-
Day By Day by Chris Muir April 9, 2009 – The Way We Were
Day By Day by Chris MuirThe United States WILL be increasing its military presence in the Somalia area within 48 hours according to General Petraeus as a stand-off continues between a United States Navy Destroyer and Somali pirates.
A stand-off was continuing on Thursday between a US navy destroyer and pirates holding a US-flagged ship’s captain hostage, amid signs other pirate-held ships were being moved towards the area.
The USS Bainbridge arrived at the scene on Thursday morning to monitor events aboard the pirate-held lifeboat, containing four pirates and Richard Philips, captain of the Maersk Alabama, the first US-flagged ship to be seized by Somali pirates. The lifeboat ran out of fuel shortly after the pirates left the Maersk Alabama with it on Wednesday following a struggle with the vessel’s 20-strong crew of US citizens.
The crew had handed over a pirate they had held hostage in a deal that would have seen Mr Philips returned, but the pirates reneged on the deal and left in a lifeboat with him, only to run out of fuel only a short distance away.
In blogging matters today, it is my birthday, so blogging will be very light.
Technorati Tags: Day By Day, Somalia
-
Somalia Watch: Somalia Strike Missed Al Qaeda Terrorists
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Meles Zenawi speaks at a news conference in Addis Ababa January 10, 2007. Meles said on Wednesday the United States had struck only once in Somali and denied reports that civilians had been killed in the air attack.
CNN: Official: Somalia strike missed al Qaeda suspects
None of the top three suspected terrorists in Somalia were killed in a U.S. airstrike this week, but Somalis with close ties to al Qaeda were killed, a senior U.S. official in the region said Thursday.
A day earlier, a Somali official had said a U.S. intelligence report had referred to the death of Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, one of the three senior al Qaeda members believed responsible for bombing U.S. embassies in East Africa. But U.S. and Ethiopian troops in southern Somalia were still pursuing the three, the U.S. official said Thursday on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.
Earlier this week, police at the Kenyan coastal border town of Kiunga arrested the wives and several children of two of the embassy bombing suspects, according to an internal police report seen by The Associated Press Wednesday. The suspects’ relatives had slipped across the border, according to the report.
Residents on Thursday reported new fighting between Islamic militiamen and Somali and Ethiopian forces.
The fighting early Thursday in southern Somalia set off a brush fire, residents said by two-way radio. There were reports of as many as 35 deaths.
The fighting comes after Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said his forces were carrying out mop-up operations against Islamic militants in the extreme southern corner of Somalia and that he expected to withdraw his troops within a few weeks.
It is a shame they have not killed these Al Qaeda thugs but they have their families and are hunting them down like dogs.
In the meantime, the United States is deploying more ships off the coast for more operations.
U.S. and Somali officials said Wednesday a small American team has been providing military advice to Ethiopian and Somali forces on the ground. The officials provided little detail and spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information.
Somali officials have said the U.S. had a right to strike, and one even called on America to send in ground troops to help root out al Qaeda extremists and the Islamic militia believed to be sheltering them.
The U.S. Navy has moved additional forces into waters off the Somali coast, where they have conducted security missions, monitoring maritime traffic and intercepting and interrogating crew on suspicious ships.
There were five ships Wednesday: the guided missile destroyer USS Ramage, the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier, the guided missile cruisers USS Bunker Hill and USS Anzio, and the amphibious landing ship USS Ashland. Officials said they could use the Ashland as a brig for any captured suspects.
The Islamic Courts have been routed and NO longer pose a threat to Somalia. Again Flap directs the reader to Bill Roggio’s excellent piece on the history of the attempted Islamification of Somalia by the Jihadists and Al Qaeda.
Stay tuned…..
Previous:
Somalia Watch: United States Denies Additional Air Strikes in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Al Qaeda Fazul Abdullah Mohammed Killed in Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Helicopter Gunships Attack Al-Qaeda Fighters in South Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Launching New Attacks Against Al Qaeda in Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Attacking Al Qaeda Positions in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Diplomats Call for Urgent Deployment of Peacekeeping Troops in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror
Technorati Tags: Somalia, Ethiopia, EritreaAbuTalhaal-Sudani, GouledHassanDourad, FazulAbdullahMohammed, SalehAliSalehNabhan
-
Somalia Watch: United States Denies Additional Air Strikes in Somalia
Somali Transitional President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed (L) and former president of Somalia Abdul Qaasim Salad Hassan (R) chat in Mogadishu after holding a closed door meeting. Somali officials accused the United States of launching new air strikes on suspected Al-Qaeda sites in southern Somalia, but Washington denied carrying out any further operations amid doubt over the results.
