AVOID MUSLIM SOMALIA


More Than 20 Killed in Deadly Bombings in Mogadishu, Afgooye


Saturday August 17, 2024


MOGADISHU, Somalia (HORN OBSERVER) - Over 20 people have been killed in a series of deadly bombings in Mogadishu and Afgooye on Saturday, marking a tragic day for Somalia.

In Mogadishu, the death toll from a double IED bombing at a teashop in Dayniile District has risen to 18, with more than 10 others injured, according to eyewitnesses. The blasts targeted a popular teashop where locals often gather to chew khat and relax in the afternoon. Among the victims were women working at the teashop.

A survivor of the attack described fleeing after the first explosion, only to hear a second blast moments later. Residents who arrived as first responders believe the IEDs were planted due to the teashop's popularity with soldiers.

In a separate incident, at least four people were killed and several others injured in a bomb explosion at a khat market in the city center of Afgooye, approximately 30 kilometers from Mogadishu. Eyewitnesses reported that two bombs were likely hurled into the market as traders crowded the busy streets.

The attacks have left both communities in shock and mourning. No group has yet claimed responsibility for either attack, and local authorities have not yet commented on the incidents. The police and emergency services were notably absent from the scenes, leaving locals to manage the aftermath on their own.

These attacks underscore the escalating insecurity in Somalia, with civilian casualties continuing to rise amid ongoing terror campaigns



Somali police say 32 people died in an attack on a beach hotel. Al-Shabab claimed responsibility.


OMAR FARUK
Sat, August 3, 2024


MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Police in Somalia said Saturday that 32 people died and 63 others were wounded in an attack on a beach hotel in the capital, Mogadishu, the previous evening.


Al-Qaida’s East Africa affiliate, al-Shabab, said through its radio station that its fighters carried out the attack.


Police spokesperson Maj. Abdifatah Adan Hassan told journalists that one soldier was killed and another wounded, while the rest of the dead were civilians. Witnesses reported an explosion followed by gunfire.


Lido Beach, a popular area in Mogadishu, is bustling on Friday nights as Somalis enjoy their weekend.


A witness, Mohamud Moalim, told The Associated Press that he saw an attacker wearing an explosive vest moments before the man “blew himself up next to the beach-view hotel.”


Moalim said some of his friends who were with him at the hotel were killed and others were wounded.


Another witness, Abdisalam Adam, told the AP that he “saw many people lying on the ground” and had helped take some wounded people to the hospital.


The Lido Beach area has in the past been targeted by militants allied to al-Shabab. The most recent attack last year killed nine people.


In a separate attack on Saturday, state media reported that seven people died after a passenger vehicle hit a roadside bomb some 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the capital.


Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud last year declared a “total war” on the militants as the country started taking charge of its own security.


Al-Shabab still controls parts of southern and central Somalia and continues to carry out attacks in Mogadishu and other areas while extorting millions of dollars a year from residents and businesses in its quest to impose an Islamic state.


Friday's attack came a month after Somalia started the third phase of the drawdown of peacekeeping troops under the African Union Transition Mission.


The U.N Secretary-General’s Acting Special Representative for Somalia, James Swan, on Saturday expressed support and solidarity for Somalia “in its efforts to ensure peace, security, and stability.”


He said Lido Beach is frequented by families and that “targeting this location is an abhorrent act that warrants the firmest condemnation.”


Over one million people displaced in four months in Somalia: UN

Hillary ORINDE
Wed, May 24, 2023
AFP


More than a million Somalis have been displaced within their own country in just over four months through a "toxic" mix of drought, conflict and floods, humanitarian agencies said Wednesday.


Around 433,000 people were forced from their homes between January 1 and May 10 as a grinding Islamist insurgency raged and clashes broke out in the breakaway Somaliland region, the UN refugee agency UNHCR and Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) said.


In addition, "over 408,000 people were displaced by floods sweeping across their villages and another 312,000 people were displaced by ravaging drought," they said in a joint statement.


Somalia and its neighbours in the Horn of Africa including Ethiopia and Kenya have been suffering the worst drought in four decades after five failed rainy seasons that have left millions of people in need and decimated crops and livestock.
UN chief Antonio Guterres and world governments are meeting in New York on Wednesday at a conference to seek funding of $7 billion to help those in need across the region.


At least 43.3 million people require lifesaving and life-sustaining assistance in the Horn of Africa, the UN humanitarian agency OCHA said last week.


The number of people displaced within Somalia's borders now stands at 3.8 million, with 6.7 million people struggling to find food, according to the UNHCR and NRC.


More than half a million children are severely malnourished, they added.


"These are alarming figures of some of the most vulnerable people forced to abandon the little that they had to head for the unknown," said Mohamed Abdi, the NRC's country director in Somalia.


"We can only fear the worst in the coming months as all the ingredients of this catastrophe are boiling in Somalia."


Most of the families have fled the Hiraan region in central Somalia and Gedo in the south of the country of 17 million people and are arriving in overcrowded urban areas, putting a strain on already stretched resources.


- 'Human tragedy' -


The agencies called for urgent and greater investment to combat the crises "otherwise we will never see the end of this unfolding human tragedy," said Magatte Guisse, UNHCR's representative in Somalia.


Currently, aid agencies have received only 22 percent of funding to meet their needs for Somalia this year.


Al-Qaeda linked Al-Shabaab jihadists have been fighting the fragile central government since 2007 and control parts of the countryside from where they have carried out numerous attacks both in Somalia and in neighbouring countries.


Meanwhile flash flooding has hit central Somalia since May after heavy rainfall sent water gushing into homes in Beledweyne town in Hiraan, submerging roads and buildings and killed 22 people.


The Horn of Africa has been scarred by protracted armed conflicts and climate disasters with the World Food Programme (WFP) warning on Wednesday that crises were far from over.


"The last three years of drought has left more than 23 million people across parts of Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia facing severe hunger," the WFP said in a statement, adding that it would take years for the region to recover.


OCHA said last week that while famine "has been prevented" in the region, the humanitarian emergency was not over.


Car bombs at Somali education ministry leave scores of casualties


October 29, 2022


MOGADISHU, Oct 29 (Reuters) - Two car bomb explosions at the education ministry in Somalia's capital Mogadishu killed or wounded scores of people on Saturday, police and the state news agency said.


Authorities said the Islamist group al Shabaab carried out the attack, which they said had targeted the education ministry, an intersection and a school.


"At 2:00 p.m. al-Shabaab terrorists carried out two explosions targeting civilians, including children, women and the elderly," police spokesman Sadiq Doodishe said.


Doodishe said police would give the death toll and number of injured later. State news agency SONNA, said the blasts had caused "scores of civilian casualties including independent journalist Mohamed Isse Kona".


The Somali Journalists Syndicate (SJS) confirmed that Kona, a TV reporter, had been killed.


The first explosion hit the ministry then the second blast occurred as ambulances arrived and people gathered to help the victims, police officer Nur Farah told Reuters.


Another police officer guarding the ministry, who gave his name as Hassan, told Reuters he saw at least 12 bodies and more than 20 people wounded.


A Reuters journalist near the blast site said the two explosions occurred within minutes of each other and smashed windows in the vicinity. Blood from victims of the blasts covered the tarmac just outside the building, he said.


Moments after the blasts a large plume of smoke rose over the site.


"The second blast burnt our ambulance as we came to transport the casualties from the first blast," Abdikadir Abdirahman of the Aamin Ambulance Service told Reuters.


A driver and a first aid worker had been injured in the blast, he said.


The attack took place at the same point where Somalia's largest bombing took place the same month in 2017.


In that bombing, which killed more than 500 people, a truck bomb exploded outside a busy hotel at the K5 intersection which is lined with government offices, restaurants and kiosks.


Al Qaeda-allied al Shabaab, which has been fighting in Somalia for more than a decade, is seeking to topple the central government and establish its own rule based on a strict interpretation of sharia law.


The group uses a campaign of bombings both in Somalia and elsewhere and targets have included military installation as well as hotels, shopping centres, and busy traffic centres.


In August at least 20 people were killed and dozens injured when al Shabaab militants stormed the Hayat Hotel in Mogadishu, triggering a 30-hour stand-off with security forces before the siege was finally ended.


Somalia's new president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, with support from the United States and allied local militias has launched an offensive against the group although results have been limited.



20 Dead, 40 Wounded as Radical Islamist Gunmen Storm Somali Hotel


Associated Press
August 20, 2022


Islamic militants have stormed a hotel in Somalia's capital, engaging in an hours-long exchange of fire with the security forces that left at least 20 people dead, according to police and witnesses.


In addition, at least 40 people were wounded in the late Friday night attack and security forces rescued many others, including children, from the scene at Mogadishu's popular Hayat Hotel, they said Saturday.


"The United States strongly condemns the Al-Shabaab attack at the Hayat Hotel in Mogadishu," State Department spokesman Ned Price wrote in a statement Saturday. "We express our heartfelt condolences to the families who lost loved ones, wish a full recovery to those injured, and commend Somalia’s security forces. The United States remains steadfast in our support of Somali and African Union-led efforts to counter terrorism and build a secure and prosperous future for the people of Somalia."


The attack started with explosions outside the hotel before the gunmen entered the building.


Somali forces were still trying to end the siege of the hotel almost 24 hours after the attack started. Gunfire could still be heard Saturday evening as security forces tried to contain the last gunmen thought to be holed up on the hotel's top floor.


The Islamic extremist group al-Shabab, which has ties with al-Qaida, claimed responsibility for the attack, the latest of its frequent attempts to strike places visited by government officials. The attack on the hotel is the first major terror incident in Mogadishu since Somalia's new leader, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, took over in May.


In a Twitter post, the U.S. Embassy in Somalia said it "strongly condemns" the attack on the Hayat.


"We extend condolences to the families of loved ones killed, wish a full recovery to the injured, & pledge continued support for #Somalia to hold murderers accountable & build when others destroy," it said.


There was no immediate word on the identities of the victims, but many are believed to be civilians.


Mohamed Abdirahman, director of Mogadishu's Madina Hospital, told the AP that 40 people were admitted there with wounds or injuries from the attack. While nine were sent home after getting treatment, five are in critical condition in the ICU, he said.


"We were having tea near the hotel lobby when we heard the first blast, followed by gunfire. I immediately rushed toward hotel rooms on the ground floor and I locked the door," witness Abdullahi Hussein said by phone. "The militants went straight upstairs and started shooting. I was inside the room until the security forces arrived and rescued me."


He said on his way to safety he saw "several bodies lying on the ground outside hotel reception."


Al-Shabab remains the most lethal Islamic extremist group in Africa.


The group has seized even more territory in recent years, taking advantage of rifts among Somali security personnel as well as disagreements between the government seat in Mogadishu and regional states. It remains the biggest threat to political stability in the volatile Horn of Africa nation.


Forced to retreat from Mogadishu in 2011, al-Shabab is slowly making a comeback from the rural areas to which it retreated, defying the presence of African Union peacekeepers as well as U.S. drone strikes targeting its fighters.


