18 years is a daunting task.

“What lies ahead in a best case scenario is a painfully slow political process aimed at building a coalition of the center, one local entity or leader at a time,” said Somalia expert John Prendergast, co-chairman of the U.S.-based advocacy group the Enough Project.

There were some signs of hope in Somalia’s capital Mogadishu after Ahmed was elected in an all-night parliament session held in neighboring Djibouti due to security concerns at home.

Residents fired anti-aircraft missiles into the sky in celebration after a long vigil in front of the television or next to radios. In the morning, people in Mogadishu waved green branches to show their support and marched in the streets.

“Welcome Sharif, we are tired of war. Let Somalis join hands,” chanted mother of three Farhia Hassan.

A 42-year-old former high school geography teacher, Ahmed headed the sharia courts movement that defeated Mogadishu’s powerful warlords and brought some stability to the capital and most of south Somalia in 2006.

While initially welcomed for bringing order, the West accused the Islamic Courts Union of links to extreme terrorist groups and Washington’s chief regional ally, Ethiopia, sent troops to drive the Islamists from power.

SUMMIT IN ETHIOPIA

Ahmed fled the country and set up the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS) with Islamist allies, while insurgents in the country began fighting to remove the Ethiopian troops, who finally pulled out this month.

“It reduces the Ethiopian footprint to a fingerprint and puts the Somalis back in control,” said a Western diplomat, adding that Islamist fighters should also give Ahmed a chance.

Al Shabaab, which is on Washington’s list of foreign terrorist groups, said just before the vote that it would start a new campaign of hit-and-run attacks on the government — whoever came to power.

“Sheikh Sharif and the election in Djibouti is not something to be supported,” Sheikh Hassan Yacqub, al Shabaab spokesman in the southern city of Kismayu, told Reuters on Saturday.

Some regional leaders and Western diplomats say al Shabaab is made up of little more than clan-based bandits using the banner of religion to justify their crimes.

In the past two years, more than 17,400 civilians have died during the insurgency, a third of the population now relies on food aid and some 2.5 million have been driven from their homes, a Somali human rights group said on Saturday.

The Islamist leader will fly on Sunday to the very country that booted him from office, as a president attending an African Union summit in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa.

He will return to Mogadishu after the summit and his immediate task is to try to put together a unity government — the 15th such attempt since Somalia descended into anarchy with the overthrow of the dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.

Ahmed said his government would not tolerate any abuse of power or corruption and treat neighbors with respect.

Legislators hope they have elected a man able to isolate or even bring on board hardline insurgents, but warned his task would be even tougher unless he forms a true unity government.

(Additional reporting by Abdi Sheikh and Abdi Guled in Mogadishu and Abdiaziz Hassan in Djibouti; Editing by Katie Nguyen)

Somalia to pick new president
01/30/2009
Source:AFP
DJIBOUTI— Somali lawmakers were to elect a new president Friday, with the current premier and the Islamist opposition leader clear frontrunners in the battle to take the helm of the war-ravaged country.

The newly-enlarged parliament comprising the more moderate wing of the Islamist-led opposition was due to vote in Djibouti on a replacement for Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, who resigned last month.

A long list of politicians have entered the fray but Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein and Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, who heads the pro-peace branch of the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS), are the frontrunners.

“My first priority is to bring peace to Somalia and I will serve the nation to the best of my ability,” Sheikh Sharif said at a lunch in Djibouti on Thursday, in an eleventh-hour bid to muster more support for his candidacy.

The cleric, in his 40s, is also the head of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), which briefly controlled much of Somalia in 2006 before being ousted by an Ethiopian military invasion.

Ethiopian troops moved into neighbouring Somalia to oust what they saw as an extremist Islamic movement on its doorstep and prop up a weak Somali transitional federal government.

But after two years of deadly guerrilla war, the Ethiopians have pulled out with little to speak for, more radical groups have blossomed and Sheikh Sharif is seen by many as the candidate of the political centre.

According to observers in Djibouti, his main opponent in the election is Hussein, who emerged victorious from his latest tussle with former president Yusuf but whose TFG is weaker than ever.

“My administration will be the continuation of the peace process… The election is part of my efforts to end the civil war in a peaceful way,” he told AFP on Thursday.

Hussein is seen as one of the main factors that helped the UN-sponsored reconciliation process get off the ground, eventually clinching the commitment of a large faction of the ARS in 2008.

Highly regarded by the international community for his humanitarian background and integrity, his critics say he has little sway over his own clan and lacks the charisma to yank Somalia out of 18 years of civil conflict.

While ARS MPs should vote massively for Sheikh Sharif, Hussein’s TFG camp is fractured, with some allies of former president Yusuf throwing their weight behind the opposition frontrunner.

“We will vote for him (Sheikh Sharif) without any reservation. His election will be the era of unity,” said Abdi Irro, an MP with close ties to Yusuf.

