Somali deaths mount, refugee exodus grows*

By Sahal Abdulle
Reuters
Friday, April 20, 2007; 2:06 PM

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Shelling and gunfire rocked Mogadishu on Friday as
an exodus from the Somali capital gathered pace from three days of
battles that a rights group said had killed at least 113 people.

The United Nations said 321,000 people -- nearly a third of the city's
population -- had fled since February in refugee scenes not seen in
Somalia since the fall of a dictator in 1991.

Since Wednesday, battles pitting Ethiopian and Somali troops against
Islamist insurgents have killed 113 people and wounded another 222, the
Elman Peace and Human Rights Organisation said.

"Today was one of the worst days of shelling yet ... We call on both
sides to cease the war immediately without any pre-condition," chairman
Sudan Ali Ahmed told Reuters.

Parts of Mogadishu looked like a ghost town of empty streets and
shattered buildings. In provinces round the city, tens of thousands of
refugees waited under trees or beside roads in what aid groups say is a
looming humanitarian disaster.

At packed Mogadishu hospitals, bloodied patients screamed and doctors
struggled to tend to scores of wounded after four days of clashes
between troops and insurgents.

Soldiers blocked off roads to military bases after a suicide attacker
blew himself up on Thursday at a former prison now used by the interim
Somali government's Ethiopian military allies.

Several dozen people, mainly civilians, died in that blast and other
fighting across the city on Thursday including a rocket attack on a
market-place.

Residents hardened by 16 years of lawlessness say violence is getting
worse in Mogadishu, where militant Islamists and some disgruntled Hawiye
clan fighters are battling Somali government forces and their Ethiopian
military allies.

African Union peacekeepers have failed to stem the war.

President Abdullahi Yusuf tried to put a brave face on the situation. "I
would say the problem of Somalia is slowly but surely ending," he said
in Ethiopia where he was holding talks with his main ally, Prime
Minister Meles Zenawi.

Mogadishu residents say the latest fighting is as bad as four days of
battles that killed 1,000 people at the end of March. Hundreds of
Somalis were fleeing by foot, donkey, cart and vehicle on Friday,
Reuters witnesses said.

"MARTYRDOM OPERATION"

A little known Islamist group, calling itself the Young Mujahideen
Movement in Somalia, claimed responsibility for the suicide blast. It
said it used chemicals in the attack, though it was not possible to
verify the authenticity of the Internet statement which referred to a
"martyrdom operation."

The United Nations estimates there are 3,000 anti-government combatants,
including foreign fighters, in Somalia. The Security Council will in
June consider sending peacekeepers.

Yusuf vowed to hunt down gunmen loyal to an Islamist movement defying
his government's bid to restore central rule for the first time since
the fall of a dictator in 1991.

Ethiopia's state news agency said Yusuf and Meles, in talks,
"underscored the need to intensify terrorist mopping up operations in
Mogadishu."

Islamist leader Sheikh Sharif Ahmed said dozens of Ethiopian soldiers
had defected in Mogadishu and fled across the sea to Yemen -- but Somali
officials denied that.

Ethiopia dismissed on Friday comments by the U.N. humanitarian
coordinator for Somalia that its troops and the Somali interim
government were not helping with access for aid.

"(Eric) Laroche's statement shows a surprising lack of understanding of
the situation in and around Mogadishu and the difficulties for relief
operations caused by car bombs, land mines and random rocket attacks by
extremists and terrorists," spokesman Solomon Abebe said.

Oxfam urged Kenya to reopen its border to allow aid to cross and Somali
asylum seekers to be screened.

(Additional reporting by Farah Roble in Mogadishu, Andrew Cawthorne and
Guled Mohamed in Nairobi, Sami Aboudi in Dubai and Tsegaye Tadesse in
Addis Ababa)