The militants in early May attacked a military base for AU peacekeepers outside Mogadishu, killing many Burundian troops. The attack came just days before the presidential vote that returned Mohamud to power five years after he had been voted out.


Terrorist bomb attack on Somali club bus kills 3 and wounds 6

 

2nd August 2021

Inside World Football

By Paul Nicholson

 

August 1 – Barely two weeks after the celebration of a full Mogadishu Stadium for a top of the table league clash, Somali football was struck by tragedy on Friday after a terrorist attack on a team bus killed two players, the bus driver and wounded five others.

 

The bomb blast happened on the JCCI football club bus in the southern city of Kismayo. The JCCI players were on their way to the Waamo Stadium which was being relaunched after being redeveloped under the FIFA Forward project.

 

Player Abdi Fitah Hassan Abdulllahi, and the team’s bus driver died on the spot, while Hanad Hassan Yusuf, later died of his wounds sustained in a blast

 

Local police said the explosive device had been planted inside the team’s bus.

 

The JCCI club founder Shafi Raabi Kaahin, was killed in a suicide attack in September last year. Al Shabaab claimed responsibility for his killing. No terrorist group has as yet claimed responsibility for Friday’s atrocity.

 

Two players, Mohamed Amin Abdi Mohamed and Osman Hassan Osman, who were seriously wounded in the blast, have been flown to Mogadishu where they were admitted to Erdogan hospital in the capital on Saturday.

 

Somali football federation president, Abdiqani Said Arab, who was in Kismaayo on Friday at the time of the attack escorted the players to Mogadishu.

 

“We have brought the two wounded players here to the Erdogan hospital today. The SFF is responsible for all the care and the treatment they need. I wish them a speedy recovery” Said Arab.

 

“I am very sorry that such atrocities happened to our players. My thoughts are with the family and relatives of the slain players. This is unacceptable.”

 

On Friday the Somali Football Federation said in a statement: “We call on the federal government of Somalia and the Jubaland regional authorities to investigate this unacceptable and barbaric attack against footballers and suddenly bring the perpetrators to justice.”

 

 

Somalia: At least 30 killed in Al Shabaab terrorist attack

 

Reuters/Mogadishu

Filed on June 28, 2021

 

An estimated 30 people died on Sunday when Somalia’s al Shabaab group launched an attack in a town in the country’s semi-autonomous state of Galmudug, a security official said.

 

The insurgents used car bombs in the assault on a military base in Galmudug’s Wisil town, located in central Somalia, triggering a fight with government troops and armed locals, Major Mohamed Awale, a military officer in Galmudug told Reuters.

 

“They attacked the base with two car bombs and fierce fighting that lasted over an hour followed,” he said.

 

“The car bombs damaged the military vehicles...residents were well armed and reinforced the base and chased the al Shabaab.”

 

Thirty people, including 17 soldiers and 13 civilians, died in the fighting, Awale said.

 

The al Qaeda-allied al Shabaab has been fighting in Somalia for more than a decade to try to topple the country’s central government and establish its own rule based on its strict interpretation of Islamic sharia law.

 

Fighters from the group frequently carry out gun and bomb assaults on a range of both civilian and military targets including busy traffic intersections, hotels and military bases.

 

During the attack that lasted about an hour, Abdullahi Mohamed, a resident in Wisil said he and others had “crept and slept on the ground,” and added he had personally seen about 30 people injured in the assault.

 

The Somalia government condemned the attack and said 41 al Shabaab fighters had been killed in the fighting as both the military and armed residents pursued the assailants, according to a statement posted on the website of the Somalia state news agency, SONNA.

 

Those injured in the attack, the statement said, had been airlifted to the capital Mogadishu for treatment.

 

Al Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attack via a statement on its Radio Al Andalus and said its fighters had killed over 30 soldiers and injured over 40 others.

 

 

New Report Shows Militant Group Al-Shabab Collecting $15 Million A Month in Tax Revenue in Somalia

 

Organization for World Peace

November 25, 2020  in Africa / Current Events / Somalia by Jason Woodroofe

 

What happens when a terrorist group collects almost as much in taxes from citizens than the government? A new report by the Hiraal Institute alleges that in Somalia this has been the case. The insurgent group al-Shabab is estimated to be collecting an approximate $15 million USD a month from Somali citizens. That’s $180 million USD a year. Anadolu Agency reported that in 2017 the Somali government’s overall tax revenue for the year was $141 million USD. 

 

Al-Shabab has been conducting a brutal insurgency in Somalia since 2004 and effectively controls the southern half of the country. Even in the northern half, al-Shabab holds a large degree of influence as is evidenced throughout the findings of the Hiraal Institute report. 

 

The report is the second in two years on the capabilities of al-Shabab’s domestic financing and tax collection. This report indicates a large jump in the capabilities of the group compared to just two years prior. The report is based off interviews with 70 bussinessmen, government officials, al-Shabab defectors and even current members of the group’s tax collection wing. The interviews took place in person and via the phone.

 

Hiraal’s findings show a well designed network of tax collection that is evolving over time. Current revenue streams for the group include placing a tax on the import and export of shipping containers at ports, an annual individual religious tax, a tax on irrigation in rural areas and the collection of tolls from checkpoints. Reuters reports that Hiraal’s findings come before a long anticipated “United Nations report expected to say al Shabaab is generating a significant cash surplus and moving millions of dollars through the formal banking system.” 

 

The level of taxation that al-Shabab is achieving is an impressive feat, but it is driven by intimidation and fear. The report highlights multiple examples of intimidation and coercion. One of the most notable of these is about a Somali military officer who refused to pay taxes to al-Shabab. 

 

The commander was attempting to construct his house when his contractors quit after being threatened by al-Shabab. The same thing happened to the second group of contractors and eventually even the materials for the house stopped arriving after the trucks were held up by the militants. In the end the commander had no choice but to pay almost $3,600 in tax to the group in order to finish construction. 

 

Al-Shabab has recently had a major resurgence in Somalia during the end of 2019 and start of 2020. With increased access to finances and an unchecked sense of confidence, al-Shabab may further dominate Somalia in years to come. 

 

 

A race against time: the new law putting Somalia's children at risk of marriage

 

Child marriage in the country has increased during coronavirus – and now a newly-tabled bill would allow children as young as 10 to marry

 

The Guardian

September 3, 2020

 

Fardowsa Salat Mohamed was 15 when her cousin asked her parents for her hand in marriage. Her father did not hesitate to say yes. When Mohamed objected, her father asked her to choose between “a curse and a blessing”.

 

“That was not a choice for me, I was basically forced,” she says. “No girl would ever choose to be cursed by her parents so I had to accept the marriage,”

 

Mohamed, who is from the town of Baidoa in south-central Somalia, was at school, dreaming of becoming a doctor. She had to drop everything and become a wife. Three years later, Mohamed was divorced with two children. She is now back living at her parents’ house.

 

According to the latest government figures, 34% of Somali girls are married before they reach 18, and 16% of them before their 15th birthday.

 

While children are married off for different reasons, such as the economic benefit of a dowry, and an increase in child marriage cases has been reported during the coronavirus pandemic, early marriage is rooted in Somali culture. An old Somali saying goes: “Gabadh ama god hakaaga jirto ama gunti rag,” which loosely translates as “a girl should either be married or in a grave”.

 

Marriage under 18 is not illegal, although Somalia’s constitution prohibits it and the country is signed up to several international treaties promising to tackle it. In July 2014, the government signed a charter committing to end child marriage by 2020. But in August, the Somali parliament tabled a controversial bill that would allow a child to be married once they reached puberty, which can mean 10 years old. The sexual intercourse related crimes bill would also allow marriage if parents consented. The UN has called the bill “deeply flawed”.

 

The new bill has been fiercely criticised after MPs realised that it was different from a sexual offences bill unanimously adopted in 2018 by ministers but not enacted, which sought to prevent child marriage, and effectively criminalise a wide range of sexual offences.

 

Last year, the speaker of the house returned the draft bill, which has been in development since 2013, to the cabinet requesting changes. It remained dormant until two weeks ago when a new version was introduced under a new name: the sexual intercourse related crimes bill.

 

“It is completely unacceptable,” says Sahra Omar Ma’alin a member of the parliament’s human rights committee. “We have to protect the rights of our children. We have asked the deputy speaker to bring back the original bill, which we had been working on for so many years. It was such a comprehensive document that provides women the dignity and protection they deserve.”

 

Somalia’s current political instability and the forthcoming general electionsmakes it difficult for Ma’alin and civil society organisations to keep the pressure on for human rights.

 

The country is now run by a caretaker government after prime minister Hassan Ali Khaire was ousted in a vote of no-confidence in July.

 

“It is a race against time as the parliament’s mandate is going to end in a few months,” says Ma’alin. “The fate of our children is being politicised. Some politicians are using the bill as a campaign tool. They attempted to carry out the voting in the same manner they used to remove the former prime minister – in just a seven-minute debate – but we will never allow that to happen.”

 

In 2015, Somalia ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which the UN applauded as a significant achievement for the country’s 6.5 million children.

 

“It is a shocking development, given that 2015 was a watershed moment for Somalia,” says Brendan Ross, chief of child protection at Unicef Somalia.

 

“Unicef has been supporting the Somali government in domesticating that convention. To see a piece of drafted legislation which allows for the marriage of young girls once they are ‘sexually capable’ is astonishing in 2020. We are certainly opposed to that and the UN is unified on that.”

 

It took Mohamed five months to convince her parents to allow her to get divorced. Her former husband was addicted to chewing khat, the stimulant leaf common in east Africa.

 

“He would spend the little money he gets on khat instead of buying milk for our hungry children,” she says. “He took advantage of the support he had from my family. But I was relentless and kept on demanding until I was finally relieved.”

Although her parents welcomed her home, Mohamed has to support her children. Her father can only do so much, as he is already struggling to put food on the table for his other 10 children and two wives.

 

Mohamed now ekes out a living selling tea on the street, putting up with the stigma associated with being a single mother. “My priorities in life have changed. My main mission now is to build a better future for my kids so that they never experience what I went through.”

 

 

Somalia car bomb attack: At least 79 dead, 125 injured in blast during rush hour in Mogadishu

 

Dec 29, 2019

Associated Press

 

A truck bomb exploded at a busy security checkpoint in Somalia's capital Saturday morning (local time), killing at least 79 people including many students, authorities said. It was the worst attack in Mogadishu since the devastating 2017 bombing that killed hundreds.

 

The explosion ripped through rush hour as Somalia returned to work after its weekend. At least 125 people were wounded, Aamin Ambulance service director Abdiqadir Abdulrahman said, and hundreds of Mogadishu residents donated blood in response to desperate appeals.

 

President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed condemned the attack as a "heinous act of terror" and blamed the local al-Shabab extremist group, which is linked to al-Qaida and whose reach has extended to deadly attacks on luxury malls and schools in neighbouring Kenya.

 

Bodies lay on the ground amid the blackened skeletons of vehicles. At a hospital, families and friends picked through dozens of the dead, gingerly lifting sheets to peer at faces.