Former speaker and senior ARS official Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden also defended Sheikh Sharif’s presidential bid as the best way to lead the Horn of Africa country out of the cycle of violence.

“He is one of the most prominent figures in Somalia. Sheikh Sharif is the best choice to overcome the current crisis,” he told lawmakers Thursday.

If the election is completed on Friday, the new president will be sworn in on Saturday, in time to represent his country at the African Union heads of state summit in Addis Ababa later this weekend.

Somalia has had no effective central authority since the 1991 ouster of former president Mohamed Siad Barre touched off a bloody cycle of clashes between rival factions.

Whoever wins the presidential election will face the daunting task of taming the Shebab, a hardline offshoot of the ICU, which rejects the peace process and controls several key towns.

Former prime minister Ali Mohamed Gedi and Barre’s son are also among the candidates in Friday’s vote.

“There are only few major candidates despite the long list of 15. Some are really running for the presidency but others just want to add a line to their CV,” MP Hussein Mohamed Jama said.

The number of candidates was limited by the fact that each one had to raise 2,000 dollars for the electoral commission.

Q+A-Somalia’s presidential election
Source:ReutersBy David Clarke
DJIBOUTI, Jan 29- Somalia’s parliament is due to elect a new president on Friday at reconciliation talks in neighbouring Djibouti. Here are some questions and answers about the vote and what happens next:

WHAT IS THE AIM OF THE TALKS?

* The talks are part of U.N.-brokered peace negotiations known as the Djibouti process. At the moment, they involve the government and the moderate Islamist wing of the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS).

* The aim of the Djibouti meeting was to double the size of parliament to include 200 new ARS members, extend the mandate of the government for another two years and elect a president to replace Abdullahi Yusuf, who quit in December.

* Somali talks have often dragged, but the international players in Djibouti have been cracking the whip to get things done. The election of the president is the last step.

* There are now 475 members of parliament. Another 75 seats have been left vacant for civil society members and other opposition groups not taking part in the process to join later.

* Why Djibouti? Insecurity in Somalia since Ethiopian troops propping up the government left meant it was not deemed safe for the talks to take place there. The seat of parliament, Baidoa, was overrun by hardline Islamist insurgents this week.

HOW DOES THE ELECTION WORK? * Applications closed earlier on Thursday. Somali election officials in Djibouti say there are 14 candidates although a final list has yet to be released.

* According to Somalia’s constitutional charter, candidates must be at least 40, Somali citizens and practising Muslims.

* The candidates will each give a 15-minute speech to parliament on Thursday, starting at 1430 GMT. The election will start on Friday at 1200 GMT.

* The process should take three rounds as the field is whittled down to six candidates and then two through secret ballots. The winner in the final round needs a simple majority.

* The president will be inaugurated in Djibouti on Saturday and fly to Ethiopia for an African summit starting the next day. The prime minister’s position and cabinet posts are expected to be filled over the following week in Djibouti.

WHO ARE THE MAIN PLAYERS?

* The two leading candidates are generally seen as Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein and Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, the moderate Islamist leader from the ARS.

* Other candidates who have declared or are said by political sources to be on the final list include:

- Ali Khalif Galaydh, a former prime minister and academic living in the United States.

- Mohamed Mohamud Guled, a former minister who was appointed prime minister last December by Yusuf but quit a few days later.

- Mohamed Qanyare Afrah, a former minister and warlord who ran for president in 2004.

- Yusuf Azhari, a former envoy to Kenya and adviser to Yusuf.

- Maslah Mohamed Barre, the son of ex-dictator Siad Barre.

- Abdirahman Abdi Houssein, a former army general and now envoy to Iran.

* While Hussein and Ahmed are seen as the leading contenders, clan interests can play a significant role in Somali politics and alliances can shift quickly.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

* The first major challenge will be to ensure a sufficient level of security so the new assembly can gather in Somalia.

* With Baidoa currently out of the question, the U.N. envoy to Somali Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah expects the government to return to the capital Mogadishu next week.

* But Mogadishu faces regular attacks and suicide bombings by Islamist insurgents. There are 3,500 African peacekeepers in the capital, but they only control parts of the city.

* Abdallah, neighbouring Djibouti and some other international players would like donors to provide urgent financial support to establish a local security force.

* The African Union has been pushing to beef up its own force although pledges to send more troops have yet to be fulfilled. The AU has threatened to pull out unless Somali politicians forge ahead with the reconciliation process.

* Immediate security issues aside, the other task for the new government and president will be to try and reach out to Islamist opposition groups still fighting.

* Crucial to any lasting peace will be bringing in the more hardline Islamist wing of the ARS lead by Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys and based in Asmara, the capital of Eritrea.

* Then the government and security forces will have to try and weaken the hardline fighters of al Shabaab who control much of the south and centre of Somalia and want to impose their strict version of sharia law throughout the country.