Reuters: U.S. denies reports of new Somalia air strikes
The United States, facing growing international criticism over an air strike targeting al Qaeda suspects in Somalia, denied reports on Wednesday it had carried out further strikes.
A Somali government source and a local lawmaker said U.S. planes struck several sites on Wednesday after an assault on Monday against a village where the suspects were thought to be hiding.
But an official in Washington said, “There have been no additional attacks.”
U.S. government sources said U.S. ally Ethiopia, which defeated Islamist forces in a lightning war last month, had conducted further air strikes since Monday.
The Somali officials did not say how they distinguished between U.S and Ethiopian planes operating in the remote southern area where Islamists were driven after their defeat.
The government source said four new U.S. strikes hit areas near Ras Kamboni, a coastal village close to the Kenyan border long thought by Western and East African intelligence agencies to be a hide-out and training camp for Islamic militants.
“As we speak now, the area is being bombarded by the American air force,” said the source, talking to Reuters on condition of anonymity.
And of course Amnesty International and other appeasers are bitchin’ about American involvement in Somalia. Flap doesn’t care who kills the Al Qaeda members and the other radical Jihadists – just as long as they are dead.
This image released by the US Navy shows flight operations from the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower at an undisclosed US Central Command area.
Amnesty International said it had written to the U.S. government expressing concern, echoing U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon, France, the European Union, former colonial power Italy, Egypt and the Arab League.
“We are concerned that civilians may have been killed as a result of a failure to comply with international humanitarian law,” said Claudio Cordone, an Amnesty International official.
At the United Nations, the Security Council raised no questions or objections on Wednesday after a U.S. diplomat told a closed-door meeting on Somalia that Washington’s air strike on Monday targeted “a high-level al Qaeda leader.”
“There was no discussion of this particular issue and I have no comment on that,” Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, the council president for January, told reporters after the meeting.Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said there had been just one U.S. air attack with no civilian casualties.
Stay tuned……..
Map Courtesy of Bill Roggio
Previous:Somalia Watch: Al Qaeda Fazul Abdullah Mohammed Killed in Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Helicopter Gunships Attack Al-Qaeda Fighters in South Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Launching New Attacks Against Al Qaeda in Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Attacking Al Qaeda Positions in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Diplomats Call for Urgent Deployment of Peacekeeping Troops in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror
Technorati Tags: Somalia, Ethiopia, EritreaAbuTalhaal-Sudani, GouledHassanDourad, FazulAbdullahMohammed, SalehAliSalehNabhan
-
Somalia Watch: Al Qaeda Fazul Abdullah Mohammed Killed in Somalia
Fazul Abdullah Mohammed
Mohammed, 32, was killed, a Somali official said on January 10. The native of the Comoros Islands is suspected of orchestrating the 1998 attacks. He spoke five languages and was “very good” with computers, according to the FBI. The U.S. had offered $5 million for information leading to his arrest.
CNN: Somalia: Al Qaeda militant killed
A senior al Qaeda suspect wanted for bombing U.S. embassies in East Africa has been killed, a Somali official said Wednesday as witnesses said U.S forces launched a third day of airstrikes.
Also Wednesday, Somalia’s Deputy Prime Minister said American troops were needed on the ground to root extremists from his troubled country, and he expected the troops soon.
The death of al Qaeda suspect Fazul Abdullah Mohammed was detailed in an American intelligence report passed on to the Somali authorities. Mohammed, one of the FBI’s most wanted terrorists who has evaded capture for eight years, was allegedly harbored by a Somali Islamic movement that had challenged this country’s Ethiopian-backed government for power.
“I have received a report from the American side chronicling the targets and list of damage,” Abdirizak Hassan, the Somali president’s chief of staff, said. “One of the items they were claiming was that Fazul Abdullah Mohammed is dead.”