 

Most of those killed were university students returning to class and police officers, said Somalia's police chief Gen Abdi Hassan Hijar. He said the vehicle detonated after police at the checkpoint blocked it from proceeding into the city.

 

Somalis mourned the deaths of so many young people in a country trying to rebuild itself after decades of conflict. Two Turkish brothers were among the dead, Somalia's foreign minister said, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned the attack.

 

 

Car bomb kills 11, injures 10 at Somalia shopping mall

 

AFRICA / 4 FEBRUARY 2019 

BY ABDI SHEIKH

Reuters

 

MOGADISHU - A car bomb exploded at a shopping mall in Somalia's capital on Monday, killing 11 people and wounding 10 in an attack that police said was probably carried out by Islamist group Al-Shabaab.

 

The blast occurred in Mogadishu's Hamarweyne district, a busy area with shops and restaurants.
"Several dead people were removed from a wrecked building at the blast scene. So far death toll is 11 civilians and 10 others injured," police officer Mohamed Hussein said.

 

Hussein had earlier put the death toll at two.

 

A Reuters witness saw one dead person at the scene, where four cars burned and a restaurant was destroyed.

 

Al-Shabaab frequently carries out bombings in Mogadishu and other parts of Somalia against government and other targets.

 

The group is trying to oust the Western-backed central government and establish its own rule based on its strict interpretation of sharia law.

 

Al-Shabaab's militants also carry out attacks outside Somalia. Its latest assault in neighbouring Kenya, a suicide and gun attack at an office and hotel complex in the capital Nairobi last month, killed 21 people.

 

Al-Shabaab want Kenya to withdraw its troops from Somalia where they are stationed as part of an African peacekeeping force which helps defend the central government.

 

 

Final death toll hits 512 in Somalia truck bombing in October


The Los Angeles Times

December 2, 2017


The final death toll in October's massive truck bombing in Somalia's capital is 512 people, according to the committee tasked with looking into the country's worst-ever attack.


The final toll is a dramatic increase from previous estimates of more than 350 killed. The committee's report, obtained by the Associated Press, says another 312 people were wounded in the Mogadishu bombing and 62 people remain missing.

Somalia's government has blamed the Al Qaeda-linked Shabab extremist group for the Oct. 14 attack, which struck a crowded street. Security officials said the bomb weighed between 1,300 and 1,700 pounds as the extremist group's bomb-making capabilities grow.


The attack appalled Somalis, with some calling it their “9/11.” Thousands later marched in defiance against the extremist group, while the president announced a new military offensive.


Shabab often attacks high-profile areas in Mogadishu. Somali intelligence officials have said the massive truck bomb was meant to target the heavily guarded airport, where several countries have embassies, but instead detonated in the crowded street after soldiers opened fire and flattened one of the truck's tires.


The Islamic extremist group, the deadliest in Africa, has been targeted this year by nearly 30 U.S. military drone strikes after the Trump administration approved expanded operations against it and declared the southern part of the Horn of Africa nation a zone of active hostilities. The U.S. now has more than 500 military personnel in Somalia.



Somali president says no quick fix for nation's woes


Mustafa HAJI ABDINUR

February 22, 2017


Mogadishu (AFP) - Somalia's new President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed sought to downplay high expectations of his new administration at his inauguration Wednesday, saying it would take decades to fix the nation's many problems.


"Our government is facing so many challenges and even though I will be doing my best, I also want to make clear for the Somali public that due to limited resources regarding economy and forces of security, what we could do is going to be limited," he said.


The president, widely known by his nickname Farmajo, officially took office last week, but his inauguration was held Wednesday in the presence of several regional leaders.


The ceremony took place in the highly secured airport zone to avoid an attack by the Al-Qaeda linked Shabaab group, which has threatened a "vicious war" against the new government.


The election of the no-nonsense Farmajo -- whose brief stint as prime minister in 2010-11 is fondly remembered -- sparked elation in a country desperate for an end to decades of conflict and anarchy.


But he warned the country that there would be no quick fixes.


"Your problems were created during twenty years of conflict and droughts. A solution will need more than another twenty years," he said.


Farmajo said he would focus on "the basic essential problems" but that his work would have to be carried on by future governments.

President Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya, Djibouti's President Ismail Omar Guelleh and Ethiopia's Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, as well as delegations from Kuwait and Egypt, attended the ceremony.


- Millions going hungry –


Farmajo said that insecurity along with a cycle of droughts which have parts of Somalia at risk of famine were the main challenges facing his administration.


The UN says about six million Somalis need humanitarian assistance, and three million are in the official "crisis" and "emergency" zone of food insecurity, which means they are suffering acute malnutrition and going long periods without meals.

Somalia has not had an effective central government since the collapse of Siad Barre's military regime in 1991, which led to decades of civil war and lawlessness fuelled by clan conflicts.


The Shabaab was forced out of the capital by African Union troops in 2011 but the jihadists still control parts of the countryside and carry out attacks against government, military and civilian targets, seemingly at will, in Mogadishu and regional towns.


"With my leadership, I promise Somalia will regain its respect and integrity," Farmajo said.


He said the long list of things that needed to be accomplished included "completion of the reconciliation among Somali clans, improving law and order and the justice system (and) regaining of the confidence by the Somali public to their government."

He said he would focus on rebuilding an army capable of serving a country whose security is still largely assured by 20,000 regional troops with the African Union's AMISOM peacekeeping force, which plans to withdraw in 2018.


- 900 killed last year –


In a sign of the challenges facing Farmajo's administration, a car bomb at a busy market on Sunday killed 39 people.


The president has offered a $100,000 (95,000 euro) reward for information on who carried out the attack, attributed to Al-Shabaab, or on potential strikes.


"Al-Shabaab killed about 900 innocent Somalis, most of them children, women and elderly, during attacks and blasts last year ... I am telling you that killing a number of people and destroying property will not deter Somalis," Farmajo said.


In his speech he reached out to youths who are fighting alongside extremists, suggesting the government would offer them alternatives to a life of violence.


"Somalia is united today and we are telling the misguided Somali youngsters to abstain from detonating themselves into their people and not to destroy the property of their country."


"We are ready to welcome those misguided youths with open hands and to provide them with incentives to start up their business," he said.



Death toll in Somalia marketplace blast rises to 34


February 19, 2017

Associated Press


MOGADISHU, Somalia   The death toll from a car bomb at a marketplace in Somalia's capital has risen to 34 with 52 injured, said a police officer.


Many of the dead were carried away by their relatives soon after the blast, said Capt. Mohamed Hussein.


"It was a horrific and barbaric attack only aimed at killings civilians," he said from the scene of the blast.


Sabriye Abdullahi, an ambulance driver told The Associated Press that some of the injured victims died on their way to the hospitals.


"Many of them suffered extensive third degree burns and others were burned beyond recognition," he said.


The blast by a car bomb parked near a restaurant went off at a busy time when shoppers and traders were gathered inside the market, said district commissioner Ahmed Abdulle.


Mohamed Haji, a butcher who suffered shrapnel wounds, pointed to a clothes shop devastated by the blast. "Someone had parked the car here and left before it was detonated," he said. Pieces of wood and metal sheets on the ground were all that remained of the shop.


Women sobbed and screamed outside the market as rescue workers moved bloodied bodies and wounded victims into ambulances.


"It's a painful carnage." said Ali Mire, a government soldier who was helping a friend with shrapnel wounds.


The powerful explosion was the first major attack since Somalia's new president was elected on Feb.8. Although no group has yet claimed responsibility, it bears the hallmarks of Somalia's Islamic extremists rebels, al-Shabab. In a Twitter post, President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed condemned the blast, saying that it shows the "cruelty" of al-Shabab.


A few hours before the blast, al-Shabab denounced the new president as an "apostate" and vowed to continue fighting against his government.


Italian Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano, in a statement condemning the attack, said that "Italy remains solidly on Somalia's side in the process of the country's stabilization." He added that "together we will act so that the terrorists don't succeed in stopping the path of peace and reconciliation that is underway."



Somali bombings leave 23 dead


AUGUST 21, 2016

CNN

MOGADISHU, Somalia A pair of suicide car bombings struck a government building in Somalia on Sunday, killing 23 people, including two attackers, authorities said.

 

Many of the fatalities are students and local traders who were at a nearby school and market in the town of Galkayo, police said.

 

One bomber rammed his explosives-laden vehicle into the main gate of the building, killing several people, local police Capt. Abdi Hassan said.

 

Minutes later, as people gathered to help the wounded, a second car bomb exploded. At least one police officer was killed, authorities said.

 

The terror group Al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attack, which targeted a government compound housing administrative offices, police said. The group’s spokesman, Sheikh Abdiaziz Abu Musab, spoke to Andalus Radio, a pro-militant station.

 

Northern Galkayo is under the control of Puntland, a semi-autonomous state in northeast Somalia.

 

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and Prime Minister Omar A Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke strongly condemned the attack, describing it “barbaric and heinous.”

 

A representative of UN Secretary-General in Somalia Michael Keating issued this statement: “This act of terror highlights the vulnerability of Somali civilians including children to actors who continue to use violence to achieve their objectives.”

 

Troubling trend

 

The attack follows a similar pattern of bombings in the country also claimed by Al-Shabaab, which wants to turn Somalia into an Islamist state.

 

In late July, six people died after double suicide car bombs exploded in Mogadishu.

 

Just days prior, suicide bombers detonated two vehicles laden with explosives near the capital’s Aden Adde International Airport, killing at least 12.

 

In June, the group also claimed separate attacks on two hotels popular with Somali politicians, which left more than two dozen people dead.

 

 

Al-Shabaab hits African Union base in Somalia

 

By Michael Pearson and Robyn Kriel

January 15, 2016

 

(CNN)Kenya's President vowed retribution Friday after Al-Shabaab fighters attacked an African Union base in Somalia, killing an unknown number of Kenyan troops serving with the African Union force fighting the militant group.

 

"We will hunt down the criminals involved in today's events," Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta tweeted Friday. "Our soldiers' blood will not be shed in vain."

 

The pre-dawn raid in El Adde in southwestern Somalia began with explosions from two car bombs driven by suicide bombers, a source told CNN.

 

AMISOM said in a statement its troops turned the attack back but some of its forces had been killed and others wounded.

 

 

Christmas celebrations banned in Somalia, Tajikistan and Brunei

 

The Guardian

December 23, 2015

 

Somalian government declared holiday is “only for Christians” and festivities could prompt attacks from al-Shabaab, as other countries issue strict warnings.

 

The governments of three countries, Somalia, Tajikistan and Brunei, have banned Christmas celebrations this year, with punishments ranging up to a five-year jail term.

 

Somalia issued a ban on Christmas and New Year’s celebrations in the Muslim country on Wednesday, saying the festivities “have nothing to do with Islam”.

 

“We warn against celebration of Christmas, which is only for Christians,” Sheikh Mohamed Kheyrow, director of Somalia’s ministry of religion, said on state radio. “This is a matter of faith. The Christmas holiday and its drum beatings have nothing to do with Islam.” He said the ministry has sent letters to the police, national security intelligence and officials in the capital Mogadishu instructing them to “prevent Christmas celebrations”.

