Jane Novak
Much of the weapons trafficking in the Middle East is accomplished by Yemen, and both the US and UN have raised concerns. Weapons registered to the Yemeni military were used in the al-Qaeda attack on the US consul in Jeddeh in 2004. While arms carrying is common within Yemen, the smuggling of arms originally purchased by the Yemeni military is of international concern. Yemen has admitted to arming the Transitional Government in Somalia in violation of a UN arms embargo before. And apparently has done it again: Somalinet
Addis Ababa, June 20, 2006 – Negotiations between MIDROC Group and Somaliland over the management concession of the Port of Berbera have collapsed, after authorities in the republic rejected the proposal, reliable sources disclosed.
Talks between MIDROC and Somaliland officials began two months ago, spurred on by the Ethiopian government’s October 2005 decision to recognize the Port of Berbera as an alternative to the Port of Djibouti. The two parties had signed a memorandum of understanding in November 2005. Subsequently, MIDROC experts traveled to the Port, 964Km east of Addis Ababa, to prepare the terms of agreement. They had submitted a proposal to Somaliland’s Ministry of Finances.
KHARTOUM, Sudan Jun. 22, 2006 – Somalia's largely powerless government and the Islamic fighters who control the country's capital agreed Thursday to stop military action and recognize each other.
The nonaggression pact signed in Sudan is a move toward international acceptance for the militia, which the U.S. has accused of harboring al-Qaida and wanting to impose a Taliban-style theocracy throughout Somalia.
TV Cameraman Killed In Somalia 
Mogadishu, Somalia, June 23, 2006 – A Swedish cameraman who has worked for Channel 4 News was today shot dead during a demonstration in the Somali capital Mogadishu.
The cameraman was shot in the chest at close range by someone who then disappeared in the crowd, news agency Associated Press claimed.
By OPHEERA McDOOM, REUTERS, KHARTOUM, Sudan
The interim government of Somalia and the Islamic Courts movement which took control of the capital Mogadishu this month began their first direct high-level talks in Sudan on June 22.
Delegations from the two sides met under Arab League auspices in the Sudanese capital Khartoum after mediators held separate meetings with them in the morning in an attempt to avert a confrontation which could extend years of conflict.
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Mr. François Lonseny Fall()
New York, June 20, 2006 – Somalia's civil war, where an Islamist militia has taken control of the southern region, may become a regional conflict involving neighboring Ethiopia, said Francois Lonseny Fall, a United Nations envoy.
“If something is not done now, the conflict may take on a regional dimension,'' Fall said yesterday in New York, referring to reports of Ethiopian soldiers moving toward the Somali border.
The Union of Islamic Courts, which won control of the capital, Mogadishu, June 5, said at the weekend Ethiopian soldiers are heading to Baidoa, the base of Somalia's transitional government lying about 240 kilometers (149 miles) west of Mogadishu, Agence France-Presse reported. Ethiopia has denied the claim, the news agency said.
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SOMALIA: Radio Station Closed, Journalists Harassed
New York, June 19, 2006 — The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by the closure of a radio station in Somalia, and the brief detention by militiamen of two of its journalists, over a report of an alleged Ethiopian incursion.
Somalia’s weakened transitional government, which is based in Baidoa, 155 miles (250 kilometers) northwest of the capital, Mogadishu, closed down the local station of Radio Shabelle on Sunday after it broadcast a report saying that 300 Ethiopian soldiers had crossed into Somalia. The station’s deputy director, Mohamed Amiin, told CPJ that Radio Shabelle in Baidoa remained off the air today.
Islamic Courts Union's victory over U.S.-backed warlords in Somalia only brings it closer scrutiny
MOGADISHU, Somalia, Jun. 20, 2006 – Allegations that al-Qaida terrorists have been hiding in Somalia revolve around an old cleric, a young warrior, a desecrated cemetery and a lot of uncertainty. President Bush and other Western leaders have expressed concern that Somalia could become a safe haven for Osama bin Laden's terrorist network _ worries heightened by the victories of a militia vowing to bring Islamic rule to the Horn of Africa nation.
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Tensions Rise In Horn Of Africa
Militia from Islamic Courts Union in Balad, some 40 kilometers north of Mogadishu
Nairobi, June 20, 2006 – Tensions are rising in the Horn of Africa amid unconfirmed reports that several-hundred Ethiopian troops have crossed the border into Somalia to confront an Islamic group that controls large areas of southern Somalia, including Mogadishu. Analysts say they fear even the perception of Ethiopian meddling could end up strengthening the Islamists' grip on power and possibly ignite a regional conflict. VOA Correspondent Alisha Ryu reports from our East Africa Bureau in Nairobi.