Good and the United States should pursue the rest of the Islamic Courts thugs who are harboring Al Qaeda. Whoever in Somalia who are supporting Al Qaeda must be convinced that it is not in their interest to continue hiding these terrorists – that is if they wish to remain alive.
The Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Anzio (CG 68) steams behind the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) as an SH-60F Seahawk from the “Nightdippers†of Helicopter Anti–submarine Squadron Five (HS-5) prepares to land on Eisenhower’s flight deck. Anzio, Eisenhower and embarked Carrier Air Wing Seven (CVW-7) are on a regularly scheduled deployment in support of Maritime Security Operations (MSO). MSO help set the conditions for security and stability in the maritime environment, as well as complement the counter-terrorism and security efforts of regional nations. These operations deny international terrorists use of the maritime environment as a venue for attack or to transport personnel, weapons or other material. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Miguel Angel Contreras U.S. Naval Forces Central Command Area of Responsibility (Jan. 8, 2007)
In Washington, a U.S. intelligence official said Tuesday the U.S. killed five to 10 people believed to be associated with al Qaeda. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the operation’s sensitivity, said a small number of others present, perhaps four or five, were wounded.
Mohammed, 32, joined al Qaeda in Afghanistan and trained there with Osama bin Laden, the terror network’s leader, according to the transcript of an FBI interrogation of a known associate. He has a $5 million price on his head for allegedly planning the 1998 attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 225 people.
He is also suspected of planning the car bombing of a beach resort in Kenya and the near simultaneous attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner in 2002. Ten Kenyans and three Israelis were killed in the blast at the hotel. The missiles missed the airliner.
Police at the Kenyan coastal border town of Kiunga on Monday arrested a wife of Mohammed, with her three children, according to an internal police report seen by the AP on Wednesday.
Also Wednesday, at least four AC-130 gunship strikes took place around Ras Kamboni, the rugged area on the Somali coast a few miles from the Kenyan border that the U.S. also attacked Monday, a local resident who declined to give his name told two-way radio operator Doorane Adan Harere in Nairobi, Kenya.
In the meantime – just off the wire (6:30 AM PST):
Reuters: New U.S. strikes hit sites in Somalia: govt source
U.S. forces hunting al Qaeda suspects hit four locations in new air strikes in Somalia on Wednesday, a Somali government source said, as criticism mounted over Washington’s military intervention.
“As we speak now, the area is being bombarded by the American air force,” the source told Reuters.
He said the attacks hit an area close to Ras Kamboni, a coastal village near the Kenyan border where many fugitive Islamists are believed holed-up after being defeated by Ethiopian troops defending Somalia’s interim government.
Four places were hit — Hayo, Garer, Bankajirow and Badmadowe, the source said. “Bankajirow was the last Islamist holdout. Bankajirow and Badmadowe were hit hardest,” he added.
Lawmaker Abdirashid Mohamed Hidig said at least 50 people were killed in strikes he said were carried out by U.S. and Ethiopian planes.
It was unclear how either Hidig or the government source were able to distinguish between Ethiopian and U.S. aircraft.
“Yesterday I personally saw the planes striking. The air strikes resumed this morning,” Hidig told reporters in the port of Kismayu after returning from a tour of the attacked areas.
“The worst loss has befallen civilians since the fleeing Islamists are hiding among the people there,” he said, adding he was airlifted to the sites in an Ethiopian helicopter.
The coward Islamists are in hiding among the Somali civilians. Time to route them out and bring them to justice.
Somalian transitional president Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed (L) and former president Abdul Qaasim Salad Hassan chat after a meeting in Mogadishu. Residents have reported a new US air strike on suspected Al-Qaeda targets in southern Somalia.
Stay tuned…….
Others Blogging:
Map Courtesy of Bill Roggio
Previous:
Somalia Watch: United States Helicopter Gunships Attack Al-Qaeda Fighters in South Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Launching New Attacks Against Al Qaeda in Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Attacking Al Qaeda Positions in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Diplomats Call for Urgent Deployment of Peacekeeping Troops in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror
Technorati Tags: Somalia, Ethiopia, EritreaAbuTalhaal-Sudani, GouledHassanDourad, FazulAbdullahMohammed, SalehAliSalehNabhan
-
Somalia Watch: United States Helicopter Gunships Attack Al-Qaeda Fighters in South Somalia
A US Marine Corps attack helicopter is seen in a 2004 handout photo from the US Marine Corps (USMC). US attack helicopters launched fresh air strikes in southern Somalia, targeting the suspected command center of Al-Qaeda militants, a Somali defense ministry official said.