 

The announcement had echoes of Islamist militants al-Shabaab, which controlled the capital Mogadishu until 2011. Among their edicts was to ban Christmas celebrations.

 

It was not immediately clear what prompted the government announcement. Somalia is almost entirely Muslim, but it hosts thousands of African Union (AU) peacekeepers, including from the majority-Christian countries Burundi, Uganda and Kenya. The country, which is struggling to emerge from two decades of fighting and chaos, has also seen a growing number of Somalis returning from Europe and North America, sometimes bringing foreign traditions and attitudes with them.

 

Officials also said that Christmas celebrations may attract attacks from the Islamist militants al-Shabaab.

 

“Christmas will not be celebrated in Somalia for two reasons; all Somalis are Muslims and there is no Christian community here. The other reason is for security,” Abdifatah Halane, spokesman for Mogadishu mayor, told Reuters. “Christmas is for Christians. Not for Muslims.”

 

Last 25 December, al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for an attack on the main AU base in Mogadishu, which lasted several hours and left three peacekeepers and a civilian contractor dead.

 

The majority Muslim but nominally secular central Asian republic of Tajikistan has also issued its toughest-ever ban on seasonal celebrations, banning Christmas trees and gift-giving in schools.

 

The country has been cracking down on Christmas and New Year’s in recent years, and banned Father Frost “Russia’s equivalent of Santa Claus” from television screens in 2013. Halloween celebrations in the capital, Dushanbe, have also been targeted by police, with revellers dressed as zombies and vampires reportedly being detained in 2013 and 2014.

 

The oil-rich sultanate of Brunei, has also banned Christmas celebrations, under a shift towards hardline Islamic law. Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, one of the world’s richest men, announced last year he would push ahead with the introduction of sharia law, eventually including tough penalties such as death by stoning or severed limbs.

 

Religious leaders in the sultanate warned this month that a ban on Christmas would be strictly enforced, for fear that Muslims could be led astray. “Using religious symbols like crosses, lighting candles, putting up Christmas trees, singing religious songs, sending Christmas greetings are against Islamic faith,” imams said in sermons published in the local press.

 

Punishment for violating the ban is a five-year jail sentence, and the government warned last year that Muslims would be committing an offence if they so much as wore “hats or clothes that resemble Santa Claus”.

 

Although Christians are free to celebrate, they have been told not to do so “excessively and openly”, in a directive that has had a chilling effect on the south-east Asian nation, which sits on a corner of Borneo island.

 

Businesses have been warned to take decorations down and authorities have stepped up spot checks across the capital. Hotels popular among western tourists that once boasted dazzling lights and giant Christmas trees are now barren of festive decor. “This will be the saddest Christmas ever for me,” a Malaysian expatriate resident told AFP, requesting not to be named for fear of reprisals from authorities. “The best part of Christmas Day is waking up and having that feeling that it is Christmas, but there’s just none of that here and you just feel deprived.”

 

“All this is just because of what the sultan wants. In 2013, I saw many Muslims together with Christians having a good time at their house parties. Everything was normal and good,” he said.

 

Most people are too scared to speak up about the ban, and while some privately gripe about the rule they know there is little to be done. “I will be working on Christmas after church. We just have to cope,” a Filipino waitress, one of Brunei’s many guest workers’ said.

 

Some people dared to post pictures on social media depicting Christmas cheer using the hashtag #MyTreedom, part of a global campaign to highlight oppression against Christians. At least one church in the capital sported decorations that were visible from the street, a rare glimpse of holiday cheer in the otherwise decoration-free city.

 

“The ban is ridiculous. It projects this image that Islam does not respect the rights of other religions to celebrate their faith,” said a Muslim mother in the capital, also too scared to provide her name. “Islam teaches us to respect one another and I believe it starts with respecting other religions even if what is being banned are ornamental displays.”

 

Others were more tempered, and urged the prohibition to be respected. “It is an Islamic country and so with respect to the law, churches need to keep decorations indoors,” said a Christian Bruneian, unfazed by the strict rules. “The meaning of Christmas for us isn’t all about Christmas decorations.”

 

However, the prohibition does not extend to the business interests of the sultan, whose estimated $20bn fortune includes the historic Beverly Hills Hotel, part of his Dorchester Collection with branches in London, Paris, Milan and Rome.

 

It is Christmas as usual this year in the upscale Le Richemond hotel in Geneva where guests are greeted by lavish displays in the hotel lobby, include bowls overflowing with pine branches, ornaments and candles aplenty. The Le Meurice hotel in Paris advertises a Christmas eve seven-course gourmet menu for 650 before drinks while the Beverly Hills Hotel is also decked out for the holidays.

 

Before unveiling the hardline law, the sultan had warned of pernicious foreign influences such as the internet and indicated he intended to place more emphasis on Islam in the conservative Muslim country.

 

Strict rules against homosexuality in sharia law, punishable with death by stoning, sparked a backlash among A-listers including John Legend, Jay Leno, Ellen DeGeneres and Richard Branson, who called for the hotels to be boycotted.

 

The sultan is no stranger to controversy at home either, the monarchy was deeply embarrassed by a family feud with his brother Jefri Bolkiah over the latter’s alleged embezzlement of $15bn during his tenure as finance minister in the 1990s.

 

Court battles and investigations revealed salacious details of Jefri’s un-Islamic jetset lifestyle, including claims of a high-priced harem of foreign women and a luxury yacht he owned called “Tits”. Some say that Brunei is on a dangerous path towards religious intolerance in a state where only 9% of its 430,000 population are Christian.

 

“In a globalised world, many countries are trying to unite different people and different religions but it doesn’t seem to be the case here,” a Catholic foreign worker in Brunei told AFP. “What’s happening here is that Christians are being alienated from the majority Muslim community.”

 

 

12 Are Killed in Bombing Outside Hotel in Somalia

 

By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM

The New York Times

JULY 26, 2015

 

MOGADISHU, Somalia  A vehicle packed with explosives detonated outside a landmark Mogadishu hotel long favored by diplomats and top government officials, killing at least 12 people and wounding many more, witnesses and the authorities said on Sunday.

 

The Jazeera Palace Hotel, close to both Mogadishu’s airport and a United Nations compound, was heavily guarded and had been considered one of the safer places in the city, despite previous attacks.

 

But on Sunday afternoon, a suicide bomber, driving on Airport Road, got to within about 100 feet of it before triggering a thunderous blast that ravaged the hotel and sent smoke billowing skyward.

 

The Shabab, an Islamist extremist group, claimed responsibility for the bombing, saying it was in retaliation for the killing of civilians during a recent offensive by Somali and African Union troops against Shabab forces in the southern part of the country.

 

Most of the people known to have been killed or wounded were pedestrians or motorists. It was not immediately clear if the bombing, which also destroyed several neighboring houses, had caused injuries or deaths inside the hotel.

 

A man who lives near the hotel said he was watching television when the blast occurred.

 

“Once the explosion happened, I saw myself laying on the ground and the television set as I was watching broke apart onto the ground,” said the man, who asked not to be identified because he feared for his safety.

 

Another resident said he had seen at least 10 bodies. Hotel employees said on Sunday evening that at least three of its guards were among the dead.

 

Mohamed Abdikarim, a journalist with Universal TV, a Somali network that has its headquarters in London, was killed in the attack, and a colleague, Salmaan Jamaal, was wounded. They had been in a car on Airport Road, according to Abdullahi Hersi, the East Africa director of Universal TV.

 

“We will miss Mohamed,” Mr. Hersi said. “He was our correspondent in the Gedo region and was on a business trip to Mogadishu.”

 

Photographs from the scene showed the hotel in ruins. It housed several embassies, including those of Qatar, Egypt and China.

 

In a statement, Somalia’s president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, strongly condemned the bombing, which he called a terrorist attack.

 

“The terrorists want to obstruct the people’s choice to live in peace, which will never happen,” he added.

 

The recent African Union and Somali campaign against the Shabab seized two strategic towns, Bardera in the Gedo region and Dinsoor in the Bay region, as well as several villages. The offensive unfolded shortly before President Obama’s visit to East Africa.

 

In his statement, Mr. Mohamud said that those defeats had led the militants to attack civilians.

 

In January 2014, the police beat back an assault on the hotel by armed gunmen and suicide bombers.

 

In September 2012, suicide bombers tried to assassinate Mr. Mohamud at the hotel shortly after his election.

 

The Shabab also claimed responsibility for the killing of a lawmaker in Mogadishu on Saturday.

 

 

Somali Militant Group Executes Girls Accused of Spying

 

Voice of America

28 October 2010

 

The Somali government has condemned the public execution of two teenage girls, killed by the Islamist militant group al-Shabab.

An al-Shabab firing squad killed the two girls Wednesday in the city of Beledweyne, on charges that they had spied for the government.  Hundreds of people watched the execution after al-Shabab called on the town's residents to observe.

In a statement Thursday, Somalia's government called the killing a barbaric act and said it had no Islamic or humanitarian justification.


An al-Shabab judge says the two girls admitted to spying after being arrested last week by Islamist fighters.


The aunt of one of the girls told VOA Somali service that the girl's parents knew she had been arrested but did not learn of her death sentence until al-Shabab sent out vehicles with loudspeakers, urging the public to attend the execution.


She identified the girls as 15-year-old Ayan Mohamed Jama and 14-year-old Horiyo Ibrahim.


Al-Shabab has carried out other executions along with amputations and whippings in the parts of Somalia under its control.

The group, which has declared allegiance to al-Qaida, aims to topple the Somali government and turn the country into a strict Islamic state. 

 

 

Somalia Violence Continues as Militants Declare War

 

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

CBNNews.com

 

A Somali hotel frequented by lawmakers in the region was attacked Tuesday, just one day after a radical Muslim group warned of a new "massive war" in the country.

 

At least 35 people were killed in the Muna Hotel bombing, including six parliamentarians.

 

The attack only extended an outbreak of violence that rattled the capital city Mogadishu, Monday, when 40 civilians died in fighting between al-Shabab and Somali and African Union troops.

 

Al-Shabab fighters declared war against what they called invaders and are believed to be in control of much of Somalia.

 

The country has not had an effective government for nearly 20 years.

 

Al-Shabab has increased its attacks in recent months. The U.S. has linked the group to al-Qaeda.

 

Last month, the group claimed twin bombings in Uganda during the World Cup final, killing 76 people.

 

 

Somali training camps fuel threat of attacks on US


By MOHAMED OLAD HASSAN and JASON STRAZIUSO (AP)

November 29, 2009


MOGADISHU, Somalia — The recruits gather in scorching desert hideouts in Somalia, use portraits of President Barack Obama for target practice, learn how to make and detonate bombs, and vow allegiance to Osama bin Laden.


Training camps in the lawless nation of Somalia are attracting hundreds of foreigners, including Americans, and Somalis recruited by a local insurgent group linked to al-Qaida, according to local and U.S. officials. American officials and private analysts say the camps pose a security threat far beyond the borders of Somalia, including to the U.S. homeland.


