Somali Islamists claim attack on Ethiopian military convoy

[Ahmed_Guree]

MOGADISHU (AFP) - Somalia's powerful Islamist movement claimed to have ambushed an Ethiopian military convoy in southern Somalia, inflicting large numbers of casualties and destroying several armored vehicles.

 

The Islamists, who have vowed holy war against Ethiopian troops in Somalia protecting the weak government, said the attack early Sunday occurred in the Bay region near the temporary government seat of Baidoa, where the two sides are girding for battle.

 

 

"I confirm that our local Mujahedeen around Kurtale area ambushed an Ethiopian military convoy," said Sheikh Abdurahim Ali Muddey, the spokesman for the Supreme Islamic Council of Somalia.

 

 

"They suffered a lot of casualties," he told reporters in Mogadishu, about 250 kilometers (155 miles) southeast of Baidoa, which the Islamists seized in June and have used as a base to take most of southern and central Somalia. "Two of their armed vehicles were completely destroyed and two others less seriously damaged," said Muddey, offering no details on the number of casualties from the attack.

 

 

He pledged the ambush was only the beginning of attacks against Ethiopian forces.

 

 

"We have Mujahedeen everywhere in Somalia and are ready to strike Ethiopian forces inside our territory," he said. "This blow is the beginning and more attacks are ahead."

 

 

Ethiopian officials were not immediately available to comment and the report could not be independently confirmed due to severe flooding and instability in the area where the attack was said to have taken place.

 

 

The Islamists last month claimed to have drawn first blood in the jihad by attacking another Ethiopian convoy in the same area, killing two soldiers.

 

 

Ethiopia denies reports it has thousands of combat troops in Somalia but admits several hundred military advisers, trainers and support personnel have been sent to help the transitional government in Baidoa.

 

 

It has also made clear it will defend the internationally backed government and itself from attack by the Islamists, some of whom are accused of links with Al-Qaeda and have refused to attend peace talks until the Ethiopians withdraw.

 

 

Ethiopia is one of 10 countries, along with Lebanon's militant Shiite Hezbollah movement, accused by UN experts of violating a 1992 arms embargo on Somalia to support the rival factions.

 

 

Seven of the 10, including Ethiopia's arch-foe neighbor Eritrea, are alleged to be backing the Islamists and there are fears an all-out war in Somalia could draw in both Addis Ababa and Asmara, fuelling a regional conflict.

 

 

Nearly all of the countries named in the report presented to the UN Security Council on Friday have denied violating the arms embargo.

 

 

Somalia has lacked an effective government since dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was toppled in 1991. Since then, more than a dozen attempts to restore a functional regime have failed.