According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Agency (FAO):
The general food security situation in Somali Region has deteriorated over the last two months due to cumulative effects of three failed consecutive rainy seasons, poor terms of trade coupled with the progressing dry “hagga” season. Humanitarian partners and elders are comparing the current drought situation to that of 1999/2000. The recently completed DPPA led multi-agency pastoral assessment team reported critical food security problems with records of massive livestock and human migration, reduced livestock births and production as well as increased prices of food.
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Click here to view a transcript from a meeting held on 19 June 2008 at Chatham House, London,......
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Dominic Pkalya of the University for Peace writes:
When the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) was driven out of Mogadishu in December 2006 by a combination of Ethiopian and the Transitional Federal Government forces, many pundits were quick to note that Somalia has once again squandered another chance of pacification and statehood.
This was based on the understanding that for the six-month period starting in June and ending in December 2006 in which the ICU was in control of Mogadishu and much of central and southern Somalia, a hitherto unprecedented period of peace, order and security was realized. In other words, the security situation was getting much better in this swathe of land that had only known and lived with over 15 years of statelessness, insecurity, clan feuds, thriving warlordism...
Jeffrey Gettleman of the New York Times sent a dispatch from the Somali caiptal and says:
The trouble started when government soldiers went to the market and, at gunpoint, began to help themselves to sacks of grain last week. Islamist insurgents poured into the streets to defend the merchants. The government troops took heavy casualties and retreated all the way back to the presidential palace, supposedly the most secure place in the city. It, too, came under fire. Mohamed Abdirizak, a top government official, crouched on a balcony at the palace, with bullets whizzing over his head. He had just given up a comfortable life as a development consultant in Springfield, Va. His wife thought he was crazy. Sweat beaded on his forehead.
“I feel this slipping away,” he said.
By its own...
Galal Nassar of the Egyptian Al Ahram Weekly writes:
US bombers began pounding away at Somali positions as battles escalated between the Somali resistance and the combined forces of the invading Ethiopian army and the Somali interim government. Hardly a day passes without a bombing or assassination in Baidoa, capital of the interim government. The Americans are using their usual excuse: they are trying to kill Al-Qaeda leaders. Somalia’s Islamic resistance seems to have mastered the art of guerrilla warfare, taking control of small towns then abandoning them and disappearing into the population. It is a tactic designed to baffle and frustrate a regular army trying to fight a symmetric war. Where exactly is the enemy? Meanwhile, the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) and the...
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Somalis are running from their country in despair, unfortunately, there is no place for many of them to go. Above picture shows Somali women heading to the closed Kenyan (Somali NFD) border.
Copy Right: Al Ahram......
Edith M. Lederer of the Associated Press writes:
Somalia’s transitional government urged the Security Council on Friday to speed up its planning for the possible deployment of a U.N. peacekeeping force to replace African Union troops in the war-wracked nation. Somalia’s U.N. Ambassador Elmi Ahmed Duale endorsed a recent appeal by African heads of state to the council “to urgently take steps for the early deployment of United Nations peacekeeping operations to further enhance peace in Somalia.”
Ms. Lederer went on by saying:
Somalia has not had a functioning government since clan-based warlords toppled dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991 and then turned on each other, sinking the poverty-stricken nation of 7 million into chaos. Its weak transitional government,...
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African Union, briefing Security Council on Somalia, appeals for urgent steps to deploy United Nations peacekeeping force to replace Union’s mission
SC/9249.
Security Council
5837th Meeting (AM)
The representative of the African Union this morning conveyed to the Security Council her organization’s solemn appeal for urgent action to deploy a United Nations peacekeeping operation in Somalia, which would replace the African Union’s mission there, to help long-term stabilization and the rebuilding of Somalia.
Briefing the Council on the situation in Somalia, Lila H. Ratsifandrihamanana, Permanent Observer of the African Union, said that it was a cause of shared concern. During the last Summit in Addis Ababa, the Assembly of the African Union had endorsed the proposals of...
Xan Rice, East Africa correspondent of the Guardian News paper writes:
The Islamist-led resistance in Somalia is growing in scale and aggression, with insurgents openly taking on Ethiopian troops and African Union peacekeepers in the capital Mogadishu, in fighting that has killed dozens, possibly hundreds, in the past three weeks.
Mr. Rice went on saying:
Few people believe that the situation is about to get better. Several experts interviewed by the Guardian say that the insurgents are becoming more powerful. A military analyst and a western diplomat to Somalia, neither of whom wished to be named, warned that the angry mood and conditions that allowed an Islamist movement to defeat a gang of warlords and take power in Mogadishu last year were returning. “We are on a merry-go-round...
