Ethiopia Invades Somalia
AYA
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* Reports on EPRDF's invasion of Luuq, Doolow, Beled-Xaawo, etc.*
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By Peter Smerdon
NAIROBI, Kenya (Reuter) - Aid workers said Ethiopian helicopter gunships
and heavy guns bombarded a town in western Somalia Friday after forces seized
two other towns nearer the Ethiopian border.
The Somali al-Ittihad (Union), a fundamentalist group, said Ethiopia
invaded western Somalia with troops and helicopter gunships, seizing at least
two towns and killing more than 100 people.
An Ethiopian foreign ministry spokesman in Addis Ababa
declined to comment on the reports of an Ethiopian incursion.
The Nairobi-based African Medical Research Foundation
(AMREF) said four of its staff were evacuated by air to Kenya from
the western Somali town of Lugh after it was attacked.
One of the evacuees, Ugandan doctor Francis Kizito, told the
British Broadcasting Corporation he saw three helicopter gunships
approaching Lugh and firing "indiscriminately" on militia
installations.
"They came from the north which is Ethiopia...They aimed at army
organisations of the Islamic organisation which governs Lugh," said
Kizito, adding there were definitely casualties as firing from the
gunships was heavy.
Lugh is more than 100 km (60 miles) southeast of the Ethiopian
border.
Speaking in Nairobi, Kizito said he saw no ground troops but
heard heavy guns from the east towards the Ethiopian border. He
said Ethiopian "missiles" had slammed into the middle of the town.
"As we were in the air we saw about 10 armoured cars going
towards Lugh from Dolow, which had already fallen to the army of
the Ethiopians. I understand Dolow fell around midnight and
Beled-Hawo fell in the (Friday) morning," the doctor said.
"They (AMREF staff) heard gunfire at six this morning and it got
more and more extreme, so they called by radio...for evacuation,"
Michael Gerber, AMREF's director-general, told Reuters.
He said the European Union Humanitarian Operations agency
sent a plane for the evacuation but it was unable at first to land
because three helicopter gunships were flying in the area.
"Our people felt they definitely came from Ethiopia," he said.
He said staff thought the attack was supported by a Somali
faction and was launched because Ethiopia believed its Moslem
fundamentalists were receiving support from fundamentalist groups
which hold sway in western Somalia.
Khalif Mahmoud Warsame, spokesman for the al-Ittihad (Union)
movement in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, said on Friday
Ethiopian troops with 30 tanks and helicopter gunships had seized
Somalia's western Gedo region on Thursday night.
He said troops, tanks and helicopter gunships also attacked
Lugh district and fighting was continuing on Friday. He said the
gunships raided Lugh and Beled-Hawo village.
More than 100 civilians and an unknown number of militiamen
had been killed, Warsame said. Thousands of Somali families
were fleeing because of the Ethiopian attack, backed by Somali
fighters of the Somali National Front led by Omar Haji Masalle.
In a statement released in Nairobi, al-Ittihad said: "This barbaric
aggression against the Islamic Ittihad is planned by General Haji
Masalle and the Ethiopian government with the help of international
imperialists."
Somalia has had no central government since the overthrow of
late president Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991. It has since been torn
by war between rival factions which hold different areas.
Moslem fundamentalists have ruled Lugh and other towns and
villages in the west of Somalia since Barre's overthrow. REUTER
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Somali Fighting Affects Mandera, Kenya
NAIROBI (Aug. 10) Kenya's northern border town of Mandera and nearby
areas were on Friday engulfed in tension and the air filled with bomb blasts
during fighting between Somali factions, one of which was allegedly assisted by
Ethiopians.
Kenyan military sources said two Kenya army officers are feared dead after
they were caught in a cross fire by the two sides and a number of Somali
civilians were reported dead while several others injured by heavily armed
Ethiopian forces.
Thousands of Somalis fled to the Kenyan side of the border to take refuge as
the three-hour gun-fire and bombardment continued, local papers reported adding
the Kenya army was on the alert closely monitoring the raid.
Business at the northern town was also halted temporarily as local trades
were closed for fear of attack.
The North Eastern provincial administration imposed a curfew after three
bombs fell into the frontier town.
Report said the fighting erupted between the Somali National Front (SNF),
formerly of the late Somali dictator Mohammed Siad Barre and the al-It-Had
Islamic fundamentalists.
Ethiopian warplanes, supporting the SNF, allegedly carried out a number of
raids against the fundamentalists.
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Apparent pull-out
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By Peter Smerdon
NAIROBI (Reuter) - Aid officials said Saturday Ethiopian troops had
pulled out of at least two Somali border towns seized in an assault with
Somali allies on Muslim fundamentalist forces.
They said staff visited the Somali border town of Belet-Hawa Saturday and
saw the bodies of 18 al-Ittihad al-Islam (Islamic Union) Muslim
fundamentalist fighters in the police station.
They quoted residents as saying Ethiopian troops had surrounded the
station and killed the fighters inside the building Friday.
``No one seems in control of Belet-Hawa now. The Ethiopians pulled back
into Ethiopia last night,'' said a Western aid official.
``The market is open and the town wasn't heavily shot up. In Dollow we
hear of one killed and the Ethiopians have also gone.''
In the Somali capital Mogadishu, al-Ittihad al-Islam officials said at
least 12 people were killed and 20 kidnapped by Ethiopian forces in
Belet-Hawa before they were beaten back into Ethiopia.
Foreign aid workers evacuated from the Somali town of Lugh by air to
Nairobi said they saw Ethiopian helicopter gunships and heavy artillery
pounding the area Friday after forces seized two other towns near the
border with Ethiopia since Thursday.
Lugh is 37 miles south of the Ethiopian border but the aid officials said
they had no word on casualties there.
Dollo is 25 miles to the southeast.
The aid officials were speaking by telephone from the northeastern Kenyan
town of Mandera, half a mile from Belet-Hawa and adjacent to the Ethiopian
and Somali borders.
They said three bombs hit Mandera during Friday's fighting and local
authorities imposed a curfew as the Kenyan army went on alert.
North Mogadishu faction leader Ali Mahdi Mohamed Saturday condemned the
Ethiopian attack, urged Ethiopia to withdraw its forces from Somalia and
called on the international community to push for a pullout.
An Ethiopian foreign ministry spokesman in Addis Ababa declined to
comment on the reports of the Ethiopian incursion.
Somalia has had no government and has been torn apart by war since the
fall of late president Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.REUTER
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