* All in all a daunting task for Somalia’s new leader. As Djibouti’s President Ismail Omar Guelleh put it, they will have to be strong, brave — and not afraid to die. (Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)

Somali pirates hijack German gas tanker
By KATHARINE HOURELD
Source: AP
Jan.29, 2009
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Somali pirates hijacked a German gas tanker and its 13-man crew Thursday in the Gulf of Aden, the third ship captured off the Horn of Africa this month.

The MV Longchamp, registered in the Bahamas, is managed by the German firm Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement, which said in a statement that seven pirates boarded the tanker early Thursday.

Spokesman Andre Delau said the ship’s master had been briefly allowed to communicate with the firm and had said the crew of 12 Filipinos and one Indonesian were safe.

“We think that everything is in order, nobody is injured,” he told The Associated Press.

No ransom demands have been made yet, the company said.

Lt. Nathan Christensen, a Bahrain-based spokesman for the U.S. 5th Fleet, said the ship was seized off the southern coast of Yemen, 60 miles (95 kilometers) from the town of al-Mukalla, the capital of Yemen’s Hadramaut region. Yemen is on the north side of the Gulf of Aden, while Somalia is on the south.

Robin Phillips, deputy director of the Bahamas maritime authority in London, said the Longchamp had been traveling in a corridor secured by EU military forces when it sent a distress signal before dawn.

“Ships and helicopters were dispatched, but they arrived too late,” said Phillips, who added that gun shots could be heard over the radio.

He said the ship later set a course south for Somalia.

The tanker is designed to carry pressurized liquefied gas, but Phillips said he did not know whether it was full. Liquefied petroleum gas is a mixture of gases used to fuel heating appliances and vehicles. The mixture can be mostly propane, or mostly butane, or a combination of both.

Piracy has taken an increasing toll on international shipping, especially in the Gulf of Aden, one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes, which links the Mediterranean Sea and the Suez Canal with the Indian Ocean. Pirates made an estimated $30 million hijacking ships for ransom last year, seizing more than 40 vessels off Somalia’s 1,900-mile (3,000-kilometer) coastline.

Somali waters are now patrolled by more than a dozen warships from countries including Britain, France, Germany, Iran and the United States. China and South Korea have also ordered warships sent to the region to protect their vessels and crews from pirates.

Somalia, a nation of about 8 million people, has not had a functioning government since warlords overthrew a dictator in 1991 and then turned on each other. Its lawless coastline is a haven for pirates.

The Longchamp is the third ship to be hijacked in the Gulf of Aden this year. Six have been released. Cyrus Mody of the International Maritime Bureau said 166 crew on nine ships were still being held off the coast of Somalia, not including the Longchamp.

Associated Press writers Barbara Surk in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Mike Melia in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Simone Utler in Hamburg, Germany and David Rising in Berlin contributed to this report.

Opposition MPs sworn in as Somali plan advances
Wed Jan 28, 2009
Source:reuters
By David Clarke and Abdiaziz Hassan

DJIBOUTI, Jan 28 (Reuters) – Somalia’s parliament swore in new opposition members on Wednesday as it prepared to elect a president this week in a long-awaited step towards ending 18 years of conflict.

Meeting for security reasons in neighbouring Djibouti, the parliament voted to extend its mandate until August 2011 and swore in nearly 150 out of 200 new members from the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS).

The United Nations and African Union (AU) have been cracking the whip to get a more inclusive parliament up and running and a president elected in time to attend an African summit in Ethiopia on Sunday.

Security will be the new leader’s main challenge. Hours after Ethiopian troops who had been propping up the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) pulled out of Somalia on Monday, al Shabaab Islamist fighters captured the seat of parliament. The capital Mogadishu could also be at risk of more attacks.

The previous Western-backed government failed to establish stability in a country where more than 16,000 civilians have been killed in the past two years, and which the United States fears could serve as a haven for terrorists. The chaos onshore has allowed piracy to flourish in Somalia’s waters.

Presidential hopefuls have until Thursday morning to apply. The candidates are due to address parliament later that day and the election will take place on Friday afternoon.

“We are going to tell the Somalis to take their responsibilities,” said U.N. envoy Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah. “I expect Somalia to form its government and return to Mogadishu.”

ISLAMIST CANDIDATE
Another challenge will be to try to encourage hardline Islamist opposition members based in Eritrea to join a peace process they have snubbed so far.

“We know that there are a lot of people who are not yet with us. I hope these people will join and see the fruits of this reconciliation,” said Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein.

Moderate Islamist Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, the presidential candidate from the ARS, was the first new opposition member of parliament to be sworn in. Candidates put their hand on the Koran and swore they would protect the country’s constitution.

Outside the meeting in Djibouti’s People’s Palace conference centre, presidential candidates handed out their CVs to members of parliament and had their photos taken with them.

