NAIROBI, Dec 25 (Reuters) - Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi said Islamists at war with his Ethiopian-backed government had 8,000 foreign fighters in their ranks but would never capture the administration's base in Baidoa. "My confidence is very high. We have enough military forces to defeat any invasion, any attack by the terrorists of the so-called Islamic Courts," Gedi told Reuters in an interview by telephone from Baidoa on Sunday night.| "The Ethiopians have my back so I'm free to lip off once again!" |
Saying government troops inflicted a major defeat on the Islamists near the town of Dinsoor on Sunday, Gedi predicted the government, which now has overt military support from Ethiopia, would be victorious. "We will definitely remain in Baidoa. If we go anywhere, it will be to (the capital) Mogadishu," he said. "Once they get defeated, they will run away. Then we will move to Mogadishu, where the people are waiting for us."
Gedi said foreign Muslim militants were pouring into Somalia and this he said confirmed the government's accusations the Islamists were led by terrorists. "Their numbers have doubled in just the last few weeks to about 8,000," he said. "Only in the Dinsoor area on Sunday, where we had the worst fighting yet, there were more than 4,000 foreign fighters."