AP: Copters attack Somalia militant suspects
Helicopter gunships attacked suspected al-Qaida fighters in the south Tuesday after U.S. forces staged airstrikes in the first offensive in the African country since 18 American soldiers were killed there in 1993, witnesses said.
Witnesses said 31 civilians, including two newlyweds, died in the assault by two helicopters near Afmadow, a town in an area of forested hills close to the Kenyan border 220 miles southwest of Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu. The report could not be independently verified.
A Somali Defense Ministry official described the helicopters as American, but the local witnesses told The Associated Press they could not make out identification markings on the craft. Washington officials had no comment.
On Monday, at least one U.S. AC-130 gunship attacked Islamic extremists in Hayi, 30 miles from Afmadow, and on a remote island 155 miles away believed to be an al-Qaida training camp at the southern tip of Somalia next to Kenya. Somali officials said they had reports of many deaths. The Pentagon confirmed the strike, but declined to comment on any details.
The Pentagon is now acknowledging the special operation:
The Somalia assault, however, was conducted by U.S. Special Operations Command and has been shrouded in secrecy. The military typically declines to reveal much about such missions by special operations forces, including the AC-130 gunships used in the Somalia attack, and Delta Force counterterrorism ground troops.
In this photo released by the U.S. Navy on Tuesday Jan. 9, 2007, An F/A-18C Hornet from the Wildcats of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 131 lands aboard the flight deck of the the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower on Monday Jan. 8, 2007. The U.S. military said Tuesday it had sent the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower to join three other U.S. warships conducting anti-terror operations off the Somali coast. The aircraft carrier is part of the Navy’s Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet.
Stay tuned as operations continue……..
Previous:Somalia Watch: United States Launching New Attacks Against Al Qaeda in Somalia
Somalia Watch: United States Attacking Al Qaeda Positions in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Diplomats Call for Urgent Deployment of Peacekeeping Troops in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror
Technorati Tags: Somalia, Ethiopia, EritreaAbuTalhaal-Sudani, GouledHassanDourad, FazulAbdullahMohammed, SalehAliSalehNabhan
-
Somalia Watch: United States Launching New Attacks Against Al Qaeda in Somalia
***SCROLL DOWN FOR UPDATES***
AP: U.S. launches new attacks in Somalia
A Somali official says U.S. helicopter gunships have launched new attacks against suspected al-Qaida terrorists. An earlier U.S. airstrike hit targets in southern Somalia where Islamic militants were believed to be sheltering suspects in the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies, Somali officials and witnesses said Tuesday. Many people were reported killed.
Monday’s attack was the first overt military action by the U.S. in Somalia since it led a U.N. force in the 1990s that intervened in Somalia in an effort to fight famine. The mission led to clashes between U.N. forces and Somali warlords, including the “Black Hawk Down” battle that left 18 U.S. servicemen dead.
Helicopter gunships launched new attacks Tuesday near the scene of a U.S. airstrike in the village of Hayi, although it was not clear if they were American or Ethiopian aircraft, and it was not known if there were any casualties.
Two helicopters “fired several rockets toward the road that leads to the Kenyan border,” said Ali Seed Yusuf, a resident of the town of Afmadow in southern Somalia.
The aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower arrived off Somalia’s coast and launched intelligence-gathering missions over Somalia, the military said. Three other U.S. warships are conducting anti-terror operations off the Somali coast.
And why are these attacks being launched?
AL QAEDA
Washington Post: U.S. Strike in Somalia Targets Al-Qaeda Figure
One target of the strike, sources said, was Abu Talha al-Sudani, a Sudanese who is married to a Somali woman and has lived in Somalia since 1993 — the year of the attack against U.S. troops that was chronicled in the book and movie “Black Hawk Down.” In a 2001 U.S. court case against Osama bin Laden, Sudani was described by a leading witness as an explosives expert who was close to the al-Qaeda leader.