The list of candidates is growing daily. Besides Ahmed and Prime Minister Hussein, there are members of the TFG and a former prime minister and academic living in the United States.

Hussein and Ahmed are currently seen as frontrunners. But if one wins, the other would not be able to become prime minister as they are from the same clan. Somalia’s political framework aims to reflect the country’s clan structure in government. (Editing by Mark Trevelyan)

Al-Shabaab fighters seize Somali parliament headquarters
Source: Xinhua

BIADOA, Somalia, Jan. 26 — Al-shabaab movement Monday has taken over the southern Somali town of Baidoa, the seat of the parliament, after brief clashes with government forces and local clan militias, hours after Ethiopian troops withdrew from the town, the Al-shabaab said.

It was not clear if there were any casualties on the warring sides but four civilians have been killed and six others wounded in the chaos that preceded the takeover.

Ethiopian troops have fully withdrawn from Baidoa, 245 km southwest of the Somali capital Mogadishu, and the last base of the Ethiopian troops who crossed over to the war-wrecked horn of African country two years ago to prop up the transitional Somali government.

The town has been the seat of the Somali interim parliament for the past three years. Nearly all the lawmakers have left Baidoa for Djibouti.

Spokesman for the Al-Shabaab movement, Sheik Muqtar Robow Abu Mansuur, who was leading the insurgent fighters, said that his forces have taken over much of the town of Baidoa including the interim parliament building in the south of the town.

Earlier Abu Mansuur said following the withdrawal of the Ethiopian troops, that his fighters, who control now most of the villages and towns around Baidoa will “peacefully take over the town” which is guarded by small number of local militia and Somali government forces.

Mohamed Ibrahim Habsade, a senior Somali cabinet minister told Xinhua in Baidoa that government forces as well as local militias are fighting to defend the town from Al-Shabaab forces who he said now “took parts of the town”.

Habsade is one of a number of senior Somali government officials including several parliamentarians from the town trying to protect Baidoa.

Local residents remained indoors since the start of the fight for control of Baidoa as government forces and local militias took up positions around the north of the town where widespread looting of government properties including the presidential residence and parliament house took place prior to the insurgent’s entry into it.

Somalia’s parliament meets amid calls for peace
Source:reuters
By David Clarke

DJIBOUTI, Jan 25 (Reuters) – Somalia’s parliament met in neighbouring Djibouti on Saturday to discuss how to include the moderate Islamist opposition in a new government that can try and bring peace to the Horn of Africa nation.

After over four years in office, a Western-backed interim government has failed to bring stability to a country where more than 16,000 people have been killed in the past two years and the chaos onshore has fuelled rampant piracy.

The international community has been urging Somalis to settle their differences, expand the parliament and elect a new president next week, in time for a summit of regional leaders.

Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, the moderate Islamist leader from the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS), told the legislators it was time to join forces, oppose the perpetrators of violence and end the bloodshed.

“This is a day to correct past mistakes. We have to take this historic opportunity,” he told the opening of the talks. “There’s no excuse for Somalis to kill each other.”

The international community hopes a more inclusive Somali government will be able to reach out to armed groups who are still fighting the government and targeting African Union peacekeepers in the capital Mogadishu.

The challenge ahead was underlined on Saturday by the worst insurgent attack in weeks. A policeman and 13 civilians were killed in Mogadishu when a suicide car bomb aimed at the African Union soldiers missed its target.

The African Union’s special envoy to Somalia, Nicolas Bwakira, condemned the attack as “barbaric” and warned the Somali politicians that if they failed to make progress, the peacekeepers could leave.

“We have no reason to be in Somalia to provide protection and support to institutions that do not exist, that do not deliver to their people,” he said.

NOT BUSINESS AS USUAL

The United Nations’ envoy to Somalia, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, was also in threatening mood, saying it was time to think about sending those fuelling the violence to the International Criminal Court. He urged the politicians to make fast progress.

“This has to end,” he told the legislators. “It’s not going to be business as usual.”

But while the U.N. wants the politicians to stick to the tight timeline for electing a new president, some members of the government and the ARS are saying they need time to discuss how to bring in other militant opposition groups.

Some say that without first tackling these issues, an agreement in Djibouti would have little impact on the violence on the ground, nor end the suffering of Somalis.

The more militant Islamist wing of the ARS based in Eritrea has so far refused to take part in the peace process, nor have fighters in the hardline Islamist group Al Shabaab, who want to impose their strict version of Islamic law in Somalia.

“We have to discuss what approach we will take to bring in the other opposition,” said member of parliament Mohamed Mohamud Guled. “Without them we won’t be able to resolve this.”

