Ethiopia: al-Qaida Operating in Somalia

[Jumatatu]

Ethiopia: al-Qaida Operating in Somalia

By CHRIS TOMLINSON, Associated Press Writer

May 12, 2005

 

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia -- Ethiopia's prime minister said Thursday he believes it is common knowledge that an al-Qaida terror cell is operating in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, and that only a stable central government can end the chaos in the Horn of Africa country and eliminate terrorist threats.

 

In an interview with The Associated Press, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said his government supported the transitional Somali government that was formed in neighboring Kenya last year and would do everything possible to help that government take power. He said, though, he would only send troops to Somalia in self defense, since it is up to Somalis themselves to install the first effective central government in 14 years.

 

"Wherever there is distress, wherever there is acute poverty, social dislocation, the potential for a terrorist state exists," Meles said. "We have a very active terrorist cell in Mogadishu, which has been involved in terrorist activities in Kenya."

 

Kenya was the site of two major terrorist attacks. A car bomb destroyed the U.S. Embassy in 1998, and a car bomb was detonated outside of a hotel on the Indian Ocean coast in 2002. The masterminds of both attacks reportedly fled to Somalia, though most Somalis reject that claim.

 

Somalia has been without a central government since clan-based warlords overthrew the dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991. Warlords then turned on each other, plunging the nation of 7 million into anarchy. An estimated 10,500 armed fighters operate in Mogadishu.

 

The African Union Peace and Security Council, also based in Addis Ababa, met Thursday to discuss plans to send troops to Somalia to guarantee the safety of the government-in-exile, which was formed after two years of peace talks in Kenya.

 

The international community needs to be more proactive in helping the Somali government establish itself, African Union Commission Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare told the meeting.

 

"Should the international community fail to act decisively to sustain the gains of the reconciliation process, there is a risk that the effort thus far deployed will be put to waste," said Konare.

 

Meles told AP the new government stood the best chance of shutting down the terror cell in Somalia.

 

"We have offered to help," Meles said. "Should the process collapse -- we very much hope it doesn't but if it does -- we plan to protect ourselves, not sort out the mess in Somalia."

 

In an African Union report obtained by AP, officials proposed that a 1,700-strong peacekeeping force go to Somalia two weeks ahead of the government's return to the country, and stay for nine months to protect the government, secure supply routes and carry out reconnaissance missions.

 

The report, which is being discussed at the African Union Peace and Security Council meeting, says the force will be composed equally of troops from Uganda and Sudan and will cost $100 million.

 

Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi told journalists his government will relocate to Somalia by month's end and the proposed peacekeeping force will join them there.

 

"We think we can bring stabilization to Somalia and pacification within nine months," Gedi said.

 

Source: AP, May 12, 2005

[Jumatatu]

Tell me it is not a coincidnece....Yeey speeding an illegal gathering of TFG MP's ( at least most were - apart from those collected from Eastleigh), PM Geedi allegedly going to Addis-Ababa with the conclussion of that meeting, The AU today accepting the request of Geedi and approving the sending of troops to Somalia, plus this ourturst from Zenawi. Am I missing something..? :confused:

[wind.talker]

All Zenawi wants is Washington to give him the Green Light. He'll say anything to get that green light, sxb. I don't know why you're surprised.

 

But you're right. Its not a coincidence. The Ethiopian card is on the table now, plain and evident. Question is: what will Sharif Xasan and his branch of the TFG do? :confused: More importantly, will Washington grant the ETs the much-needed Green Light to invade Somalia in chase of their ghost terrorists? I hope they don't. There's a greater evil here behind the scenes that's much worse than all other Somali warlords, TFG whatever the hell you wanna call 'em put together. And I don't think any of these so-called leaders are ready to combat this threat to Somalinimo.

[Fyr]

Don’t act all shocked Jumatatu it doesn’t take a genius to guess this coming. Although I’m quiet impressed by Meles Al-Qaida timing, it always works doesn’t’ it? I say good luck to both sides and may the best man win.

