Islamists Poised for Somalia Takeover
Dan Clore
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo
[When the government of Ethiopia invaded Somalia in December, 2006, it
planned to occupy the country for three months. (What's that I hear --
Countries don't invade other countries in the 21st century?) It quickly
found itself in a Vietnam/Iraq-style quagmire, and is still stuck,
despite a partial withdrawal. Thousands of civilians have been killed in
the conflict, and things are only getting worse as Islamists are now
poised for a complete takeover. But the Somalia quagmire will
undoubtedly remain one of the most underreported news stories.--DC]
*****
http://tinyurl.com/5nldys
November 22, 2008
Dozens Killed as Fighting Intensifies in Somalia
By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM and SHARON OTTERMAN
MOGADISHU, Somalia — At least two dozen people, including six children,
were killed in heavy fighting here in Somalia’s capital on Friday as
government troops tried to reassert control and Islamist insurgents
fought back fiercely, witnesses said.
Bodies littered the streets of the bullet-pocked city, and hundreds of
residents began to flee. Both sides claimed victory.
Violence between Islamist rebels and government forces has intensified
over the past few weeks. Islamist insurgents now control much of south
central Somalia, including many neighborhoods within Mogadishu, and seem
intent on seizing the few enclaves the government, with Ethiopian
muscle, still controls.
The gun battles on Friday started just after dawn outside the house of a
local district commissioner, Ahmed Daaci, in a southern neighborhood of
the city. At least 17 people died and 6 were wounded in that fighting,
according to witnesses’ accounts.
Mr. Daaci, who survived the attack, said that government forces had
repulsed a group of insurgents who attacked his house, and that 17 of
the attackers were killed.
The bodies were left on display for hours, after government forces
blocked residents from collecting them, an apparent attempt to ward off
further attacks.
“I saw 12 dead bodies lying on the streets, and there were 2 bodies in
front of my house,” said Abdurashid Abdullahi, a resident of the Medina
neighborhood, where the fighting took place. “They are the Islamists,”
he said.
More fighting erupted in the afternoon, when Islamist insurgents and
government forces, backed by Ethiopian troops, fired artillery at each
other. Six children were killed when a mortar shell slammed into their
house, said a resident who lived next to the crushed building.
Ethiopian troops were to start leaving some positions in Mogadishu on
Friday, under terms of a recent United Nations-brokered peace deal in
Djibouti between the transitional government and a coalition of Islamist
groups. African Union troops are scheduled to replace them.
But there were no signs of a withdrawal, witnesses said.
One of the insurgent groups, a faction of the Union of Islamic Courts,
considered one of the more moderate Islamist groups in Somalia, said it
had lost six men in the day’s fighting and had killed 15 government
soldiers. The figures could not be independently verified.
Ethiopian troops entered the country in late 2006 and ousted an Islamist
administration that briefly controlled much of south and central
Somalia. But the Islamists regrouped, and have steadily progressed from
staging sporadic hit-and-run guerrilla attacks to seizing — and holding
— large swaths of territory.
A deal reached late last month between the transitional government and
the main Islamist-led opposition group called for Ethiopian troops to
pull out of areas in Mogadishu and the central garrison town of
Beledweyne by Nov. 21, which was Friday.
Under the deal, the Somali government and the opposition Alliance for
the Reliberation of Somalia are to assemble a 10,000-strong police force
to help the African Union peacekeepers control the areas.
Somalia has been without a functioning central government since 1991,
when Mohammed Siad Barre was removed from power and the army fell into
the hands of clan militias, throwing the country into lawlessness.
Mohammed Ibrahim reported from Mogadishu, and Sharon Otterman from New York.
*****
http://wiredispatch.com/news/?id=461774
SCENARIOS-Is Somalia on the verge of an Islamist takeover?
by Andrew Cawthorne
Reuters North American News Service
Nov 21, 2008 04:16 EST
NAIROBI, Nov 21 (Reuters) - Rampant piracy offshore and an advance by
Islamist rebels on Mogadishu have put Somalia's long-running civil
conflict in the global spotlight.
Here are some possible scenarios for the country.
ISLAMIST TAKEOVER?
* After a two-year insurgency, Islamist fighters are within nine miles
(six km) of the capital and President Abdullahi Yusuf admits his
Western-backed government is on the verge of collapse. The Islamists or
aligned groups now control most of the south, except Mogadishu and the
seat of parliament, Baidoa.
* The Islamists' momentum in recent months has led to some predictions
of an imminent assault on the capital, where they launch regular
guerrilla-style attacks on the government and its Ethiopian military allies.
* But the rebels are split. The most militant wing, al Shabaab, which is
on Washington's terrorist list, is urging jihad, or holy war. Moderate
elements in another faction, the Islamic Courts Union, are leaning
towards talks. The umbrella opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of
Somalia (ARS) is divided into a pro-peace group known as ARS-Djibouti
and a hardline wing ARS-Eritrea.