The first step is for the 275-member Somali parliament to amend the constitutional charter so up to 200 ARS members can join. The new assembly is then expected to elect a new president to replace Abdullahi Yusuf who quit in December. (Additional reporting by Abdiaziz Hassan in Djibouti; Editing by Charles Dick)

Ethiopia withdraws all troops from Somalia
Source: AFP
ADDIS ABABA (AFP) — Ethiopia said on Sunday it has completed the withdrawal of its troops from Somalia where they were deployed two years ago to help the Somali government fight an Islamist insurgency.

“The Ethiopian army has successfully completed its mission in Somalia and it has been fully withdrawn,” said Communications Minister Bereket Simon.

“There is no armed presence in Somalia anymore. Our troops are fully in their own backyard at the moment,” he said.

“It was a successful mission. The major task to get rid of the extremist threat was accomplished in a swift way. We believe that the forces of instability led by the Eritrean government have been dealt a heavy blow by Ethiopia.”

Ethiopia had blamed Eritrea for supporting the Somali Islamists, while Eritrea accused its arch-foe of occupying a sovereign country.

Ethiopia sent troops to neighbouring Somalia in late 2006 to support the country’s fragile transitional government against Islamist insurgents who had won control of most of the country but were later ousted by the forces in early 2007.

Addis Ababa announced on January 2 that it had started the final withdrawal of its forces from war-torn Somalia.

The troops had faced relentless attacks by the Shebabs, the military youth wing of the vanquished Islamic Courts Union who remained in the country after the political leaders of the movement fled.

The Shebab and other militia have since regained control of much of the territory they lost to the Ethiopia-backed Somali forces, with the government only present in Mogadishu and the provincial town of Baidoa.

Residents of Baidoa, the seat of parliament, said they saw a convoy of Ethiopian army trucks driving out of the south-central town.

“I saw about 30 Ethiopian military vehicles outside Baidoa early this morning heading towards Dolo,” said witness Abdiweli Yusuf, referring to a town on the Somalia-Ethiopia border.

State-run Ethiopian News Agency said the troops were given a “warm welcome” by residents of Dolo.

“The return of the defence force with mission accomplished is a source of pride,” the agency quoted the town’s mayor Usman Abdulnaser as saying.

After the Ethiopian troops completely pulled out of Mogadishu earlier this month, fighters allied to moderate Islamist leader Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed took control of the abandoned bases.

Ahmed’s Islamist-dominated Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS) has signed a peace agreement with the government and is set to join parliament which is expected to be expanded at a meeting on Monday.

Part of the deal reached under the United Nations-mediated negotiations being held in Djibouti included Ethiopian troop pullback, a ceasefire and the formation of joint security units to gradually take over until UN peacekeepers are deployed.

But the Ethiopia pull-out sparked security concerns for the war-ravaged country, where African Union peacekeepers have also come under attack by the insurgents and have been unable to stem the conflict.

On Saturday, at least 22 civilians were killed in a suicide car bomb aimed at the AU peacekeepers, but which missed its target and rammed into a bus, killing 17 people. Five others were killed in the ensuing gunfight.

The Horn of Africa country has lacked an effective central authority since the 1991 ouster of president Mohamed Siad Barre sparked internecine violence.

Security forces in NW Somalia seize illegal missile launchers
Source: Xinhua
MOGADISHU, Jan. 23– Security forces in the self-declared republic of Somaliland in northwestern Somalia on Friday sized nearly 10 small one-time use anti-aircraft missile launchers and arrested two suspects in connection with the illegal weapons in Hargeisa, capital of the state, reports reaching here said.

Abdullahi Ismail Irro, the interior minister of Somaliland which declared its independence from the rest of Somalia in 1991, said the missile launchers were originally from Eritrea and were transported through the central Somali region of Galgadud before they were stored in a house in Hargeisa.

“We have information that the missile launchers were brought from Eritrea and came to Somaliland through Galgadud region in central Somalia,” Irro told reporters in Hargeisa.

“The weapons are shoulder-held one-time use missile launchers and were kept in a house in Hargeisa where we make arrests of two suspects.”

The two suspects from Somalia are under investigation by Somaliland police and the motive or uses for the anti-aircraft launchers have not yet been established.

Somaliland has not received international recognition for its secession from Somalia since the collapse of the Somali government in 1991. However the region, which enjoys relative stability, has its self-government, flag, police and military forces and currency.

The region has been the target of three car bomb attacks in late October of last year in which twenty-four people were killed and more than two wounded.

Eleven youths suspected of being trained with the hardline Islamist group of Al-Shabaab in the south-central Somalia were arrested. The youths reportedly arrived from Mogadishu to Hargeisaand had lived in the United States.

The suicide bombers were Somali youths allegedly recruited and trained by Al-Shabaab movement to carry out the attacks in Hargeisa. The movement which is active in south central Somalia did not claim responsibility for the suicide attacks which also targeted the northeastern semiautonomous region of Puntland.

Since then authorities in Somaliland have tightened security in the capital Hargeisa, the airports, seaports and all the other entry points of the region.