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Anna Husarska of the International Rescue Committee says:
Somalia’s internal conflict is propelled by a combustible mix of religion, politics and clan rivalry. Civilians are killed daily in Mogadishu, there are roadside bombs and mortar attacks, and politicians and journalists are targeted. Making matters worse, the country has suffered this year from both floods and drought. This combination of insecurity and natural disasters has displaced huge numbers of people and caused suffering on a scale painful to behold. According to the most recent UN figures, 400,000 people, or roughly one-third of Mogadishu’s population, have fled the city.
She continued by saying:
Yet Somalia still rarely gets into the headlines. This partly reflects the near impossibility of gathering news. Few...
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The Guardian newspaper reports:
Rising tensions in the Ogaden region of eastern Ethiopia, combined with chronic instability in neighbouring Somalia, Eritrean enmity, and human rights concerns, are testing US support for the Addis Ababa government led by Clinton-era good governance pin-up Meles Zenawi.
The paper continued by saying:
Keeping a firm hand on ethnically Somali, Muslim Ogaden, the scene of a cold war-era proxy conflict, is a long-standing US objective.
The paper continued by saying:
Eritrea, its bitter border dispute with Ethiopia still simmering, is shipping “huge quantities of arms” to insurgents in Somalia, according to a UN report. Concerns about a spreading humanitarian and refugee emergency grow, even as international aid targets undershoot. And now, far from...
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The Somalia Prime Minister; Cali Maxamed Geedi was quoted as saying:
We are very grateful for the sacrifice made by the Ethiopians. Ethiopia is the number one friend of this country.
This is where Cali Maxamed Geedi and the fast majority of the Somali people, including myself turn sharply to different and opposing directions. Contrary to what the Prime Minister said, and I must say, with all accounts, Ethiopia has always been, and continues to be Somalia’s worst enemy. Unless one is blind-folded by myopic tribalist agenda, personal greed or irrational self hate, no one need to be a brain-surgeon to understand that Ethiopia is far from being Somalia’s “best friend” as the Prime Minister ignorantly stated.......
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Leoul Mekonen, Sudan Tribune
It is clear that the Somali Islamists are enemies to the US but arming and supporting a dictatorial regime with the notion of supporting the enemy’s enemy will not bring positive outcome to the US as well as Ethiopians… It is lunatic to think that the Ethiopian army will crush the Islamists. Instead it will raise the patriotic spirit of Somalis and even those who have had negative attitude towards Islamists will prefer to join them. Any Somali who hates the Islamists will not necessarily like the presence of Ethiopian troops in Somalia but be compelled to join the jihadists when their airport is bombed by Ethiopian aircraft.
Samuel Makinda, Kenya’s Nation
Ethiopia’s invasion is unlikely to bring peace and order to Somalia, or to assist...
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The Australian ABC Online reports:
The Arab League and the African Union have called for Ethiopian troops to be withdrawn from Somalia immediately. Ethiopian troops are said to be only 30 kilometres north of the capital Mogadishu. Speaking after a joint consultative meeting the chair of the African Union commission, Alpha Oumar Konare, said the three organisations wanted to see Ethiopia’s troops withdrawn from neighbouring Somalia immediately. Mr Konare told journalists at the African Union headquarters that they wanted all parties to cease hostilities and return to peace talks. The Somali Ambassador to Ethiopia, Abdikarin Farah, said it was down to the governments in Baidoa and Addis Ababa to decide when the troops would leave.
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The South African News 24 reports:
Kenya plans to hold talks with Somalia’s embattled Islamic leaders in a bid to end escalating fighting with Ethiopian forces backing government, said diplomats on Wednesday. The talks in the Kenyan capital Nairobi on Thursday “will seek ways to urgently end the conflict”, said a diplomat, requesting to remain anonymous. The diplomat said that the Islamic courts leadership has confirmed participation. Asked if Ethiopia and the Somali government would participate in the talks, the diplomat said: “We will deal with only those whom we can manage.”
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Click here to view the full dispatch on Xinhuanet (The Chinese News Agency).
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The European Union’s Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid, Louis Michel, condemned Monday the escalating battles in Somalia. Speaking in Brussels, he was quoted as saying:
I express my deepest concern on the reported involvement of foreign forces in Somalia and urge all external players to refrain immediately from intervening militarily in Somali affairs and provoke further violence.
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The Norwegian Newspaper; Dagbladet has a long analytical report.
Click here to view the full report. Please note that the article in Norwegian only. Please also note that graphic picture on......