* Some analysts say the Islamists may be quietly satisfied with the
current, Iraq-style situation of daily attacks in Mogadishu, drawing in
African peacekeepers and keeping Somali-Ethiopian troops bogged down.
The presence of several thousand Ethiopian troops -- who beat them
militarily at the end of 2006 -- is a major deterrent to an assault on
the city.
* Should the Islamists take the capital, hardline leaders say they will
impose sharia law across the south. Washington fears that would make it
a haven for al Qaeda-linked extremists, and neighbouring Ethiopia fears
a push on its ethnically Somali regions. But some regional diplomats say
the world should have nothing to fear from an Islamist-led Somalia,
provided -- crucially -- al Shabaab and other militants are
marginalised. The northern states of Somaliland and Puntland run their
own affairs, with the former having declared itself independent.
* Islamist leaders have publicly vowed to stamp out piracy if they take
over and cite their action against gangs when they ruled the south for
half of 2006. But analysts say some factions, including Shabaab, are
increasingly linked to piracy, using the gangs to bring arms from abroad
and sharing spoils.
POWER-SHARING?
* After 14 attempts to re-establish effective central government in
Somalia since warlords toppled a dictator in 1991, another one came
along this year. The U.N. special envoy to Somalia, Ahmedou
Ould-Abdallah, has been leading talks in Djibouti between the government
and moderate Islamists.
* Both sides have signed a ceasefire in principle and an agreement to
form a power-sharing government. But with hardline Islamists stepping up
attacks every time the peace process moves a notch forward, it has had
no impact in stemming violence on the ground. Further, Prime Minister
Nur Hassan Hussein says Yusuf himself is opposed to the peace process.
"The president is an obstacle, no doubt," he told Reuters this week,
underlining rifts that are frustrating the government's foreign backers.
* East African nations and the wider international community are backing
power-sharing as the best way to avoid the collapse of Yusuf's
government while adapting to the reality of Islamist power on the ground.
* A regional summit in Nairobi at the end of October gave the Somali
government a 15-day deadline for a cabinet reshuffle to bring in some
moderate opponents. The deadline has expired.
FOREIGN INTERVENTION?
* Any talk of foreign intervention in Somalia is tinged with memories of
disastrous U.N. and U.S. interventions in the early 1990s, perhaps most
vividly illustrated by the "Black Hawk Down" battle in 1993 when 18
American troops were killed.
* The African Union (AU) has a 3,000-strong peacekeeping force of
Ugandans and Burundians, but they have been unable to do much more than
guard a few key installations like the presidential palace and airport.
Both of those have been hit by insurgents, however, and AU troops
themselves are targets too.
* The AU is struggling to increase the force to an intended 8,000,
though Nigeria and others are talking of soon sending reinforcements.
The pan-African body's preferred option, however, is to hand over to the
United Nations.
* The U.N. Security Council appears to have no political appetite for
another major intervention in Africa -- at a time when it is facing
criticism over failing to keep the peace in Congo and Darfur -- but has
begun contingency planning in case.
* By contrast, foreign nations have swung into quick action to try to
contain piracy which has reached unprecedented levels this year in the
nearby Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean waters.
* The NATO alliance and the European Union (EU) have sent ships, while
the United States, France, Russia, India and others have all stepped up
patrols in the area. As if mocking their efforts, pirates took a Saudi
supertanker off Kenya last weekend in their biggest and geographically
furthest strike yet.
* Ethiopia has been quietly withdrawing soldiers it sent in 2006 to back
the government. But it still has several thousand there and is viewed as
unlikely to pull them all out for fear of an al Shabaab assault on
Mogadishu.
CHAOS AS NORMAL?
* In the absence of any major shift in Somali politics, the current
quagmire would simply continue.
* Fighting has killed 10,000 civilians since early 2007 and more would
undoubtedly be caught up in daily clashes. More than 1 million are
internal refugees, and that number would grow.
* Foreign fighters may continue to be attracted to "Africa's Iraq" which
militants present as a war against infidel invaders.
Source: Reuters North American News Service
*****
--
Dan Clore
My collected fiction: _The Unspeakable and Others_
http://tinyurl.com/2gcoqt
Lord Weÿrdgliffe & Necronomicon Page:
http://tinyurl.com/292yz9
News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo
Skipper: Professor, will you tell these people who is
in charge on this island?
Professor: Why, no one.
Skipper: No one?
Thurston Howell III: No one? Good heavens, this is anarchy!
-- _Gilligan's Island_, episode #6, "President Gilligan"
James A. Donald
<cl...@columbia-center.org> wrote:
> News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo
>
> [When the government of Ethiopia invaded Somalia in
> December, 2006, it planned to occupy the country for
> three months.
The government of Ethiopia did not invade Somalia. The
Union of Islamic Courts invaded Ethiopia, intending to
impose Islam by fire and sword, seventh century style.
This worked out rather badly for them.
If they regain power, which I doubt, it will be as part
of peace deal where they promise to attack only non
Ethiopian Christians.
--
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We have the right to defend ourselves and our property, because
of the kind of animals that we are. True law derives from this
right, not from the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state.