Uganda wants $14m compensation for African Union Somalia mission
Friday, 23 January 2009
Source: MONITOR
The government wants compensation worth $14m from the African Union for the depreciation of its military hardware being used in the peace keeping mission in Somalia.

The Minister of Defence, Dr Crispus Kiyonga, told Members of Parliament yesterday that Uganda should be compensated for weapons worn out in the past two years as it executed the African Union mission in Somalia. “We have made calculations of the depreciation and the total comes to around $14 million dollars. We expect this money soon,” he said.

Dr Kiyonga, who was appearing before the parliamentary committee on Defence and Internal Affairs, said before UPDF deployed in Somalia, AU agreed to compensate for the devalued weapons used to keep peace in the anarchic state. Uganda deployed 1,500 soldiers in 2007, who were later joined by two Burundian battalions in the lawless state to make a 3,000-strong force.

The Chief of Defence Forces, Gen. Aronda Nyakairima, asked MPs to urge the African Union to swiftly pay for the depreciated equipment “Honourable members, if you can, please tell them to quickly work on the reimbursement,” Gen. Aronda said.

He said Uganda and Burundi were planning to send more 1,600 troops to fill the security vacuum left by Ethiopian forces in the Somali capital Mogadishu.

This means there is still a vacuum of 3,500 troops to reach the targeted 8,000-strong force. “We are sending a third battalion to beef up security. Burundi is preparing to another as we wait for Nigeria which has recommitted itself to send troops,” he said. Gen. Aronda said the Transitional Government in Mogadishu is in talks with the opposition to recruit 10,000 soldiers who will supplement the AU force.

Somali lawmakers leave for Djibouti for presidential election
Source:Xinhua
Jan.23, 2009

Somali parliamentarians have started leaving the southern town of Baidoa for Djibouti City, capital of neighboring Djibouti, where the Somali presidential election is scheduled to be held later this month, the deputy speaker said Thursday.

Since the former Somali President Abdulahi Yusuf Ahmed resigned late December, the venue for the presidential election has been a point of disagreement within the Somali transitional government as some including the parliament speaker, Adan Madobe, maintained that the election be held in the parliamentary seat of Baidoa while others said it should be held in Djibouti city.

“We have agreed to go along with the Speaker who is also the acting President of the state. He urged us to the common consensus that we go to Djibouti for the election of the President and we are going there,” said Osman Ali Boqore, deputy speaker, as nearly fifty members of parliament boarded a chartered plane bound for Djibouti.

The remaining lawmakers are expected to fly to Djibouti on Friday where the Speaker of the parliament, Adan Madobe will also arrive to chair the final session of the current 275-member Somali parliament which will approve its expansion to include members from the opposition, Boqore said.

The new expanded assembly would include 275 new members with 200 of them from the opposition Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS) while the 75 members will be distributed among Somali civil society and the diaspora, according to an agreement between the Somali transitional government and the opposition last year.

Under the agreement, the new parliament will elect new senior government leaders such as the president and the speaker within the legal time limit of thirty days starting after Dec. 29 of the past year when the former president resigned. A number of politicians have announced their candidacy in the presidential election in Djibouti later in the month.

Yemen grants asylum to ex-Somali president
Source: AFP

SANAA – Yemen has granted political asylum to former Somali president Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, who resigned in late December after a row with his prime minister, a Yemeni presidency source said on Wednesday.

“The president of Yemen granted Somalia’s president the right of political asylum last night,” the source told AFP.

The ex-head of state has been given a permanent home in Yemen, which faces Somalia on the other side of the horn of Africa.

Yusuf stepped down on December 29 after having tried and failed to sack Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein.

The president’s bid to push Hussein out of his job was thwarted when parliament backed the prime minister with a massive vote of confidence.

Yusuf clashed with Hussein over their approach to the opposition. During his time as president, Yusuf had poor relations with the opposition, who accused him of obstructing the peace process.

Conflict in Somalia and power struggles that erupted since 1991 have hampered successive initiatives to restore any semblance of order to the country, where the government is facing a military campaign by Islamist fighters.

2 killed during attack on AU force in Somalia
by By MOHAMED SHEIKH NOR
Source:AP
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — At least two civilians were killed during an attack on African Union peacekeepers by an extremist Islamic group in the Somali capital, witnesses said on Sunday.

Al-Shabab, an extremist Islamic group, attacked two AU bases late Saturday. The troops retaliated, leading to heavy fighting, said Mohamed Hussein, a resident in the area where the attack happened.

“I saw two dead men killed by mortar rounds,” Hussein said.

AP Photo/ Farah Abdi Warsameh

Fadumo Ali, a nurse at Medina hospital, said nine civilians wounded in the attack were brought to her hospital.