More recently, Sudani was identified by U.S. intelligence as a close associate of Gouled Hassan Dourad, head of a Mogadishu-based network that operated in support of al-Qaeda in Somalia. Dourad is one of 14 “high-value” prisoners transferred last September from CIA “black sites” to the U.S. military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence then disclosed that Dourad “worked for the East African al-Qaeda cell led by . . . al-Sudani” and carried out at least one mission for him, related to a plan to bomb the U.S. military base in Djibouti.
Others have identified Sudani as the financier for Fazul Abdullah Mohammed and Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, believed responsible for the 1998 bombing of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. All are among the senior al-Qaeda operatives the Bush administration has charged were sheltered by Somalian Islamic fundamentalists controlling Mogadishu, the country’s capital. They are believed to have fled late last month when Ethiopian troops drove the fundamentalists out of the capital and toward the Kenyan border.
A FBI most wanted poster of Fazul Abdullah Mohammed who has been indicted by a U.S. Federal court for his involvement in the 1998 U.S. embassy attacks in Kenya and neighboring Tanzania, displayed on the FBI’s website Friday, March 21, 2003. The target of U.S. air strikes in Somalia is one of the FBI’s most wanted terrorists and the suspected mastermind of two major terrorist attacks in East Africa.Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, a slight, youthful man born in Comoros, has a US$5 million price on his head for allegedly planning the 1998 attacks on the U.S. Embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam.
Fox News is reporting continuing military strikes against targets in Somalia.
BREAKING: Fox News is reporting United States officials are reporting that Abu Talha al-Sudani has been killed. Identification of bodies is pending.
Update: 8:00 AM PST
Fox News is reporting that “several” Al Qaeda members may have been killed. There are on-going military operations with Somali, Ethiopian and Americans working jointly to flush out hiding Al Qaeda members.
In the meantime, the reader should be directed to Bill Roggio’s excellent treatise: The Rise & Fall of Somalia’s Islamic Courts: An Online History
Stay tuned……..
Previous:
Somalia Watch: United States Attacking Al Qaeda Positions in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Diplomats Call for Urgent Deployment of Peacekeeping Troops in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror
Technorati Tags: Somalia, Ethiopia, EritreaAbuTalhaal-Sudani, GouledHassanDourad, FazulAbdullahMohammed, SalehAliSalehNabhan
-
Somalia Watch: United States Attacking Al Qaeda Positions in Somalia
MSNBC: Report: U.S. airstrike targets al-Qaida in Africa
Action reported by helicopter gunship in southern tip of country
A U.S. helicopter gunship conducted a strike against two suspected al-Qaida operatives in southern Somalia, but it was not known whether the mission was successful, CBS News reported on Monday.
The U.S. Air Force helicopter, operated by the Special Operations Command, flew from its base in Djibouti to the southern tip of Somalia, where the al-Qaida suspects were believed to have fled from the capital, Mogadishu, the network reported.
Fox News is reporting 4:25 PM PST the air strikes in Somalia and confirming the air strikes by an AC-130 Gunship.
There are casualties on the ground.
No report of whether the mission was successful.
CBS News: U.S. Strikes Al Qaeda In Somalia
CBS News Learns Strike Was Aimed At Alleged Al Qaeda Members Linked to 1998 Embassy Bombings
A U.S. Air Force gunship has conducted a strike against suspected members of al Qaeda in Somalia, CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports exclusively.
The targets included the senior al Qaeda leader in East Africa and an al Qaeda operative wanted for his involvement in the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in Africa, Martin reports. Those terror attacks killed more than 200 people.
The AC-130 gunship is capable of firing thousands of rounds per second, and sources say a lot of bodies were seen on the ground after the strike, but there is as yet, no confirmation of the identities.
The gunship flew from its base in Dijibouti down to the southern tip of Somalia, Martin reports, where the al Qaeda operatives had fled after being chased out of the capital of Mogadishu by Ethiopian troops backed by the United States.
Once they started moving, the al Qaeda operatives became easier to track, and the U.S. military started preparing for an air strike, using unmanned aerial drones to keep them under surveillance and moving the aircraft carrier Eisenhower out of the Persian Gulf toward Somalia. But when the order was given, the mission was assigned to the AC-130 gunship operated by the U.S. Special Operations command.
If the attack got the operatives it was aimed at, reports Martin, it would deal a major blow to al Qaeda in East Africa.
