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| Africa Horn | |
| Peace Accord Brings More Violence to Somalia | |
| 2008-06-14 | |
Violence in the Somali capital Mogadishu and elsewhere has increased dramatically since a U.N.-backed peace agreement was signed Monday in Djibouti between Somalia's transitional federal government and a moderate faction of the Islamist-led opposition group in Eritrea.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reports that at least 30 civilians were killed and nearly 100 wounded in Mogadishu alone this week. Witnesses say Shabab fighters, armed with machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars, have ambushed government and Ethiopian troops in various parts of the capital, including a deadly attack on Thursday on forces patrolling a road near the presidential palace. On the same day and for the second time this month, the Shabab launched mortars at Somalia's interim President Abdullahi Yusuf at Mogadishu's airport as he tried to board a flight to Ethiopia. Late Wednesday, residents in the border town of Ferfer in the ethnically Somali Ogaden region of Ethiopia say Shabab fighters attacked two Ethiopian military bases there and sparked heavy fighting that lasted nearly two hours. The militants briefly seized the town before withdrawing. The spokesman for the Shabab group, Sheik Muktar Robow, says the attacks this week underscore the group's determination to defy what he called a false cease-fire agreement signed by men who do not represent his group. Robow says Shabab fighters attacked the town of Ferfer and will continue to attack Ethiopians wherever they are until they are defeated. He went on to say, "We will see if those who signed the agreement can bring about a real cease-fire." The Shabab, along with hardliners in an Eritrea-based opposition group called the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia, boycotted the U.N.-sponsored peace talks in Djibouti. Those talks produced an agreement on Monday that calls for a three-month truce and the withdrawal of Ethiopian troops after the deployment of a sizeable force of U.N. peacekeepers in Somalia. | |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #1 Now, that's so typical. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2008-06-14 06:55 |