The AU peacekeepers’ spokesman Barigye Bahoku said the force did not suffer any casualties. Al-Shabab spokesman Sheik Muktar Robow told local radio stations his group carried out the attack.

On Sunday, AU troops patrolled parts of Mogadishu in tanks.

Al-Shabab has threatened to focus its attacks on AU troops now that Ethiopian troops, who had been on a two-year deployment, have left Mogadishu. The U.S. State Department considers al-Shabab a terrorist organization linked to al-Qaida, something the group has denied.

On Saturday, the AU peacekeeping force commander Maj. Gen. Francis Okello said in neighboring Ethiopia that he was not worried by threats from hostile groups, indirectly referring to al-Shabab.

The AU force in Mogadishu has a restricted mandate guarding key government installations and has not been involved in a lot of the violence in the capital during which thousands of civilians have been killed over the past two years. But hardline groups have viewed it as an occupying force.

Al-Shabab has been the most aggressive of the Islamic groups that have been waging a two-year insurgency since Ethiopian troops deployed to Somalia to support the weak U.N.-backed government.

The last Ethiopian troops left Mogadishu Thursday and various Islamic militia groups took over the bases they vacated. Until Saturday’s fighting, there had been no reports of violence.

The departure of the Ethiopians has raised fears of a power vacuum at a time when Somalia is also facing rampant piracy off its coast. The country has not had a functioning government since 1991.

Chaos feared in Somalia after Ethiopians pullout
Source:AlJazeera

One day after the withdrawal, there are underscoring fears the country could fall into further chaos because of fresh clashes between rebel fighters and the departing Ethiopian forces.

Clashes erupt in Somali capital

Clashes between Somali fighters and Ethiopian troops have killed at least 21 people and wounded 48 others in Mogadishu, witnesses say.

The fighting erupted on Wednesday after fighters attacked the presidential palace, ambushing departing Ethiopian soldiers in the Somali capital.

A heavy exchange of mortar and gunfire later ensued, witnesses said.

Al-Shabab, an armed group that has been fighting the transitional government and Ethiopian forces in Somalia, is thought to be behind the attack.

Ethiopian withdrawal

The violence underlines fears of an upsurge in bloodshed after Ethiopia’s military completes its troop withdrawal from Somalia.

Ethiopian fighters exit Mogadishu

On Thursday, the last of the Ethiopian forces withdrew from their bases in Mogadishu. They face a 500km journey through Somalia to the border.

Fighting in Somalia has killed more than 16,000 civilians since the start of 2007, after Ethiopia sent military forces to help the government drive out the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) from Mogadishu.

After vacating four bases on Tuesday, the Ethiopians left two more on Wednesday, one at a football stadium.

Abdullahi Hassan, a Mogadishu resident, told Reuters: “The Ethiopians have deserted the stadium and many residents have come to watch.”

“We see only chairs and their footprints,” he said.

Chaos feared

Analysts say the ongoing withdrawal of 3,000 Ethiopian soldiers will leave a vacuum, triggering more violence by fighters who have battled the UN-backed administration for two years, and are now increasingly fighting each other.

Some Somalis are pessimistic about a return to peace in a nation that has suffered 18 years of incessant civil conflict.

Ahlu Sunna Waljamaca, a spokesman from a government-allied Sunni group, said: “No Somali wants the Ethiopians to stay, but there will be chaos whether they withdraw or not.”

Sheikh Muktar Robow Mansoor, al-Shabaab’s national spokesman, told a news conference in Mogadishu that his group would focus on attacking African Union (AU) troops and government targets.

“Now that the Ethiopians have left the bases we used to attack, we shall launch attacks on AMISOM (AU mission), the government and the airport,” he said.

The AU currently has 3,500 soldiers in Somalia.

Hundreds of Africans Drown En Route to Yemen
Source:The Media Line

Another case of mass drowning off the Yemeni coast was revealed over the weekend, as Yemeni authorities announced that three illegal migrants’ ships carrying 400 Africans capsized near Bab Al-Mandab at the Red Sea, the Yemen Post reported.

The majority of illegal immigrants on board the ships came from Somalia, according to the Ministry of Interior. Coast Guard sources said that only a few dozen immigrants managed to swim to shore, where they were apprehended.

In a similar incident last week, a ship carrying 120 Somalis capsized and 40 people drowned. Another ship, carrying 32 Ethiopians, was captured by the Yemeni Coast Guard and those on board were arrested.

Yemen’s Ministry of Interior revealed that more than 1,100 Somali refugees landed in the country during the first two weeks of January. Ministry officials estimated that the number would increase as more Somali refugees are undertaking this hazardous journey to escape their lawless homeland.

The ongoing civil war in Somalia, which has not seen a functioning government for almost two decades, push thousands of citizens to escape to nearby Yemen each year.

The Gulf of Aden separates Somalia and Yemen by 170 nautical miles at its widest point, and by 100 nautical miles at other points.