CNN: U.S. targets al Qaeda suspects in Somalia, Pentagon official says
A U.S. gunship has attacked suspected al Qaeda targets in southern Somalia, a senior Pentagon official said Monday.
The AC-130 flew its mission within the last 24 hours, the official told CNN. The operation was launched based on intelligence that al Qaeda operatives were in the location, but there was no immediate indication of how successful the strike had been.
Additionally, the official said, the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower has moved within striking distance of Somalia, but its jets have not been put to use.
Three al Qaeda operatives accused in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania have been hiding in Somalia for years. The US believes they were closely tied to the Somali Islamic group – the ICU.
“We had seen intelligence evidence these three Al Qaeda operative were very much influencing the leadership of the council of the ICU — for example providing logistics, fuel and arms to the militias,” said Jendayi Frazer, assistant secretary of state for African affairs
U.S. officials in East Africa said earlier this week that al Qaeda operatives were developing the ability to attack U.S. targets just as they did when the embassy bombings killed hundreds.
Intelligence shows Al Qaeda stepped up its operations in Somalia in June after an Islamic militia took power.
Mudville Gazette has Nowhere to Run?:
Read it all…….
Stay tuned…….
Others Blogging:
Stop The ACLU » Blog Archive » U.S. Strikes Al Qaeda In Somalia
MKH at Michelle Malkin
Previous:
Somalia Watch: Diplomats Call for Urgent Deployment of Peacekeeping Troops in Somalia
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror
Technorati Tags: Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea
-
Somalia Watch: Diplomats Call for Urgent Deployment of Peacekeeping Troops in Somalia
Somalia’s President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed (L) and Assistant Secretary for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer attend a meeting in Nairobi. The international meeting called for urgent funding for a peacekeeping mission in Somalia which the strife-torn African country’s president said was desperately needed.
Reuters: Peace force proposed for Somalia as Qaeda threatens
Western and African diplomats on Friday called for the urgent deployment of peacekeepers in Somalia as al Qaeda’s deputy leader urged defeated Islamists to launch an Iraq-style insurgency against Ethiopian forces there.
The Islamists took control of much of southern Somalia in June but have now been forced into hiding after being routed from their strongholds by Ethiopian military defending Somalia’s interim government in two weeks of full-scale warfare.
They have vowed to fight on, melting into the hills in Somalia’s remote southern tip where Ethiopian and government forces are hunting hundreds of their fighters.
Nairobi has sent troops to seal its frontier, blocking entry to Somali refugees fleeing the conflict. Many fear the Islamists, who fled a last stronghold on New Year’s Day, will mount a holy war against largely Christian Ethiopia.
The Islamists have been routed now it is time for the United Nations or a consortium of western nations to secure the peace or Ethiopia will be forced to route(meaning hunt down and kill) the remaining Islamists nee insurgents.
Somalia’s former army officers stand guard at a building in the capital Mogadishu January 5, 2007. Western and African diplomats called for the urgent deployment of peacekeepers to Somalia as al Qaeda’s deputy leader urged defeated Islamists to launch an Iraq -style insurgency against Ethiopian forces there.
“You must ambush, mine, raid and (carry out) martyrdom campaigns so that you can wipe them out,” Ayman al-Zawahri, deputy to al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, said in his message.
“As happened in Iraq and Afghanistan, when the world’s strongest power was defeated by the campaigns of the mujahideen, troops going to heaven, so its slaves shall be defeated on the Muslim lands of Somalia,” he said.
Al-Zawahri’s message, posted on a Web site used by militant Islamist groups, is likely to reinforce Washington’s belief that the Somalia Islamic Courts Council is linked to and even run by an al Qaeda cell, a charge the Islamists have denied.
In Nairobi, the International Contact Group on Somalia, which includes the United States, European and African nations, pushed for a fast deployment of foreign peacekeepers approved by the
United Nations before the war.U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer said the security vacuum had to be filled, but played down the significance of the al Qaeda tape.
“I think a lot of bold statements were made by extremists in the Courts, that they were going to kill Somalis, that they were going to stand and fight … and they just ran,” she said.
Easy for al-Zawahri to day since he is hiding in some cave in Pakistan. Make no mistake about it, Ethiopia will not fall prey to an Iraq like insurgency that has stymied the United States.
