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| Africa Horn | ||
| Al-Shabaab sez they'll use Somaliland ports, airports | ||
| 2009-05-28 | ||
“AU is lying, they can restrict us we can transport and equipments we have through Somaliland ports and airports into a country with a suitcase” Alshabaab said in a statement posted on www.alshabaab.net before it’s [was?] suspended. They continued: "It would be a relatively easy and simple process. A few hundred dollars and a plane ticket and you could have a pretty good stab at it." Trying to stop everything coming in at the border and seaports plus airports would not work, the statement said.
The statement also called for imposing a UN blockade of Somalia's airstrips and seaports "to prevent the entry of foreign elements into Somalia" to join the Islamist militants in their armed campaign against the western-backed Somali interim government and the AU peacekeepers deployed in the Horn of Africa country. In response to the AU call for UN sanctions, Eritrea on Saturday rejected the allegations of supporting the Somali insurgents and suspended its membership of the African Union. Earlier in the week, the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a six-member east African regional bloc, had called for imposing UN sanction on Eritrea, accusing it of supplying arms to the Somali Islamist insurgents. The IGAD also suspended Eritrea from the bloc, which currently consists of Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia, Djibouti, Sudan and Uganda, and urged the United Nations to impose an air and sea blockade on Somalia to prevent the Islamist militants there from getting arms and foreign fighters. The calls for imposing UN sanctions on Eritrea came as clashes intensified in the Somali capital of Mogadishu after the government forces launched a major counter offensive to recapture the areas captured by the rebels in their recent offensive. The latest attacks by the Islamist militants are aimed at overthrowing Somalia's interim government led by President Ahmed, who had agreed in March to enforce Islamic law in the country to appease the militants after they seized control of many major towns in southern and central Somalia, including Baidoa, the seat of the Somali interim government. Somali officials say that more than a hundred people have been killed and over 45,000 others displaced from Mogadishu after a combined force of two militant Islamic groups, al-Shabab and Hisbul-Islam, launched the anti-government offensive ten days ago. The al-Shabaab group, a military wing of the Islamist movement ousted by Ethiopia-backed Somali forces two years ago, and several other allied militants groups have opposed past UN-sponsored reconciliation efforts in Somalia, and insist that they will negotiate with the country's transitional government only after the AU peacekeeping mission leaves Somalia. Currently, a 4,300-strong AU force is struggling with their peacekeeping efforts in Somalia after the ousted Islamist fighters turned to guerrilla warfare against the government and AU troops. So far only Uganda and Burundi have contributed troops to the AU peacekeeping force, which was initially planned to have strength of over 8,000. | ||
| Posted by:Seafarious |
| #1 TOPIX > SOMALIA ASKS FOR INTERNATIONAL HELP TO FIGHT EXTREMISTS/MILITIAS. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2009-05-28 00:42 |