In interviews with The Associated Press, former trainees gave rare details on the camps, which are scattered along desert footpaths, rutted roads and steamy coastal dens. They say the recruits are told the United States is the enemy of Islam.


U.S. and Somali officials say Somalia's al-Shabab jihadist, or holy war, movement is growing, and uses foreign trainers with battlefield experience from other conflicts.


The threat posed by the training camps was underscored in federal court documents unsealed Nov. 23 in Minneapolis, home to a large Somali-American community. An indictment against several Somali-Americans who allegedly fought in Somalia said trainees at one camp included dozens of ethnic Somalis from Somalia and other African countries, Europe and the United States.


"The trainees were trained by, among others, Somali, Arab, and Western instructors in ... small arms, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades, and military-style tactics," said an affidavit from FBI Special Agent Michael N. Cannizzaro Jr. that was unsealed with the indictment.


Former al-Shabab fighter Hassan Yare, who works in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, said life in the camps is austere. Recruits sleep on plastic sheets and sometimes eat only one meal a day, often maize cooked with water. Phones are confiscated. Recruits are only allowed to speak to their parents once every other Friday, Islam's holy day.


"The message is simple," Dahir Muhiyadiin, 18, said three months after finishing his training at a camp run by Somalia's main insurgent group. "We are taught how the Western infidels want to eradicate pure Muslims, about how the U.S. government does nothing as Israel harasses our Muslim Palestinians."


Al-Shabab, "the youth" in Arabic, controls much of the desert nation's southern region and holds large parts of Mogadishu. It wants to overthrow the government and install a strict form of Islam. Analysts say the group has between 2,000 and 3,000 fighters.


Among al-Shabab's ranks are an estimated 200 to 400 foreigners from Pakistan, Chechnya, Sudan, Kenya, Tanzania and other countries, many of them veterans of fighting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, said Mark Schroeder, an Africa analyst at the global intelligence firm Stratfor.


The proliferation of jihadist training camps raises concerns that Somalia will become the next Afghanistan, a sanctuary for al-Qaida-linked groups to train and plan attacks. The Somali government seems powerless to do anything about it.


"The threat posed by al-Shabab is something that we pay very, very close attention to," Vice Adm. Robert T. Moeller, the deputy commander for the U.S. military's Africa Command, told AP at the command's headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany.

The government is backed by 5,000 African Union peacekeepers but controls only a few blocks in Mogadishu. The insurgents are so confident that they stage executions of suspected spies there.


Jihadists linked to al-Shabab can also roam through neighboring countries without attracting much attention and already cross boldly into northern Kenya.


U.S. officials are concerned Somali-Americans who fought with al-Shabab will return to the United States and carry out attacks. As many as 20 from Minnesota have been lured to their ancestral homeland to join the jihad. At least one blew himself up in a suicide attack in Somalia.


One of the documents unsealed in Minneapolis gave details on that attack. It said Shirwa Ahmed, a naturalized U.S. citizen and Minneapolis resident, took part in a truck-bombing in Bossaso, Somalia, on Oct. 29, 2008, against offices of a regional intelligence service. Ahmed, who was alone in the truck, was identified through a fingerprint obtained from a finger found at the bomb site.


A Somali-American from Seattle is suspected of also having taken part in a suicide attack against an AU peacekeeper base on Sept. 17. U.S. authorities said they are awaiting DNA test results to confirm it.


Michael Leiter, the director of the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center, told Congress in September there is "significant concern" that al-Qaida operatives in Somalia may commission Americans to return to the U.S. and launch attacks. In recent weeks, al-Shabab has threatened to attack Uganda, Kenya, Israel and other countries, although it has not made a direct public threat against the United States.


About a dozen al-Qaida operatives are in Somalia with ties to al-Shabab, Schroeder said. One of them, Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, is wanted for al-Qaida's 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 people, including 12 Americans.


Somalia is among a handful of places where terrorists can train openly. The U.S. State Department says terrorist training also takes place in Afghanistan, Pakistan, parts of North Africa, the Philippines, Lebanon, Yemen and Colombia.


The United States withdrew most of its troops from Somalia in 1994, months after 18 U.S. soldiers were killed in the battle described in the book "Black Hawk Down." The soldiers had been deployed to help amid a famine but became embroiled in clan warfare. The U.S. is leery of making such a large commitment again but is still engaged.


On Sept. 14, U.S. commandos on helicopters strafed a convoy carrying top al-Qaida fugitive Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan in rural southern Somalia, rappelled to the ground, collected his body and another corpse and took off. Nabhan was wanted for the 2002 car bombing of a beach resort in Kenya and an attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner.


In October, the U.S. began using sophisticated Reaper surveillance drones in the region, initially to hunt for pirates. Analysts expect they will also be used to search for militants in Somalia.


Al-Shabab recently released a video showing its members vowing allegiance to bin Laden, training in dusty camps and calling Somalia's U.S.-backed President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed a traitor. The militants leaped over sandbags, crawled on the ground and fired at targets under the gaze of light-skinned, bearded trainers.


Recruits are trained in intelligence matters and explosives, said an al-Shabab official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press.


Suleyman Hussein, a former al-Shabab fighter who defected to a government-allied militia, told AP that camp leaders affixed photos of Obama and Ahmed to wooden boards.


"They were our targets," he said.


Somali Police Chief Abdi Hassan Awale said the camps are mostly near the Kenyan border and are drawing more recruits. He said one camp is near Raaskambooni, a town along the Indian Ocean less than two miles (3 kilometers) from the Kenyan border.


"Most of the trainers are foreigners, including people from Western countries," he said. "We do not know exactly how many there are, but we estimate hundreds."


Awale said al-Shabab tries to recruit the poorest, the mentally ill and teenagers who have lost their parents in Somalia's violence. He accused the group of brainwashing recruits "with false, un-Islamic ideas imported from Afghanistan and Pakistan."


Somalia has many orphans that al-Shabab can try to recruit. As many as 22,000 civilians have been killed and 1.1 million displaced in the past two years, according to Ted Dagne, an African affairs specialist with the Congressional Research Service.


Straziuso reported from Stuttgart, Germany, and Nairobi, Kenya. Associated Press writer Andrew O. Selsky contributed from Johannesburg.



U.N. Criticizes Beheadings in Somalia


JULY 11, 2009

The Wall Street Journal

By JOE LAURIA


UNITED NATIONS -- The top United Nations human-rights official said that extremists trying to overthrow a fragile transition government in Somalia are carrying out ad hoc trials and killing prisoners by stoning, decapitation and amputation of limbs -- acts that "might amount to war crimes."


Navi Pillay, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said in Geneva that the al Shabaab militant group, which is attempting to gain control of the capital Mogadishu, had also been using human shields and indiscriminately firing mortars into populated areas where they have also planted bombs and mines.


"In this new wave of attacks, it is clear that civilians -- especially women and children -- are bearing the brunt of the violence," Ms. Pillay said. "Displaced people and human-rights defenders, aid workers and journalists are among those most exposed, and in some cases are being directly targeted."


The militants on Friday beheaded seven prisoners, accusing them of abandoning the Muslim faith and spying for the government, the Associated Press reported.


The fighting has displaced 200,000 people in the past month. There are now 1.2 million displaced Somalis.


Ms. Pillay called on those able to do so to gather evidence that might one day be used in court.


Somalia has been without an effective central government since 1991, when the dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown. Since then, competing groups of warlords and Islamic groups have vied for control. Western diplomats say the current transitional government of President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, which came to power in February, offers Somalia the best hope in years for political stability.


Toward that end Western governments, including the U.S., have pledged hundreds of millions of dollars of aid to help shore up the government's and other regional security forces.


 

Somalia

 

Somalia is recovering from a period of ten years without a central Government and civil war. Even before this, the country was ridden by poverty and women's situation was difficult. Thus, there is little reliable data available from Somalia from the lost decade of the 1990's. We know, however, that the Somali society, basically rural, is mostly traditionalist and holds on to Muslim and non-Muslim practices. As there has been no central Government for ten years to enforce the law, one can expect that traditional law has only grown stronger. The Somali interpretations of Islam are generally not favourable to women's rights, and include the almost universal practice of female genital mutilation.

 

Large areas of Somalia are not under control of the new government in Mogadishu. Somaliland in the northwest, drawing its history back from the British colony Somaliland, unilattery declared its return to independence in 1991. Somaliland has been polically stable since independence, but is not recognised by any country. Little is known about women's situation in Somaliland, although the country's constitution provides for equal rights, including special rights to education. The constitution is however partly based on the Muslim Shari' a laws. One can assume the tradistional practices remain strong in rural Somaliland.

 

The northeastern corner of the country is presently independent under the name of Puntland, a more unstable state not recognising the Mogasishu government but claiming it works for the unification of Somalia in a federal state. The situation of women in Puntland is not well known.

 

The legal information below will refer to Somalia under control og the Mogadishu government. Information on Somali traditional can be expected to have the same validity in Somalia proper as in Puntland and Somaliland.

 

Women are subordinated systematically in the country's overwhelmingly patriarchal culture. Polygyny is permitted, but polyandry is not. Under laws issued by the former government, female children could inherit property, but only half the amount to which their brothers were entitled.

 

According to the tradition of blood compensation, those found guilty in the death of a woman must pay only half as much to the aggrieved family as they would if the victim were a man.

 

Violence against women is known to exist in Somalia. About 98% of all Somali females undergo FGM. Infibulation is the form practiced. Women in Somalia averagely give birth to 7,18 children (2000 est.)

 

Women are subordinated systematically in the country's overwhelmingly patriarchal culture. Polygyny is permitted, but polyandry is not. Under laws issued by the former government, female children could inherit property, but only half the amount to which their brothers were entitled. Similarly, according to the tradition of blood compensation, those found guilty in the death of a woman must pay only half as much to the aggrieved family as they would if the victim were a man.

 

There is no national judicial system in Somalia. The judiciary in most regions relies on some combination of traditional and customary law, Shari 'a law, the penal code of the pre-1991 Siad Barre government, or some combination of the three. For example in Bosasso and Afmedow criminals are turned over to the families of their victims, which then exact blood compensation in keeping with local tradition. Shari 'a courts continues to operate in several regions of the country, filling the vacuum created by the absence of normal government authority. Shari 'a courts traditionally ruled in cases of civil and family law, but extended their jurisdiction to criminal proceedings in some regions beginning in 1994. In the northwest, the self-proclaimed Republic of Somaliland adopted a new constitution based on democratic principles, but continues to use the pre-1991 Penal Code. A U.N. report issued in September notes a serious lack of trained judges and of legal documentation in Somaliland, which cause problems in the administration of justice. In Bardera courts apply a combination of Shari 'a law and the former penal code. In south Mogadishu, a segment of north Mogadishu, the Lower Shabelle, and parts of the Gedo and Hiran regions, court decisions are based solely on Shari 'a law. The five Islamic courts operating in Mogadishu are aligned with different subclans, raising doubts about their independence. The courts generally refrained from administering the stricter Islamic punishments, like amputation, but their militias administered summary punishments, including executions, in the city and its environs. With the collapse in December 1998 of the Shari'a courts in north Mogadishu headed by Sheikh Ali Dere, the application of physical punishment appears to have ceased.