In Somalia, Islamic Militias Are Fighting Culture Wars
By Marc Lacey
MOGADISHU Somalia, June 18, 2006 — Flush from a military victory earlier this month that caught Washington and the world by surprise, Islamic militiamen have begun waging smaller battles — cultural, not military ones — in and around Somalia's shellshocked capital.
A week ago, when Mexico and Iran were still playing the first half of their World Cup soccer match, gunmen allied with the Islamic courts burst into a tiny theater in the Hiliwaa neighborhood of north Mogadishu, condemned the place as ungodly and angrily switched off the television set.
Story by ROSELYNE AKOMBE
Thursday, June 22, 2006 – The laurels that Kenya has won due to its contribution to international peace and security are numerous.
But the just-concluded meeting of the US-led International Contact Group on Somalia at the Norwegian Mission to the UN in New York speaks volumes of where Kenya is placed in diplomatic circles.
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Somaliland Foreign Minister Meets with Jendayi Frazer
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Somaliland Foreign Minister Edna Adan Ismail
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Djibouti, June 24, 2006 (SL Times) – Somaliland Foreign Minister Edna Adan Ismail met on Thursday night with US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer in Djibouti.
Ms Ismail who was originally accompanying president Rayale on tour of eastern African countries arrived Tuesday in Djibouti on a separate mission to meet with the top US diplomat for Africa, Jendayi Frazer.
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UK Parliament Group For Somaliland To Be Launched
Bristol, UK, June 24, 2006 (SL Times) – Members of the British House of Commons from a cross section of political parties are to launch next week a parliamentary group to support efforts made by the people of Somaliland to rebuild their country after years of civil unrest.
Since the former British Somaliland declared independence from Somalia in 1991, significant social developments have taken place to establish credible three democratic parties which embraced the notion of free and open elections.
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President Dahir Rayale Kahin being welcomed by by Tanzanian president Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete.
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Hargeysa, June 24, 2006 (SL Times) – Somaliland president Dahir Rayale Kahin is expected to arrive in Hargeysa today from the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.
Mr. Rayale left Hargeysa on June 12 for a tour of 5 African countries in East Africa and the Great Lakes region.
The purpose of president Rayale’s tour was to mobilize support for Somaliland’s admission to the African Union.
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Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer
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Nairobi, June 22, 2006 — Stung by setbacks to its latest strategy in Somalia, the United States for the first time reached out to hardline Islamists, its erstwhile enemies, to help catch "terrorists" allegedly hiding in the shattered African nation.
In an about-turn, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer sought the help of the Joint Islamic Courts to arrest terrorists believed hiding in Somalia. Washington previously blamed these courts for having links with Al Qaida and harboring foreign fighters.
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If impossible is a word to be found only in the dictionary of fools as remarked by Napoleon Bonaparte, the world may see the Somali Islamist fighters of the Union of Islamic Courts in Mogadishu reversing the trend of history by turning tables on advocates of the clash of civilizations, by inventing a new meaning for the concept of Islamism and by becoming alien contenders for the Nobel peace prize.
By I.M. Lewis
Poor ex-Italian Somalia!. When it is in chaos and subject to the shambolic anarchy
of the secular warlords who have terrorized its civilian population, the best outsiders have been able to do is to engage in so-called peace-making, producing virtual governments which are incapable of governing and, manifestly have no public support. First there was the Arta regime(‘transitional national government’) created in Djibouti by the UN in January 2000. Its supreme achievement was to control fitfully a handful of streets in Mogadishu. Without elections, and any demonstration of general public support, it quietly expired three years later.
Somalia: A New Actor On The Stage
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A street scene in downtown Mogadishu, most of which is now in the hands of the Islamic courts militia
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The last stronghold of a US-backed warlord alliance, the Somali town of Jowhar, was captured last week by an Islamist militia whose leaders pledged to establish Sharia courts, cementing their victory after more than four months of fighting, residents said.
Mogadishu, June 20, 2006 – Columns of heavily-armed militia aboard pick-up trucks mounted with machine guns -- known as “technicals” -- patrolled the town about 90 kilometers north of the capital Mogadishu, which they also captured earlier this month.