[Gabbal]

Dooliga fooshaxun maxuu yidhi? Alle yaa u sheego inaysan taariikhda ahayn 2001. Xukunka Buush iyo taa Zenaawi waxaa ka dhaxeeso "LAGU BARAY, LAGU YIQIIN". Alle yaa danyeerka u sheego.

[SOO MAAL]

Somalia: Meles Zenawi plays the terror card

Thu. May 12, 2005 03:08 pm.

(SomaliNet) Ethiopian Prime Minister Mr. Meles Zenawi said there’s an active terror cell in Mogadishu, Somalia in an interview with the Associated Press. This bold statement coincides with today’s African Union (AU) meeting in Addis Ababa, in which the organization is trying to help Ethiopian backed new Somali government. It also coincides with human rights report on Ethiopia.

 

Just yesterday, Human Rights Watch accused the Ethiopian government of widespread human rights abuses in Oromo region. Somalis under Ethiopian occupation also report similar brutalities. People who oppose Ethiopia’s occupation are labeled as terrorists and often die in government hands.

 

Mogadishu warlords are opposed to the new government backed by Mr. Zenawi and today’s claim can be interpreted as an effort to get the US on his side. Somali political analysts say it should be fully investigated before one side of the struggle is taken seriously. The other side always accuses Ethiopia of smuggling weapons into Somalia.

 

Mr. Zanawi came to power in 1990 after his armed militia overthrew the former regime in a bloody confrontation.

[SOO MAAL]

Nowadays, Tolstoy became exceedingly concerned south Somalia politics more than north, Well there is no such thing that he especially emphasizing (Nairobi wing and Mogadishu wing), because TFG is still one government and has the backing of 152 MPs, and there is the opposition mainly Mogadishu warlords, and deceived Sharif Hassan – the speaker of the parliament.

I believe legitimacy is more essential than money, and Abdulaahi Yusuf’s government iis still the only legitimate government in all Somalia.

 

And Tolstoy, in fact Riyaale will serve better to Mr. Meles Zenawi and Ethiopians than Abdulaahi Yusuf , Riyaale said in his own words “It's good. We have no better friend than Ethiopia,they always treat us as brothers, as young brothers.They help us better than any other country in the area."

[hukri]

THERE IS CONFERENCES GOING AROUND THE WORLD THAT IS BETWEEN OROMO AND ETHIOPIA AND THE DEAL IS THAT OROMO WILL TAKE SOMALIA AND LEAVE ETHIOPIA ALONE.

[Jumatatu]

Tolstoy your points well understood and it is obvious it was an expected implications on the sudden convening of a parliament meeting by Yeey. He obviously mis-calculated the domino reaction his hasty decission will result in, unless he was looking forward to this political instability.

Quoting you :

What this "Mugadisho-Wing" will be attempting to do at that time, is to revoke the legitimacy of Col. Yey in the eyes of the international community as a president of the TFG; because as it so happens for now he is still the TFG president by right, but if they were successful in impeaching him, then in that case his legitimacy will be in question, by firstly, the EU and US, who will be saying any political pronouncement made by Col. Yey's government or for that matter his Prime-Minister Mr. Ghedi is not worthy of the paper is written on.

On your latter assumption is quite clear the cloud of doubt gathers over the intention of Yeey and Geedi, but what am interested is could the Lawmakers in Mogadishu joined by those in Nairobi under the head of Sharif call for the impeachment of the Yeey and would it actually be acceptable as a legal binding, or will it classify as worthless as the actions of Yeey in the recent meeting?

[Jumatatu]

African peacekeepers would worsen Somali crisis - faction

Fri May 13, 2005 2:18 PM GMT+02:00

By William Maclean

 

NAIROBI (Reuters) - African nations will worsen Somalia's crisis if they send in peacekeepers before the government has solved a row over where it should be based, one wing of the divided administration said on Friday.

 

"Any deployment without a solution of this dispute is not helpful and will contribute to the crisis," Deputy Prime Minister Mohamud Ali Jama said by telephone from Mogadishu.

 

Jama, also information minister in the Horn of Africa country's embattled administration, speaks for a Mogadishu-based faction that opposes President Abdullahi Yusuf's plans to base his administration outside the capital in Baidoa and Jowhar.

