Somalia condemns BBC journalist killing

[General Duke]

Somalia condemns BBC journalist killing

- Thursday, February 10, 2005 at 13:22

 

By Mohamed Ali Bile

 

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - The murder of a British journalist in Somalia appears to be an attempt to scare off international efforts to rebuild the anarchic country, its new government says.

 

"We cannot allow the forces of darkness to succeed, because more of these incidents could derail our attempt to restore order," Deputy Prime Minister Mohamud Abdullahi Jama told Reuters on Thursday.

 

"And even if the intention was not to weaken international confidence in our government, that could be its effect."

 

Government officials acknowledged Wednesday's killing of BBC producer Kate Peyton had cast a shadow over plans to restore order with the help of foreign troops. But it urged international donors to stay involved.

 

Peyton, 39, was shot in the capital Mogadishu shortly after she arrived to report on the lawless Horn of Africa state where the new government is hoping to end years of militia violence.

 

At least eight other foreign journalists have been killed in Somalia since warlords overthrew former dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.

 

Witnesses said a gunman approached Peyton at the gate of a hotel, fired one bullet with a pistol and then sped off in a car with other passengers. The car was found abandoned in another part of town.

 

"We suspect this was the work of people trying to destabilise the new government and prevent foreign peacekeepers from coming to Somalia," a spokesman for President Abdullahi Yusuf said in Nairobi.

 

"She was a soft target whose death sends a big international message," the spokesman, Yusuf Ismail Baribari, said.

 

"But the Somali people have a message of their own -- it is that they are hostages of these gunmen and their programme of instability. They reject this cowardly killing. After 14 years of bloodshed, Somalia says enough is enough.

 

"If the message was to scare the transitional government and the president, they have failed."

 

NO POLICE FORCE

 

Mogadishu has no working police force and there is no formal hunt for Peyton's killers. But residents in Mogadishu said Abdi Hassan Awale, the police chief of a previous failed attempt at government in 2000-2003, was trying to launch investigations using his network of former colleagues.

 

The new Somali government, which was set up last year in the relative safety of neighbouring Kenya, announced on Wednesday it planned to go home on February 21.

 

It aims to end feuding between the militias which have carved the country of up to 10 million into clan fiefdoms since 1991.

 

Several cabinet ministers and dozens of MPs are visiting Mogadishu this week to assess security ahead of the government's return. They are due to report back in Nairobi on Friday.

 

Although Yusuf is planning to welcome a combined African Union and Arab League force of 7,500 troops to help him establish authority, several Mogadishu warlords in his cabinet argue that local militias are all the military muscle required.

 

Diplomats say their remarks reflect mistrust of Yusuf's intentions rather than confidence in their militias' competence. Yusuf is seen by many in Mogadishu as being too close to regional power Ethiopia, Somalia's historic foe.

 

Source: Reuters UK

[N.O.R.F]

It takes one silly person to do such a thing. I hope the government arrests the perpetrator and makes an example of him in order to deter others in send out the message that they are serious about desarming people & installing peace. The govnt must act and act swiftly to dispell any fears among ordinary people and to also show that a they are not affraid of bringing them to justice, no matter which warlord/clan/faction they are part of. Does the govnt have any balls? Its crunch time!

[NGONGE]

^^^ Surely you jest!