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All Africans of goodwill – and particularly those in the neighborhood of Somalia – know the anguish and pain our brothers and sisters have gone through since the early 1990s. Recent events in Somalia demonstrate that all is not well there, despite earlier hopes pinned on the transitional government of Somalia, whose seat of power is in Baidoa and not Mogadishu, the recognized capital.
Mogadishu was recently taken over by a Somali teacher, Sheikh Shariff Ahmed, now the chairman of the Union of Islamic Courts. While this group may now be in charge in Mogadishu, the war is far from over as there appears to be fears that the fighting could degenerate into internecine warfare, long the bane of Somalia.
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AID, aid, and more aid to Africa was the mantra that emerged from last year’s Group of Eight (G-8) summit in Gleneagles. In April, however, in the run-up to the forthcoming St Petersburg G-8 summit, where the past year’s development progress with be under scrutiny, there was a very different message from Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown. Add the promised crackdown on corruption by World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz and it could signal the start of a radical reappraisal of a flawed and failing strategy.
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International News
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Primary Target ... Chicago's Sears Tower.
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Miami, June 24, 2006 – US authorities have arrested seven people suspected of planning attacks on FBI offices and Chicago's Sears Tower, the nation's tallest building.
A law enforcement source said the suspects, mostly Americans and thought to be Muslims, were caught in a sting operation focused on a Miami warehouse. The suspects had thought they were dealing with al-Qaeda but had been infiltrated and tricked by a US Government informant.
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Somalia TFG President Abdillahi Yusuf
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Mogadishu, Sunday, June 18, 2006 – The United Nations has warned that fresh conflict is increasingly likely in Somalia, where Islamic forces have risen to power in recent weeks, rivaling the authority of the country's official transitional government. So where do key players find money, weapons and friends.
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Prime Minister Tony Blair, Editor of The Somali Voice KaysarCabdilaahi Maxamed
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Bristol, UK, June 23, 2006 – Tony Blair may be under fire in the Commons and the country over law and order. But an invited audience of community leaders from Bristol was ready to hear the Prime Minister's new ideas on how his Government can effectively fight back against criminals.
After his visit to crime victims in Southmead, Mr. Blair made an appearance at the Labor Party's first ever Let's Talk event.
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New York, Jun 19, 2006 – Amid intensifying violence in Somalia, where Islamic forces this month had captured the capital of Mogadishu and now controlled three major districts, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative, François Lonseny Fall, said today that the exact intention of the Islamic forces was not clear, but they had recently indicated their willingness to talk with Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government.
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Somali Situation Is A Challenge To The AU
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Wednesday, June 21 st, 2006 – WHEN a people have suffered for a long time under a dictatorship the tendency is to declare that nothing could be worse than they were experiencing. It is like the optimism in that song by Yazz: the only way is up.
But experience does teach a different lesson. No matter how bad the situation is it could always be worse. But the opposite is also true. No matter how good it is it can always be better. Who would have thought that the glee that saw the exit of Somalia’s long-time dictator, Mohammed Siyad Barre, in 1991 was going to quickly turn into a nightmare for his compatriots who have not known peace or even enjoyed the protection of a legitimate government since then.
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ISLAMIC COURTS UNION: Bush Strategy Stirs Tempest In Somalia
A Somali protests Friday in Mogadishu at a rally that drew about 10,000 who opposed a proposed peacekeeping mission.
MOGADISHU, Somalia, June 19, 2006 -- In early March, nine of Mogadishu's most prominent leaders secretly flew to neighboring Djibouti and pleaded with U.S. military officials there to stop funding the warlords who were devastating the city. Backing the warlords, they said, would end up strengthening an Islamist militia with a shadowy radical wing.
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''The Islamic Courts Union Opens A New Chapter In Somalia's Political History''
"Addis Ababa is the wild card in the game -- if it is acting alone, its military threat is probably limited; if it is acting with U.S. support, the power balance in Somalia becomes more uncertain and fraught with the possibility of intensified conflict."
Having consolidated their control over Somalia's official capital Mogadishu, the Islamic Courts Union (I.C.U.) moved during the week of June 12 to extend their rule to most of the country's southern region, taking the strategic town of Jowhar -- the last stronghold of their warlord adversaries -- and then sweeping north toward Beletweyne near the Ethiopian border, meeting no significant resistance along the way.