 

Jama was commenting on the Africa Union's approval of a plan to send more than 1,000 troops to help Yusuf's government relocate from Kenya where it has worked since it was formed there at peace talks last year.

 

In Addis Ababa, the 53-nation AU authorised the east African peace body, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), on Thursday evening to send a peace force to Somalia to help the government establish itself. It did not say where the force would be stationed.

 

The force of Ugandan and Sudanese troops would protect the government and help with disarmament, AU peace and security chief Said Djinnit said in a statement.

 

He said the force would deploy "within weeks" but acknowledged there was no money as yet to fund it and he appealed to the international community to provide financing.

 

Jama said the move was premature because it did not have the agreement of all players in the government.

 

"If IGAD deploys troops in Baidoa and Jowhar without a consensus they will do so at their own risk. It will encourage one side to pursue its unilateral ambitions and discourage dialogue and reconciliation," Jama said.

 

Yusuf plans to set up his government outside Mogadishu, arguing the city is too dangerous. The heavily armed warlords whom Jama speaks for want Yusuf to come to Mogadishu, saying they can take care of security.

 

"The Mogadishu faction does not speak for public opinion in the capital, where people are tired of roadblocks, militia taxes and terrorism," an aide to Prime Minister Mohammed Ali Gedi said.

 

"We welcome the decision of the AU and we are packing our bags to leave Kenya as soon as possible," he said.

 

At the core of the dispute is mistrust among many warlords, especially those based in Mogadishu, of the intentions of Yusuf's main foreign sponsor Ethiopia, Somalia's historic foe.

 

Many among the overwhelmingly Muslim 10 million population are hostile to what they see as attempts by their big, nominally Christian-led neighbour to dictate events in the region.

 

Regional tensions rose sharply this week when a group of Somali MPs accused Ethiopia of sending troops across the border to back militias friendly to Yusuf. Ethiopia denies the charge.

 

Somalia collapsed into chaos after the overthrow of military ruler Mohammed Siad Barre in 1991. Conflict and famine have killed hundreds of thousands of people since then.

 

Members of Yusuf's cabinet and parliament have been arguing for months about several matters including where to be based once they go home, but speaker and president have rarely exposed their differences so openly or strongly as they have this week.

 

Parliament speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan said on Thursday he would leave Kenya on Saturday and install a rival assembly in Mogadishu, a move diplomats said would institutionalise the rift in Yusuf's cabinet.

 

Source: Reuters, May 13, 2005

[Jumatatu]

Is this another coincidence:

 

Somalia Has Become a Safe Haven for Terrorists in East Africa, U.S. General Says

By By CHRIS TOMLINSON Associated Press Writer

 

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia May 13, 2005 — Somalia has become a safe haven for terrorists in East Africa and the government-in-exile must take power to restore law and order to the Horn of Africa nation, the commander of a U.S. counterterrorism task force said Friday.

 

U.S. Marine Maj. Gen. Samuel Helland, the commander of the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, said American troops were working with Somalia's neighbors to improve their border security since U.S. pressure on the al-Qaida terror group in Pakistan and Afghanistan may force some members to seek refuge in East Africa.

 

"Somalia is a safe haven, it is ungoverned space," Helland told The Associated Press in an interview from his headquarters in Djibouti. "We, the international community, have to do something to take away that safe haven."

 

 

He said Somalia's government-in-exile, formed last year in Kenya after three years of peace talks, needs to assert itself inside Somalia and introduces law and order.

 

On Thursday, the African Union authorized deployment of 1,700 peacekeepers to Somalia to help secure the transitional government as it heads home. The Ugandan and Sudanese troops will be deployed in the towns of Baidoa and Jowhar, from where the government will operate temporarily because the Somali capital is unsafe, the AU's Said Djinnit said.

 

 

Somalia has been without a central government since clan-based warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991. Warlords then turned on each other, plunging the Horn of Africa nation of 7 million into anarchy. Somalia's government has been based in neighboring Kenya since it was formed in 2004 because the capital, Mogadishu, is considered unsafe.

 

The government is opposed by Islamic extremists and some of the dozens of warlords in the country.

