Mogadishu: Islamic Militants Wage Heaviest Fighting In Months
MOGADISHU, Somalia- Insurgents and government-allied forces battled with machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades Saturday in the heaviest fighting to hit Somalia’s capital for months, leaving at least seven people dead and dozens others wounded, witnesses and health officials said.
Islamic fighters briefly occupied a police station in south Mogadishu, before heading back out of the area, chanting “God is great,” witnesses said. Witnesses said at least seven people including a woman had died in the heavy fighting between insurgents, government troops and government-allied Ethiopian forces.
At least 35 people wounded in the fighting were being treated at Mogadishu’s Medina Hospital, said Tahir Mohammed Mahmoud, an administrative assistant. He said it was the worst fighting, and heaviest day for hospital admissions, for at least four months in the war-scarred city.
Another witness to the fighting, Hassan Hussein, said he saw two dead Ethiopian troops. Ethiopian officials were not immediately available for confirmation.
On the political front, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi was in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, for consultations.
He has been locked in a power struggle for months with President Abdullahi Yusuf, who wants to push through a no-confidence vote this week and form a new government—presumably without Gedi. On Friday, Gedi told local media that he was not planning to resign, contrary to widespread speculation.
Twenty-two ministers and deputy ministers have threatened to resign unless the no-confidence vote is held, exposing deep rifts in the administration largely along politicians clan lines.
Analysts say the Ethiopian government primarily wants stability in Somalia so it can withdraw its troops, who still patrol Mogadishu and other parts of the country.
It is unclear which of the two leaders it backs.
Mogadishu has been plagued by fighting since government troops and their Ethiopian allies chased out the Council of Islamic Courts in December. For six months, the Islamic group controlled much of southern Somalia, and remnants have vowed to fight an Iraq-style insurgency. Thousands of civilians have been killed in the fighting this year.
Some 1.5 million Somalis are now in need of food and protection—50 percent more that at the start of the year—due to inadequate rains, continuing internal displacement and a potential cholera epidemic, the U.N. says.
AP article by Salad Duhul here.
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This is a place that needs to be re-visited. Sooner or later, Somalia will have to be dealt with. Much of the piracy in that area comes from Somalia. We have troops, and aircraft nearby, as well as Coasties and other naval craft.
Whether or not the Ethiopians can outlast AQ is anyone’s guess. They’d have to cut off the supplies of Kat and eradicate every AQ stronghold before any success can be achieved in Somalia. And Somailians themselves need to fight the irhabis the same as Iraqis are doing, before any real change can take place there. Otherwise, it is possible that millions will die from starvation, war and disease.
An all-out air and land assault on the irhabis by Ethopia, Northern Somalis and American air power might do the trick.
October 27th, 2007 at 1:21 pmUnfortunately, I doubt that this will happen any time soon.