The right to representation by an attorney and the right to appeal do not exist in those areas that apply traditional and customary judicial practices or Shari 'a law. These rights more often are respected in regions that continue to apply the former government's penal code, such as Somaliland.

 

The traditional practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is near-universal in this country. About 98% of women undergo this harmful procedure. Infibulation, the most dangerous form of FGM, is the common practice in Somalia

. Main sources: U.S. Department of State, CIA, Mundo negro

 

 

Hyphenated identities, fractured lives

 

Somali immigrants make Rochester their home

By Sujata Gupta

 

"When you flee your country, you don't even know where you're going, what direction you're going. You say, 'OK, I need to save my life.'"

 

IsseAbukar pulls out a box of pictures, a postcard of Mogadishu, Somalia, before it was ravaged by civil war, and a business card, frayed and yellow with age. The box, says Abukar --- a former partner in his family's weaving company --- contains everything he brought from his motherland.

 

In a classroom at the Family Learning Center, a city school district program that holds classes for non-native English speakers, another Somali describes her family: herself, her husband, and three children. American life is good, she says through a translator. She has, she claims, never experienced much loneliness or culture shock or linguistic barriers. Later in the interview, however, she breaks down and cries. There is a fourth child left in Somalia, a daughter that immigration services refuse to recognize as part of her family. "Always, she calls and she's crying," the woman says. "And then I start crying." For the briefest moment, the woman's pain takes shape, becomes palpable. "I don't want to talk about her," she says, and she rises from her seat. A door clicks.

 

A tiny box; a tiny omission; a tiny store of memories containing only those things worth remembering. There is no denying it: Compared to the dangers of living in a refugee camp or hiding from rebel forces or wondering if there will be enough water to last the day, this life is better. This is heaven. This is home? Maybe.Sometimes. It depends.

 

Those unfamiliar with African culture and history tend to see all Somalis --- and indeed all Africans --- as a single entity. But for Somalis, who watched their country disintegrate into civil war 15 years ago, the lines dividing them run deep. Clan loyalties dominate, and though many Somalis in America and elsewhere are working to shed those distinctions, time beats to a slow drum. Somalia itself is in ruins. Anarchy reigns.

 

But if suffering could be measured, few would know its depths as keenly as the Somali Bantu, a minority group that has suffered centuries of social and educational marginalization. The Bantus first came to Somalia in the 18th century as slaves from Mozambique and Tanzania, but few of them managed to assimilate into mainstream society even after slavery ended in the early 1900s.

 

The Bantus became especially vulnerable when civil war broke out in 1991. Because agriculture networks collapsed with the war, the largely agrarian Bantus were among the few with stockpiles of food. Lacking clan protection due to their minority status, both bandits and civilian Somalis robbed, raped, and killed Bantus with impunity. An estimated 10,000 Bantu had fled to Kenyan refugee camps by 1994. In the camps, however, Kenyans and Somali refugees continued to target the Bantus, who were forced to set up along the compound's dangerous outskirts.

 

Recognizing that Somali Bantus could never return to their homeland, the United States government agreed to let 12,000 Bantu refugees resettle here about five years ago. It was among this country's largest relocation efforts in two decades, and its largest effort ever with African refugees. The first wave of Bantu refugees began arriving in 2002. Typical of refugees from other countries, most Bantus relocated to smaller cities, where resettlement agencies hoped they would experience less disorientation and culture shock.

 

In Rochester, there are now more than 300 Somali families, of which about 60 are Bantu. Ironically, as the two groups begin to reconcile their differences thousands of miles from home, it is often the Somali refugee who is best equipped to help the Bantu. Whereas most Bantus cannot speak Somali, the country's main dialect, many educated Somalis can speak at least a rudimentary form of the Bantu dialect, MaayMaay. They are also more likely to have acquired some English either during their time in America or in Somali schools.

 

While refugees in general face a host of challenges upon arriving in this country, from securing a job to learning English, Somalis and Somali Bantus often view their role in this country from different vantage points. What it means to be Somali-American fragments, to some extent, along class lines.

 

For Abukar, a senior member representative for the Genesee Co-Op Federal Credit Union, the overarching goal has been to regain what he lost when he came to the United States 10 years ago. "You see, when I start I was working different jobs," he says. "Any job I go, I don't care, you know, what I'm doing. But I was just looking about how I can support my family. Second, I was thinking about how you can change your life. Right now, I have skilled job. Still I'm not happy. You know why? Because I'm not free, because I work for someone. I used to have my own business. I never worked nobody; my father never worked nobody."

 

Jennifer Carroll, a family doctor with BrownSquareHealthCenter on Lyell Avenue, says Abukar's attitude is typical of those who have lost everything. "When you see that kind of dramatic drop in socioeconomic status, in the best-case scenario you work really hard to get back to where you were," she says.

 

But for Somali Bantus, dreaming --- even the ability to dream --- can be new and disorienting. Says 21-year-old Aweys Hussein, a Bantu who relocated here with his wife and family three years ago: "We wasn't happy. It was difficult. We don't know where we can go. It was a difficult life." Hussein's come a long way, though. Aside from becoming a father, he managed to move into his own apartment, find a job at Wegmans, and begin working toward his GED. His 18-year-old wife, BisharaKasim, is in 10th grade at JeffersonHigh School. She wants to be a doctor. And in a society that values large families, Kasim is thinking the unthinkable: two kids. But they are young and less set in their ways than their elders.

Through a translator, Hussein's father, AbdurahimMukumbira, says he hopes to own a house in a few years. But with eight children, including one just born a few months ago, limited English ability, and a job as a dishwasher at an AIDS clinic, Mukumbira must still rely on food stamps, Medicaid, reduced-price school lunches, and housing allowances. His wife stays home to tend to the baby. Asked if he wants any more children, Mukumbira chuckles. "Only God knows that," he says.

 

For all their differences in social status, age, and upbringing, Carroll, who has been studying the Somali community for a decade, says Somalis are bound by one of humanity's darkest and most powerful forces: trauma. "The cross-sectional studies that have been done across a variety of refugee populations show routinely across the board that over 85 percent to 90 percent have either felt their life directly threatened or witnessed the life of a loved one being threatened," she says. "The scope of exposure to traumatic experiences is staggering."

 

Dehydration, starvation, poverty, attackers in the bushes, unemployment, despair, nightmares: This is a refugee camp. It is a place, says Abukar, where air and waterborne diseases run rampant, where the line between life and death dims."If you need to survive, it's fine. If you need to die, it's fine," he says. "There's no medication. If you're sick and you need to go to hospital, and if you don't have money, you will die. My mom, she died in the refugee camp. Malaria. Not big disease. Malaria only."

 

How one responds to trauma differs from person to person, says Carroll, but she adds that many Somalis externalize emotional concerns as physical ones. That means that joint pain can signify muscle-clenching flashbacks; headaches, recurring nightmares. "There is some stigma about which symptoms get expressed and which don't," Carroll says.

 

But refugees here know that they are the lucky ones. That knowledge, however, carries with it the weight of responsibility. Traumatic disorders compound present-day stresses: the guilt of abandoning loved ones, the expectation of happiness, and the strains of poverty. "Another cause of mental problems that emerged is the theme of post-migration stress, such as protracted economic strain in the United States with the pressure to provide for family members remaining in Africa," wrote Carroll in a University of Rochester-funded study of how mental illness is understood, expressed and treated among Somali refugees.

 

MuminaShangolo, a full-time student at the FamilyLearningCenter, says finances are very tight these days. Her husband earns minimum wage and can barely support his family of five, and Shangolo periodically sends money to Africa so her father and sister can buy their medications.

 

Many Somalis' economic troubles are exacerbated by their large immediate families --- an asset turned liability. Abukar jokes that in Somalia, children are like social security: The more one has, the better the retirement options. Not true in America, though, where the cost of living is among the highest in the world.

 

Despite their myriad pressures, Somalis seldom receive private counseling, says Carroll. This disinclination toward psychiatric care likely stems from several factors, from Somalis' reluctance to discuss personal matters with a stranger to fears associated with riding public buses where signs are entirely in English.

 

Moreover, one of the greatest challenges for both psychiatric and medical practitioners is finding translators who speak English, MaayMaay and Somali. As it stands, many Bantus struggle to communicate through their former persecutors. "The Somali Bantus were a slave class. I've had Somali Bantus look at a translator who's more of a Somali background and say, 'Every time I look at that guy I see the guy who shot my father and raped my sister,'" says Louise Bennett, a family doctor with Westside Health Services on Genesee Street.

 

NibhanGudle, a Somali translator at Westside, says the need for both Bantu and female translators is essential to meet the needs of his community. He has, he says, seen many cases where patients respond to doctors' questions based on what they think he would expect to hear. Others simply never come back. "They say, 'OK, thank you very much. We'll be back to you.' That's it, they're gone," he says.

 

"Gone." These anonymous patients fade into Rochester life, much as they would have faded into life at a refugee camp, or hidden from rebels on the long trek to the Kenyan border, or, for women, shielded sexual assaults or rapes from family members.

 

The silent and the invisible --- few fit this definition better than Somali women. Born into a traditional Muslim culture, Somali women seldom receive education or work outside the home. Virginity at marriage is sacrosanct and most sexual crimes go unreported, says Carroll, who has spent the last year interviewing 34 Somali women with funding from the Department of Health and Human Services. "A lot of women who had been raped or sexually assaulted and several of whom had acquired HIV as a result didn't want that information included in their asylum claim even if it would be their ticket to freedom to the US," she says. "To them it would be better to have their asylum claim denied than to let people know what happened."

 

In addition, while female circumcision is a taboo here in America, some studies report that more than 90 percent of Somali women undergo the procedure, which ranges in severity from removal of part of the clitoris to excision of all of the clitoris and labia minora. "When I first started taking care of this community, I didn't know how to approach the issue," Carroll says. "But I would be remiss if I didn't address this because it's part of women's health."

 

While most Americans' reaction to the procedure is one of shock, even revulsion, many Somali women think that in light of current hardships, now is not the time to attack the time-honored tradition, Carroll says. So her approach has been to ask women if they have been circumcised, if they're experiencing any difficulties, and then move on. "Keep the moralizing, keep the political stuff out of it. Just focus on what is the meaning of this for this particular person right now. That's how I think about it," she says.

 

One of the greatest challenges of her project, says Carroll, was simply convincing the women that their stories were worth telling. "One of the lessons we learned as part of our project was that in certain countries or backgrounds where women don't have the same role as men...and often don't have the same educational opportunities or opportunities to become independent outside the home, they're not used to people asking their opinions about things. A common answer that we would get is, 'Well, I can't tell you anything that you don't already know. You're the doctor.' So engaging women in ways that would really allow them to speak freely and comfortably about their own experiences was actually harder than it might seem," says Carroll, who relied on female interpreters only.