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Apee Ojulu editor of Gambela Today writes:
There has been a sort of unanimity among various advisors in Prime Minister Meles Zenawi government that in an all-out-war they will defeat the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) within few days. Zenawi’s Foreign Ministry warning to the UIC that his administration “will not tolerate an Islamist regime in neighboring Somalia” is an indication of that confidence (see MCT, /22, 2006). But hubris is not a military strategy to win a war. It is a risking scheme. Having mechanized forces, countless warplanes, weapons, backing of the international and capacities to destroy every house in Somalia do not prove to win the war. Recent war between Israeli mechanized army forces against a lesser tech wired Iranian and Syrian backed Hezbollah forces have...
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Stephanie McCrummen of the Washington Post Foreign Service writes:
War or no war with Somalia, Mulunesh Abebayhu wants out. Out of her teaching job, where Ethiopian security forces constantly harass her because of her political views. Out of this city, where hundreds of protesters were killed by police bullets after disputed elections last year. And, if she can manage, out of this country that she believes has plunged into the abyss of dictatorship at the hands of its prime minister, Meles Zenawi, a staunch ally of the United States in the vulnerable Horn of Africa.
“He confuses the Westerners so that he can keep ruling,” said Abebayhu, 54, an opposition member arrested along with an estimated 30,000 others in the sweeping post-election crackdown last year. “Our party...
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Xinhuanet; the Chinese news agency reports:
In a press release, the AL, of which Somalia is a member state, expressed apprehension and regret over maintaining armed clashes between the two sides at war, which has left thousands of Somalis homeless.
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The San Francisco Chronicle reports:
The aerial and ground assault was the first open admission by Ethiopia’s Christian-led government of its military operations in Somalia, where it has been supporting a weak interim government threatened by forces loyal to the Islamic clerics who control the capital, Mogadishu, and much of the rest of the country.
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Melez Zenawi the Ethiopian Prime Minister made it clear to everyone that he wants Somalia annexed by forces.
Mr. Zenawi was quoted as saying that:
Our patience was considered as weakness and we were forced to go to war and the alternative left to us is to speedily bring the war to a successful and victorious end in the shortest time possible.
Well, this sounds like a twisted logic! Somalia did not invade Ethiopia....
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In an editorial the Dubai based Khaleej Times newspaper says:
WITH Ethiopian military incursions into the Somalian territory, in the name of fighting Islamic militants, the situation in the Horn of Africa is getting increasingly dangerous. Regional peace is under serious threat. And it looks like Somalia, one of the hotspots of the continent, would now be used for a proxy war between largely-Christian Ethiopia and its bitter rival, Eritrea, a nation that backs the Islamists.
The paper continued by saying:
Ethiopian incursions are now undermining these efforts. Amid the rolling in of the Ethiopian tanks and the air strikes that followed, the bitter memories of the past two wars have come to haunt the people. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s stand that his government has a ‘legal and moral...
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Islamic Courts Union spokesman Abdi-Rahiin Ali Mudey was quoted as saying:
Ethiopia has recently asked us to start talks with them so the deadline was basically meant to tell the Ethiopians to withdraw from Somalia, then talks they offered would be possible.
Does this mean that the threat of all out war is receding? I am not so sure but I hope that is case. We must give peace a chance.
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Kassa Ayalew; the chairperson of Ethiopian American Civic Advocacy writes:
The undemocratic Ethiopian parliament declared war against Eritrea under the pretext that Ethiopia must “stop Eritrean aggression and punish the terrorist invaders” not long a ago. As result of that declaration, about 100,000 innocent soldiers were killed in battlefields and ten of thousands of families and individuals faced tragic deportations and dire humanitarian consequences. The same parliament that has not yet learnt from its past blunder echoed again the readiness and preparation to invade the eastern neighbor Somalia in the name of protecting Ethiopians and the rest of the world from terrorists’ threat.
Mr. Ayalew continued by saying:
The truth of the matter in waging this war against Somalia is the...
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The Toronto Globe and Mail newspaper reports:
Nearly 200 troops serving Somalia’s weak Western-backed government defected to the Islamic courts movement, an Islamic official said Sunday, as both sides braced for impending war. Sheik Mohamed Ibrahim Bilal, head of the Islamic court in the Al-Bayan region, said the troops switched sides there late Saturday. Sheik Bilal told the Associated Press by telephone that the former government soldiers “are ready to be incorporated into the Islamic courts forces.” The court movement has promised to launch a holy war Tuesday unless troops from neighbouring Ethiopia, who are supporting the government, leave Somalia. Islamic fighters have surrounded the southern Sudanese town of Baidoa, the only town the government controls. Al-Bayan, where...
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Click here to view a full transcript of interview with Melez Zenawi, the Ethiopian Prime......
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Terrence Lyons of the Center for Preventive Action wrote a report titled: “Avoiding Conflict in the Horn of Africa: U.S. Policy toward Ethiopia and Eritrea”.
The entire report (PFD format) can be downloaded free of charge by clicking here....
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