In the meantime, Somali and Ethiopian troops are preparing to launch a major assault on the last stronghold of Islamic movement militiamen.
Somali troops backed by Ethiopians prepared to launch a major assault Friday on the last stronghold of Islamic movement militiamen. U.S. Navy warships were patrolling off the Somali coast to prevent the militiamen from escaping by sea.
The Somali and Ethiopian force captured a southern town near the Kenyan border Thursday evening. Col. Barre “Hirale” Aden Shire, the Somali defense minister, said Islamic militiamen were dug in with their backs to the sea at Ras Kamboni at the southernmost tip of Somalia.
“Today we will launch a massive assault on the Islamic courts militias. We will use infantry troops and fighter jets,” said Shire, who left for the battle zone on Friday. “They have dug huge trenches around Ras Kamboni but have only two options: to drown in the sea or to fight and die.”
Somali government and Ethiopian troops routed the Council of Islamic Courts militia last week, driving them out of the capital and their strongholds in southern Somalia. The Islamic movement had wanted to rule Somalia by the Quran and some of its leaders had been linked to the al-Qaida terrorist movement.
Former Somali soldiers in different rank uniforms listen to the Transitional Federal Government Prime Minister, Ali Mohamed Gedi, unseen in Mogadishu, Somalia, Friday, Jan. 5, 2007. Over the past 15 days, troops of Somalia’s transitional government and Ethiopian forces routed the Islamic movement, which had controlled most of southern Somalia. Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi has said he believes major fighting was over. But the Islamic movement has declared it would keep fighting, raising the specter of an Iraq-style guerrilla war.
Update:
Somalia’s Islamists vow to heed al-Qaida
Islamic fighters hiding in Mogadishu since their movement’s main force was driven from the Somali capital say they will heed al-Qaida’s call for guerrilla attacks and suicide bombings against Ethiopian troops whose intervention was key to the Islamists’ defeat.
“I am committed to die for the sake of my religion and the al-Qaida deputy’s speech only encourages me to go ahead with my holy war,” 18-year-old Sahal Abdi told The Associated Press, referring to an audio message posted on the Internet on Friday.
Troops of Somalia’s transitional government, backed by the Ethiopian military, routed the Islamic militia from much of southern Somalia, ending their six months in power. The group had brought a semblance of stability here but terrified residents with a version of Quranic rule that included public executions and floggings of criminals.
Interviews with militants who fought with the Council of Islamic Courts and went underground when most of their comrades fled Mogadishu last week suggest their movement is fractured and cut off from its leaders but still motivated for battle.
And does anyone REALLY think that Ethiopia will allow the Islamic Court folks an opportunity to organize an insurgency?
NO WAY…….
Stay tuned…….
Ethiopian soldiers patrol Somalia’s port city of Kismayu, January 5, 2007.
Previous:
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror
-
Cox & Forkum: Somalian Front
Cox & Forkum: Somalian Front
CNN: Somalia’s prime minister: Major fighting over.
Somalia’s prime minister said Tuesday he does not expect any more major fighting against rival Islamic fighters, and his Ethiopian military backer described the operation as within weeks of being completed.With attention shifting to suspected al Qaeda fighters believed to be sheltered by the hard-line group, a security official in neighboring Kenya said 10 foreigners who had fought with Somalia’s Islamic movement had been captured. They had told interrogators the militia was doomed by internal rifts, the official added.
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
A militant Islamist movement fled from rapidly advancing government forces into a rugged, forested corner of Somalia, as the prime minister offered the Islamist rank and file amnesty if they surrendered.
Diplomats from the region were working to arrange the speedy deployment of African peacekeepers to help the interim government establish its authority in the country, which has known only anarchy for 15 years.
As the last remaining stronghold of the Islamic group was overrun by government troops backed by Ethiopian tanks and MiG fighter jets, the net began closing on suspected al-Qaeda fighters believed to be sheltered by the hardline group.
Neighboring Kenya vowed to seal its frontier to prevent any extremists, now wedged against the sea and their border, from escaping the 13-day military offensive.
Sea routes from southern Somalia were also being patrolled by the U.S. navy, hunting three al-Qaeda suspects believed to be among the Islamic group and wanted for the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa.