 

HassanAbdi, an Ethiopian-born Somali who has been in America for 15 years, says Somalis must also re-evaluate gender roles. "It's not hard to change," he says. "It's a matter of not knowing how to change." Often, he says, men tell their wives that it's OK if they don't work or get a driver's license or learn English. The thought process, he says, goes like this: "I tell my wife not to drive. I'm thinking I'm doing positive. Now, 10 years, five years later, what I'm thinking now? 'Oh shit, she can't drive.'"

 

Ironically, says AbdullahiJama, a Somali case manager for CatholicFamilyCenter, a long history of subjugation actually helps Bantu women adjust to life in America. Compared to Somali women from more advantaged backgrounds, these women are more willing to use public transportation and get jobs, however menial, he says.

 

This role reversal is evident at the FamilyLearningCenter, where most of the Somali students are of Bantu origin. "Bar, car, F-F-F, fff, faaar," enunciates ESL teacher, Robert Shaver. The class repeats after him. A few giggle as Shaver feigns falling off the desk, saying: "Don't ffffall off the desk."

 

Surrounded by their peers, their kids safe in the day care center downstairs, the women appear relaxed, at ease. Asked why she wants to learn English, HawaMsanda, a mother of five, says through a translator that then she will be able to do everything: drive a car, buy groceries, maybe even get a job. Her days before the learning center, she says, consisted of getting the kids ready for school and housekeeping. Even that was OK, though, she says --- much better than the 15 or so years she spent at the refugee camp.

 

For the women and men who spend seven hours a day, five days a week in a classroom, the struggle to learn English is admirable. Spoken fluency can take years; written ability even longer. But if before the future was too bleak to ponder, now it can at least exist. Carroll says that the move from thinking entirely in the present to pondering the future is a subtle but powerful shift. "We talked about this a lot when we were doing our analysis," she says. "When you've had a life that was so marked by uncertainty and day-to-day survival, how do you change your life framework to start to think about future-oriented goals?"

 

As Somalis begin to envision new possibilities in their own lives, they often look to their children to fulfill the American Dream --- to go to college or buy a house or get off welfare.

 

The truth is, some will and some won't. Many Somali children, especially those whose entire life was spent in an refugee camp, have never known what it's like to feel safe, or to have enough food, or to view themselves as anything but outsiders. What these children have experienced, says Mike Boucher, a social worker with St. Joseph's NeighborhoodCenter who has worked closely with Rochester's Somali community, confounds comprehension. "When I hear the word 'camp' I don't know what that means," he says.

 

Despite America's luxuries --- water fountains and escalators and textbooks for all --- many of these children find this country disorienting. They must struggle to belong, for the most part, in difficult urban environments without English fluency or even a basic understanding of this country's social norms. And, says Boucher, the onus is on Somali children to preserve their traditional Muslim roots, which can mean eschewing everything from alcohol to dating to premarital sex. Compounding the problem is the fact that few Somali parents --- particularly those of Bantu origin who themselves never learned to read, write or complete basic math equations --- can help their children adjust academically.

 

That presents a huge problem because many refugee children's education already lags behind that of their American peers, says Bennett, who visited Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya a few years ago. While the majority of children went to school in the camps, she says, their training "looks good on paper."

 

Aside from being behind academically, many Somali children wind up in special education classes, Bennett adds, because English as a Second Language tests typically rely on Western concepts. For example, some tests ask children to identify fruits that don't exist in their native desert climate. "If you talk about African foods or African backgrounds they might be able to test better than if you put them into an American urban setting," she says. "They should be tested in their own language, and they should be tested using some non-written and verbal materials."

 

Under the current system, adds Abukar, children are placed in grades according to their age, which means that a 15-year-old who has never even held a book will become a high school student. And with interpreters in short supply, Abukar and other English-speaking Somalis often translate at parent-teacher conferences, or help these children with their homework. American educators must create special programs for Somali refugee children, Abukar says.

 

Educating Somali children, however, is a challenge facing communities across the country. The federal Education Department recently determined that public schools in Springfield, Massachusetts, failed to provide Somali students with adequate educational services, the New York Times reported earlier this month. Although Springfield public schools will soon expand their tutoring services and concentrate Somali students in fewer schools, Mary Beach, assistant to the superintendent of the Springfield schools, said in the Times articlethat the biggest challenge is finding enough translators to meet demand.

 

Abdi worries that as parents and educators work out these kinks, Somali kids are getting lost in the shuffle. And increasing numbers of Somali children are getting involved with drugs, alcohol, and crime, he says.

 

Formal support systems for Somalis do exist, but that help typically lasts for only a few months. Most Somali families are initially paired with representatives from CatholicFamilyCenter, a nonprofit organization that receives federal funding to help refugees. CFC case workers help Somalis acclimate to all aspects of daily life, from academic placement services to job skills training to everyday logistics, such as finding the nearest grocery store or using public transportation. The goal, says Jim Morris, CFC's resettlement program manager, is to help refugees become self-sufficient as quickly as possible.

 

That's partially because federal funding for everything, save employment services, dries up after half a year. "Within six months, to buy a car, to get a driver's license, to get insurance --- it's hard," says Abdi. Many Somalis who have been in the States longer help newcomers with transportation, paperwork, tutoring and other daily challenges. But most Somalis interviewed agree that there is great demand for long-term assistance.

 

Abukar notes that very few Somali families --- even those who have been here for several years --- own a home. "To own house, some people they scared. You know why they scared? Because of mortgage payments. They scared about the long-term payment. Some people they don't have credit score. Some people, right now they need to buy a house but when you save $30,000 and you have to pay $38,000, they say 'Wow, I don't want to buy a house,'" he says. "If the government supports those families, then they can afford to live."

 

Aside from serving as role models, interpreters, and ad-hoc taxi drivers, Somali immigrants who arrived in America years ago have also become social educators for newcomers struggling to belong in a foreign culture. Abdi, for example, encourages parents to support their children in activities outside of academics. They have to realize that their children's sports and hobbies are important, too, he says. "I know one guy in HoneoyeFalls. This one guy, he is very good with soccer, but I asked his father, would you ever go to his game? He said, 'No,'" Abdi recounts.

 

But in the perpetual tension between assimilation and preservation,identity means different things to different people. Where Abdi emphasizes parental involvement in sports, others emphasize Islam or traditional dance or the virtues of respecting your elders. Or all of the above. What does it mean, really, to become American? Or more specifically, to become Somali-American?

 

For many children, home is a dusty field in a Kenyan refugee camp or a foggy memory or, possibly, here. America. The land of immigrants and second chances. And, for the Somali, a place where one can begin to consider the future. How awesomely frightening.

 

There are certain questions we must all ask, says Bennett. Not just as health-care professionals or social workers or church leaders, but as individuals. As Americans. "There is the myth of the great American melting pot. Come to the United States, the land of opportunity. This is what the United States has stood for --- opportunity and freedom," she says. "The question is, What is the reality for people when they do actually come here? What is their happiness level?"'

For the 20 or so members of the Somali Bantu Soccer Team, happiness is this: a bitterly cold February Sunday, a concrete floor inside the South Avenue Recreation Center, one soccer ball, a handful of shin guards, basketball shoes, soccer cleats, green and yellow jerseys, and a wild "Ruuun!" shouted in English. "Soccer," jokes AwesoMkomuu, "is in our blood."

 

For another group, happiness is knowing that in its own conflicted way America will provide. "In the camp, you wake up in the morning. You don't know where you're going. Your kids crying, they need milk. You don't have money. You don't have charcoal. You don't have furniture. You don't have bed to sleep," says Abukar. "But United States, even if you don't have insurance, you can go to a doctor. The government, they will cover. You don't have food, you go to social service, you apply. If social service doesn't give you food, you go to Open Door Mission."

 

For others, though, happiness still waits behind a closed door. Hidden in a gap in the floorboard, or tucked out of sight in a refugee camp half a world away. If you ask Somalis if life is good, they will always say "Yes," says Jama. Do they mean it, though? Maybe.Sometimes. It depends.

 

But if attitude is survival, does it matter?

 

How to Flee 101

 

When IsseAbukar and his wife, Khadija, fled Mogadishu, Somalia, they left just about everything --- including each other. Isse carried a camera, Khadija their daughter.

 

They made a choice, Isse explains. "This militia, when they see all family together, they feel that this family is together because they have money," he says. "They will kill you," adds his brother, AbukarAbukar. The Abukars share their story one wintry night from the comfort of their Northeast Rochester home. The walls are decorated with maroon tapestries, Khadija's favorite color. The kids are watching Cartoon Network and drinking mango juice out of plastic glasses. It all feels a little surreal.

 

Isse and Khadija found each other at a Kenyan refugee camp a year and a half later. It was luck. Or God.Or both. Both recount stories of families who never discovered various members' whereabouts. During the Abukars' four years in the camp, their hut burned to the ground. Isse's camera was spared. He took a picture. The background is brown; dust swirls in the air.

 

AbdurahimMukumbirasays when he fled, he was convinced his family would all be killed by armed militia, or perhaps hungry animals. It took him three weeks to get to Kenya. He languished in a camp there for more than a decade. How one survives in a camp varies, says BisharaKasim, Mukumbira's daughter-in-law. Example: Refugees with bikes transport people back and forth; on an average day they earn about 40 Kenyan Shillings, or 50 cents.

 

Mukumbira and Kasim arrived in Rochester three years ago. Kasim's five siblings and parents stayed behind. Kasim would like to sponsor them to come over as soon as she can. "They will come now," she says. "I hope."

 

 

Muslim militias claim control in Somali capital

 

BLOW DEALT TO U.S. EFFORTS TO HALT VIOLENCE

By Jonathan S. Landay

Knight Ridder

 

WASHINGTON - Muslim militias claimed Monday to have routed warlords allegedly backed by the United States after weeks of fighting for control of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, dealing a setback to U.S. efforts to contain the spread of militant Islam.

 

U.S. officials and other experts warned that if the militias consolidated their victory, they would establish an Islamist state where Al-Qaida could secure bases from which it could spread its violent ideology to other East African and Horn of Africa nations.

 

The Islamists' claim of victory in Mogadishu comes as the United States and its allies struggle to contain growing Islamist violence in Iraq and some of the fiercest attacks in Afghanistan by the Taliban since that Islamist militia was driven from power in 2001.

 

Al-Qaida-inspired extremists might be allowed to use Somalia as a refuge from which to support and mount operations against Yemen and Saudi Arabia, the world's No. 1 oil producer, located a boat ride away across the Red Sea, said U.S. officials and other experts.

 

“If they can grab control and maintain it, Somalia becomes a little place that becomes important to Al-Qaida and other Islamists,” said Michael Scheuer, who was the first chief of the CIA unit that tracks Osama bin Laden and his network.

John Prendergast of the International Crisis Group, a conflict-prevention organization, said it's too early to predict what could happen. The secular warlords could rebuild their forces with outside aid and launch a counteroffensive for Mogadishu.

 

The United States hasn't been directly involved in Somalia since 18 U.S. soldiers were killed in Mogadishu in 1993 during vicious street fighting, depicted in the film “Black Hawk Down.”