 

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told AP on Thursday that an al-Qaida terror cell was "very active" in Mogadishu, but that a Somali government was the best bet for dealing with the problem.

 

Helland spoke to AP as he prepared to end his one-year command of the task force

[wind.talker]

^^

 

I searched some other press releases by this American general Helland - below is one dated back in 2002 when he's claiming 'al-Qaeda' was operating in Somalia. No one seemed to listen to him then, but I suppose now things are going to change a tad bit (with Zenawi's unresearched claim of 'terrorists' in Somalia). Like I said, the question remains: will the U.S. give Zenawi the Green Light to root out his ghost terrorists from Somalia? :confused: The comments made by this U.S. general surely aren't helping.

 

US commander claims al-Qaeda basis in Somalia

Terror groups, including al-Qaeda, are exploiting lawless areas in the Horn of Africa region to hide, recruit and train members and possibly plan attacks, the head of the region's United States-led anti-terror force said.

 

"We find the terrorist networks here using the fact that there is a lot of ungoverned space in the Horn of Africa," Major-General Samuel Helland said on Monday.

 

"Because of this, it's very easy for a terrorist organisation to establish a presence. It's very easy for them to train, equip, organise and use the facilities that are present to gain a foothold.

 

"And I suspect that if we look very hard at the area, we'll see that there is some training going on for operations in other parts of the world," he said by phone from Djibouti, where he heads the Combined Joint Task Force overseeing counterterrorism activities in the Horn of Africa.

 

Since late 2002, Djibouti has hosted United States troops using the tiny state as a base to hunt down terrorist groups.

 

Helland took over the task force in May.

 

"I think we can say with some level of confidence that there are al-Qaeda operatives in the Horn of Africa," Helland said. "This is ungoverned space they thrive in." - Reuters

SOURCE: http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=68&art_id=vn20041228105102641C361287

[SOO MAAL]

Dear Mr. Tolstoy

 

You and I hold extremely opposing political views regarding north Somalia – the region that both of us are from- (or Somaliland as call it) and also south Somalia, and that is not necessarily negative thing but healthy and natural, and the purpose behind the formation of this forum was to facilitate nomads to express their contradictory opinions.

 

Secondly, the transitional federal government of Somalia (TFG) is the legitimate government of Somalia, as Arta government was the Somalia’s only legitimate government until October 14,2004. Although I don’t admire Mr. Abdulaahi Yusuf (Somalia current president), but still he is Somalia’s head of state. Every Somali president ought to be respected from Adam Abdullah Osman, Abdi Rashid Ali Shermarke, Mohamed Siad Barre, Abdulkassim Salat Hassan, to Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, and believe me, I will assure any future president of Somalia,my full support, because I am a strong believer of the importance of stability, rule and law.

Unlike warlords who prefer to maintain the current situation in Somalia of mayhem and anarchism. (Somaliland is not my interest; it’s up to the Somali Landers to choose their leader)

 

Third, this is a public forum and if you were wise enough, you should don’t question my age, or elders. And I don’t understand, why you making character assassination and making the whole issue very personal, If you didn’t like my comment about your posting, I am sorry, the favor I can do for you is to ignore your comments (and I expect the same from you). I am not interested to discuss with you or your brother with political affairs of Somalia (both north and south). Again this is a public forum and I am not intending to turn the discussion into personal with anyone.

 

Fourth, to see division within the members of the government is not surprising, since both parliament and council of ministers includes most Somali warlords except Riyaale, for that reason this government was expected to be the government of reconciliation. In essence, the transitional federal government is legitimate and has the backing of 152 MPs; although there is strong opposition consists of warlords.

[sudanes]

ethiopia is surrounded by muslim countryies ..if he keeps talkin like it wont be long before sudan and soamlia join and invade from both sides..that would keep him shut.

 

terrorist kulahaa,he is the terrorist and torturing the innocent ugaden people.

 

actually i dont want so much the ******* region as i used..cause i heard a heart breaking stories form there,,how they spread HIV by taking laddies and rapping them(their HIV soldiers),,,taking back agaadeen region would bring the disease to our land.