The United Nations reported that more than 43,500 illegal migrants – mostly Somalis – arrived in Yemen by boat during 2008.

In 2007, Yemeni authorities reported more than 1,400 illegal migrants were either killed or went missing while attempting to cross the Gulf of Aden.

Numerous reports indicate that smugglers are forcing refugees to jump into the water as they approach the shore, so that they – the smugglers – would not be caught by the Yemeni navy.

Ethiopian force pulling out of Somalia
Source:boston Globe
MOGADISHU, Somalia – Ethiopia handed over security duties yesterday to a Somali force, raising fears that the Horn of Africa country – already fighting an Islamic insurgency and rampant piracy – could collapse into chaos if extremists with alleged Al Qaeda links move to seize power.

The Ethiopian pullout after a two-year deployment was widely welcomed by Somalis who had viewed the troops as an occupying force, but the Ethiopians also have provided a measure of stability in a land plagued by extreme poverty and relentless warfare.
Ethiopian soldiers left Mogadishu after a ceremony yesterday marking the transfer of security duties in Somalia. (Farah Abdi Warsameh/associated press)

Few expect the Somali government can ensure security even with the help of the Islamist faction it has agreed to share power with. The government controls only pockets of the capital, Mogadishu, and Baidoa, where Parliament sits – and has tried to rule without a president for weeks.

It was unclear when all the thousands of Ethiopians will depart. They were pulling out in stages and gave no exact dates for security reasons.

An African Union peacekeeping force of about 2,600 remains in Somalia, where it is limited to guarding the seaport, the capital’s main airport, and government buildings, all in Mogadishu.

The United States this week circulated a draft resolution at the United Nations calling for a UN peacekeeping force to be deployed to replace the AU force.

Somalia has not had a functioning government since warlords overthrew a dictator in 1991 and then turned on one another. Its weak UN-backed government called in the Ethiopian troops in December 2006 to oust an umbrella Islamic group – which included the al-Shabab extremists at the center of the current fighting – that had controlled southern Somalia and the capital for six months.

The Islamists launched an insurgency that has killed thousands of civilians and prompted Somalia’s president to resign in December, saying he had lost control of the country.
———————————————-
Bardhere (allAfrica)— Heavy fighting between Ethiopian soldiers accompanied by Somali government soldiers and Islamist insurgents has broken out in Bardhere town in Geda region, southern Somalia early on Monday morning, Shabelle’s correspondent reported.

Residents say that the fighting has started about 02:00 local time in Kilaliyow Mountain which is 12 kilometers north of Bardhere town in Gedo region and both allied soldiers and the Somali Islamist insurgents have exchanged heavy weapons which could be heard in all the areas around the town during the fighting.

Mohamed Abdi kalil, a deputy district commissioner of Bardhere town and Col. Warfaa Sheik Aden known as (Farole), a government soldiers’ officer in Jubba regions, southern Somalia have talked the fighting and said that there were more casualties including deaths and wounds but could not be confirmed and denied that the fighting was involved by Ethiopian troops.

The real casualty of the fighting is unclear and there is no group who claimed the responsibility of the fighting in Bardhere town yet. Reports from Bardhere town say that the fighting was stopped and the situation returned calm.

The Ethiopian troops arrived in Somalia in 2006 to help the transitional government oust Islamists from the capital but many of Somalis were deeply unpopular with the Ethiopian intervention.

The fighting comes as Ethiopian government announced it will withdraw its troops from Somali territory in over the past week but delayed.

25 killed in fighting in Somalia between rival Islamist groups

MOGADISHU (AFP) – Fighting between rival Islamist groups in central Somalia left at least 25 people dead and more than 50 wounded Sunday, said local elders and witnesses.

Clashes broke out between fighters of the hardline Shebab militia and members of a more moderate religious group, the Ahlu Sunna Wal-jama’ah in Guriel, about 500 kilometres (310 miles) northeast of Mogadishu.

“It was the heaviest clash ever in the region between the two sides,” Abdulahi Hirsi Moge, a local elder, told AFP.

AFP/File – African Union Peacekeeping Forces patrol a street in Mogadishu in 2007.

“We have counted at least 25 people, most of them combatants, killed in the fighting and there is still a possibility of some undisclosed dead bodies outside of the town,” he added.

Local resident Ahmed Abdifatah said the fighting had stopped around midday and the dead bodies, at least 25 of them, were being collected from the streets. The wounded, including several civilians, had been taken to hospital, he added.

Mohamed Adan, a member of staff at the main hospital in the town, said at least 51 people had been admitted after the fighting.

The two forces clashed several times for control of the town at the end of December.

Somalia has been in the grip of a civil war since 1991, with no central government strong enough to impose its authority.

Shebab officials blame Ethiopian troops — who invaded the country in 2006 to back the government but who are in the process of pulling out — of supporting some religious groups against them.