 

But the Bush administration has deployed about 1,500 U.S. soldiers in the tiny nation of Djibouti, on Somalia's northern border, as part of a regional strategy of preventing Al-Qaida and other radical Islamist groups from operating in the rugged, poverty-stricken and largely lawless Horn of Africa.

 

The United States has been secretly supporting a coalition of secular Somali warlords, the Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism, according to leaders of a largely powerless transitional central government restricted to the city of Baidoa, according to regional observers and news reports.

 

Prendergast said three alliance leaders recently told him that they were receiving funds from the CIA. The CIA declined to comment.

 

The bloodiest fighting in more than a decade erupted in February between the alliance and the Islamist militias. The militias are associated with courts that have succeeded in the past several years in bringing order to some areas by enforcing Islamic law.

 

The violence escalated last month as Islamist militias moved to take control of Mogadishu, with hundreds of people dying in street battles.

 

Princeton Lyman, a former senior State Department official, said the Bush administration should begin working urgently with regional governments and Somaliland, an unrecognized self-declared independent nation in northern Somalia, to contain Islamist militias.

 

 

Somali minister blames US for latest violence

 

Cairo, Egypt

16 May 2006

 

Somali officials on Tuesday blamed the latest violence in their lawless capital, Mogadishu, on the United States, which they accused of meddling in domestic affairs by funding an alliance of warlords.


"The US is behind [the latest violence] through its financial and military support of warlords and its interference in the country's internal affairs," said Somali Health Minister Abdel Aziz Sheikh Yussef at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo.

Mogadishu was this week the scene of deadly battles between Islamic militia and gunmen loyal to a US-backed warlord Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism, the worst violence the capital has seen for 15 years.


The warlords claim the country's Islamists are harbouring foreign fighters and Muslim extremists, including al-Qaeda members.

While the US has not explicitly confirmed its support for the alliance, US officials have told Agence France-Presse that the alliance has received US money and is one of several groups it is working with to contain the threat of Islamic radicalism in the country.


But Yussef denied Washington's claims of "creeping Talibanisation" in Somalia.


"The people of Somalia deal with officials of the Islamic courts because they are appointed by tribal chiefs and have a good reputation compared with the warlords, contrary to what the US claims," he said.


During his visit to Cairo, the health minister asked the Arab League to fulfil their promise of $500 000 in aid money to help with the deteriorating health situation caused by years of violence, adding that the number of functioning hospitals in Somalia was now down to three.


"It is the innocent people who die every day that are the victims, and they are dying in larger numbers than the fighting parties," said the minister.


Somalia, a nation of 10-million people in the Horn of Africa, has been without a functioning central authority since the fall of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991 plunged it into anarchy. Since then, warlords have been battling for control of a patchwork of fiefdoms.


More than a dozen attempts to restore stability have failed. The latest, a transitional government set up in 2004 in Kenya and now based in the town of Baidoa, west of Mogadishu, has been undermined by infighting and proved unable to assert control. -- AFP

 

 

Italian Nun Murdered In Somalia 

 

MOGADISHU, Somalia, Sept. 17, 2006

 

(Associated Press) An Italian nun was shot dead at a hospital by Somali gunmen Sunday, hours after a leading Muslim cleric condemned Pope Benedict XVI for his remarks on Islam and violence.


The nun, who was not immediately identified, was shot in the back at S.O.S. Hospital in northern Mogadishu by two gunmen, said Mohamed Yusuf, a doctor at the facility, which serves mothers and children. The nun's bodyguard and a hospital worker were also killed, doctors said.


There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, and it was not clear if it was directly linked to the pope's comments. Two people had been arrested, said Yusuf Mohamed Siad, head of security for the Islamic militia that controls Mogadishu.


Earlier Sunday, a Somali cleric criticized the comments the pope made in a speech last week for offending Muslims. The pope had cited the words of a Byzantine emperor who characterized some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad, Islam's founder, as "evil and inhuman."


"The pope's statement at this time was not only wrong but irresponsible as well," said Sheik Nor Barud, deputy leader of the Somali Muslim Scholars Association.


"Both the Pope and the Byzantine Emperor he quoted are ignorant of Islam and it is noble Prophet," he told journalists at a news conference in the capital Mogadishu.


In Rome, Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi called the nun's slaying "a horrible episode," the Italian news agency ANSA said. "Let's hope that it will be an isolated fact."


Lombardi indicated the shooting could be related to the uproar over the pope's remarks.


"We are following with concern the consequences of this wave of hate, hoping that it does not lead to grave consequences for the church in the world," he was quoted as saying.


Benedict apologized earlier Sunday for the angry reaction to his remarks, which he said came from a text that didn't reflect his personal opinion.


Witnesses also said the shooting and the pope's comments appeared to be linked.


"These gunmen always look for white people to kill, and now the pope gave them the reason to do their worst," said Mohamud Durguf Derow, who was at the scene when the nun was killed.


The nun, who spoke fluent Somali, was believed to be around 60 and had been working at the hospital since 2002, said witnesses at the hospital on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.


Somalia has been without an effective central government since warlords overthrew it's longtime dictator in 1991 and divided the nation into fiefdoms. The Islamic fundamentalists have stepped into the vacuum as an alternative military and political power.


The current interim government was established two years ago with the support of the United Nations, but has failed to assert any power outside its base in Baidoa, 150 miles from Mogadishu.


The Islamic group, which seized the capital and much of southern Somalia this summer, is credited with bringing a semblance of order to the country after years of anarchy, but some of its leaders have been linked to al Qaeda and there are fears of an emerging Taliban-style regime.

 

 

Somalia Reconciliation Conference Opens, but Soon Stalls

 

Delegates gathered Saturday in Mogadishu, Somalia, on the eve of what was intended to be a national reconciliation conference. The conference was postponed when leading members of the opposition did not attend.

 

By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN

Published: July 16, 2007

 

NAIROBI, Kenya, July 15 A national reconciliation conference that diplomats have described as a make-or-break opportunity for Somalia’s troubled transitional government opened in Mogadishu on Sunday. But it barely got off the ground. Top opposition leaders did not show up, and the session was quickly postponed.

 

The conference organizer, Mohammed Ali Mahdi, a former warlord, greeted about 1,000 delegates who had gathered in an old police warehouse in Somalia’s bullet-pocked capital, saying, “I urge you to rise above your respective clan and sub-clan in order to bring normalcy to our country.”

 

But then he adjourned the meeting until Thursday, saying he wanted to wait for more people.

 

Somalia’s transitional government seems on the brink of disappearing into the same vortex of violence that has consumed 13 previous transitional governments. Even as the delegates were meeting on Sunday, mortar shells whooshed nearby.

 

“It’s true, we’re seeing another Baghdad in the making,” said a Western diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of diplomatic protocol. “But if this conference produces a road map, albeit with a few simple priorities, there’s a little hope.”

 

Somalia desperately needs that hope. Since 1991, when the central government imploded, it has been a stateless mess of warring clans, blown-up buildings, starving people and no clear path forward.

 

The national reconciliation conference was supposed to bring the warring factions back together. The plan was to invite 1,325 elders from Somalia’s dozens of clans and sub-clans and have them meet for at least 45 days to discuss clan differences, disarmament and radical Islam, a growing issue since an Islamic government briefly took power last year.

 

“Our hope is that the tribes will forget all their wars from before,” said Abdi Haji Gobdon, a transitional government spokesman, before the conference.

 

But the Islamists and hard-core members of opposing clans, who are thought to be the backbone of the growing insurgency, are boycotting.

 

“The government doesn’t have a political vision for the country, they are not following a just process for the distribution of resources, and the president is using his militia as a clan militia,” said Mohammed Uluso, a former agricultural minister and leader of the Ayr clan, which remains mostly hostile to the government. “So, no, we don’t feel there’s any reason to attend this conference and lend it legitimacy.”

 

Ibrahim Hassan Addou, the former foreign minister of the Islamist movement that briefly controlled the country for part of past year, said that until the Ethiopian troops that returned power to the transitional government left Somalia, the Islamist leadership had no interest in attending a conference.

 

“Somalia is under occupation right now, and people are not free to express their views,” he said by telephone from Dubai. “So what’s the point?”

 

Ethiopia invaded in December, with covert American help, and ousted the Islamic movement, which had managed to pacify much of the country. Ethiopian and American officials had accused the Islamists of harboring terrorists.

 

Since then, the Ethiopian forces occupying Somalia have been struggling with an Iraq-style insurgency that has quickly progressed from drive-by shootings to suicide attacks and cellphone-detonated bombs. Mogadishu is so dangerous again that other nations hesitate to send peacekeepers. Despite pledges from African countries to send 8,000 soldiers, only 1,600 Ugandans have showed up so far.

 

Meanwhile, the transitional federal government, a United Nations creation that has never had much grass-roots support, seems stuck in a rut. Its job is to shepherd the country toward elections in 2009. But it has yet to register voters or even organize a census. Piracy off Somalia’s 1,880-mile coastline is a serious issue again, threatening to cut off crucial food deliveries to a population that is often just a few handfuls of grain away from famine.

 

Part of the problem is that the transitional government does not act like the multiclan outfit envisioned by the United Nations. Instead, many Somalis, especially in Mogadishu, see it as Darod clan revenge against the Hawiye for what happened in the early 1990s, when Hawiye warlords ran Darod clan members out of Mogadishu. Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, the transitional president, is a former Darod warlord. Tensions between the Darod and Hawiye, two of Somalia’s biggest clans, have dominated modern Somali political history.

 

“Elders used to solve the problems among the tribes long ago,” said Bile Mohamoud Qabowsade, a Darod delegate. “So this conference may pave the way for a lasting solution among Somalis.”

 

But the conference cannot succeed if representatives of major groups do not attend. Another possible reason that they stayed away is that the conference was to be limited mostly to clan issues, and not political ones. Had the government opened the possibility of picking a new prime minister or discussing more equitable ways of sharing revenues from Mogadishu’s port, about the only source of tax income right now, more opposition members might have come.

 

While the transitional government is billing the conference as a historic, one-of-a-kind meeting, it is not much different from the transitional Parliament, which is made up of representatives of all major clans in a formula that reflects Somalia’s demographics. The Parliament has been essentially neutered, though, and recently more than 50 members made a formal statement demanding that they be consulted on important decisions, not ignored.

 

Most foreign diplomats assigned to help piece Somalia back together seem worn out, and pessimistic. European diplomats who had promised to attend the conference canceled their flight at the last minute because the pilots refused to fly into Mogadishu.

 

“I don’t think this could be opening in any worse conditions,” another Western diplomat said, also speaking on condition of anonymity because of diplomatic protocol.

 

One of the most radical ideas about governing Somalia came from a recent letter to the editor of a Nairobi newspaper: split the country into clan-based fiefs and rotate the president every few years.

 

“The status quo can’t go on,” the first diplomat said. “Something’s going to change. For better or worse, I don’t know.”

Mohammed Ibrahim and Yuusuf Maxamuud contributed reporting from Mogadishu, Somalia.

 

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