CBC News: Kenya arrests as many as 2 men with Canadian passports: reports. (via Little Green Footballs)
As many as two Somali Islamic fighters who claim to be Canadian were among 10 fighters arrested by Kenyan police, according to separate reports Tuesday.The 10 were arrested on Monday at the Liboi border crossing in Kenya as they tried to flee Somalia, the Kenya Daily Nation reported.
Two were reportedly carrying Canadian passports, while the remaining eight were said to have Eritrean passports. According to the newspaper, all 10 militants were being detained in the Kenyan town of Garissa. It is not known whether they have been charged.
Technorati Tags: Somalia, AlQaeda, Islamists, Ethiopia, Kenya
-
Somalia Watch: Somalia Offers Islamists Amnesty
Ethiopian soldiers wait along side a road in northern Mogadishu, Somalia on Sunday Dec. 31, 2006. Somali government troops backed by Ethiopian tanks and MiG fighter jets have captured the last major stronghold of a militant Islamic movement, Somalia’s Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi said Monday, Jan. 1, 2007. Islamic fighters, many of them Arabs and South Asians, were fleeing in heavily armed trucks toward the Kenyan border, 160 kilometers (100 miles) to the south after a 13-day onslaught led by the Ethiopian army.
CNN:Somalia offers Islamists amnesty
A militant Islamist movement fled from rapidly advancing government forces into a rugged, forested corner of Somalia, as the prime minister offered the Islamist rank and file amnesty if they surrendered.
Diplomats from the region were working to arrange the speedy deployment of African peacekeepers to help the interim government establish its authority in the country, which has known only anarchy for 15 years.
As the last remaining stronghold of the Islamic group was overrun by government troops backed by Ethiopian tanks and MiG fighter jets, the net began closing on suspected al-Qaeda fighters believed to be sheltered by the hardline group.
Neighboring Kenya vowed to seal its frontier to prevent any extremists, now wedged against the sea and their border, from escaping the 13-day military offensive.
Sea routes from southern Somalia were also being patrolled by the U.S. navy, hunting three al-Qaeda suspects believed to be among the Islamic group and wanted for the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa.
“Kenya cannot be a haven for people who are not wanted by their lawful government,” Kenyan government spokesman Alfred Matua said in a statement on Monday.
The military advance marks a stunning turnaround for Somalia’s government, which just weeks ago could barely control one town — its base of Baidoa — while the Council of Islamic Courts controlled the capital and much of southern Somalia.
What a dramatic turn around in Somalia. One day radical Islamists are running the country and exporting terrorists and the next they are killled and out of power.
Ethiopia knows better than to let a cancer grow.
Somalia’s Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi attends a meeting with members of Somalia’s divided parliament in Mogadishu December 31, 2006. Somali Islamists fled overnight from their final stronghold round the southern port of Kismayu in what could be the end of a nearly two-week war with the Ethiopian-backed government, residents said on Monday.
In a bid to cement its control, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi ordered a countrywide disarmament that comes into effect Tuesday, an immense task in Somalia, which is awash with weapons after more than a decade of civil war.
“The warlord era in Somalia is now over,” Gedi said at a news conference in the recently captured capital, giving a three-day deadline for the handing over of all weapons. Somali warlords, who have begun returning to Mogadishu after the Islamists defeat, have not yet voiced agreement.
And Prime Minister Gedi has promised to turn over Al Qaeda terrorists wanted by the United States.
Somalia’s interim government and its Ethiopian allies have long accused Islamic militias of harboring al-Qaeda, and the U.S. government has said the 1998 bombers have become leaders in the Islamic movement in Africa.
“If we capture them alive we will hand them over to the United States,” Gedi said.
Islamic movement leaders deny having any links to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda terror network.
But in a recorded message posted on the Internet on Saturday, deputy al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri called on Somalia’s Muslims and other Muslims worldwide to continue the fight against “infidels and crusaders.”
Looks like a MAJOR battle in the global war on terror has been won.
Time for rebuilding Somalia and an African Union peacekeeping force to prevent the radical Islamists from returning.
Stay tuned…..
Previous:
Somalia Watch: Mogadishu Retaken by Somali Government Troops
Somalia Watch: A Guide to the Latest Front of the War on Terror