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Editorial
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Governments in this region and beyond might have been scrambling for the kind of policies and actions to be taken in the face of the takeover of Mogadishu by militia of the Islamic Courts Union earlier this month, but the real angst in Somaliland today is about the consequences that the huge quantities of arms delivered since the last few months to both the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia and the ICU, could have for security and stability in this country.
The influx of arms into Somalia from countries in the region has escalated following the rapid advances made by ICU fighters across most of the former Italian Somalia with Yemen openly supplying new consignments of heavy weaponry to the TFG in Baidoa only last week.
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Special Report
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REPORT ON FAMILIARISATION TOUR TO SOMALILAND
In November 2005, the Centre for Human Rights began investigating the possibility of a third destination for the LLM field trip. The reasons for increasing the number of field trip destinations to include Somaliland include the following:
Somaliland is a state in the making; it would be ideal for students on the programme to have a first hand experience of this.
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Opinions
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Over The Spoils Of The Haunted Somali State
By Ahmed Ali Ibrahim Sabeyse
As a last act of desperation, the left over of the Siyad Barre’s Nazi government are on a full swing campaign to rewrite the history of the dark ages. The politics of the spleen are on the rise again and in full bloom; there is no shortage of champions of the lost cause; and the vitriolic rhetoric spares none. The Somali government of the Embagathi Swine Stockyards fame really injected some fresh new blood into some of the characters on the rampage. Giving a new spin to the old routine or throwing in the towel in indignation; reckoning with the fact that ‘Somalia is gone forever’ does not and should not absolve one’s responsibility in the current predicament. The unexpected rise of Union of Islamic Courts of Mogadiscio to sudden prominence added a new dimension to the conflict.
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Faysal Diriye
Needless to say, the sweeping military victories of the Islamic Court Union has deeply changed political discourses across the map. It is now common to see lifetime promoters of the Somali “unity”, “homogeneity” adopt a resolutely regionalist stance. For the last 15 years Puntland has presented itself as the standard bearer of the advocacy for a strong and centralized Somali government. Even it this hypocritical stance was all about introducing by the back door remnants of the Siyad Barre regime, the propaganda stemming from it help achieved the lifelong presidential dream of Abdillahi Yusuf. To Yalahow calling on Hassan Abshir to go back to Garowe, Somali unity propagandist downplayed Somali regionalism and contemptuously attached to Somaliland the label of Somalidiid.
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By Ibrahim Adam Ghalib, Borama
My topic today looks funny but it is carrying attractive meaning to the readers. Jamal is an Arabic word and Camel is English. It is the state of Somaliland today. It is neither Arabic nor English and here are my excerpts. Somaliland was born out of the people’s desire when the central government of Somalia disintegrated. There was no strategic plan. Quick decisions and thinking were needed at that time before things get out of hand. When you do not know where to go any road will do. The civic societies of Somaliland convened in Burao and immediately late Abdurrahman Ahmed Ali was declared president. During his presidency there were ups and downs. This was hectic period and the president’s car was even seized once in the street by mobs. The trends and challenges during this difficult time were great. We have to appreciate that his good offices lead the country to assume the reconciliation process once again in Borama 1993.
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Rebuttal Of: An Appeal To The Secretary-General Of The African Union In Response To The ICG Report
By Farah Ali Jama, Ottawa, Canada.
You’re Excellency,
An old saying states that, “Evil Flourishes When Good Men Are Quiet.” Therefore, the meaningless and slanderous letter titled, “An Appeal to the Secretary- General of The African Union in Response to the ICG Report” by the unknown and so-called “The Unionists of Northern Somalia (UNS),” which is dated on June 3, 2006, and posted on some hostile and tribal Somalia websites that are suspected to be finance by the criminal “Beast-Man” Warlords of Somalia will not go unchallenged.
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Dr. Abdi Elmi Obseyeh
A t least 7 weeks have passed unnoticed with a critical conversation about an issue which most of us have either been ignoring or have misunderstood. The issue is the “Yes” and “No” response of the high supreme court. Due to the House of Guurti’s extension. It is really unfortunate that our highest Supreme Court chair-person in S.Land make a false contraindication of complicate such a point. Such information seems very confusing and conflicting, and instead of trying to clarify it publically he (the judiciary chairperson) again put it on the other side. We have to avoid telling the community what some one really think and believe without not considering what our constitution says an issue.
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By Abdifatah Ismail
The fall of Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, to Islamists comes at a time when anti-terror surveillance on the Horn of Africa is at its height.
At present, several western countries including the US, Germany and France have military bases in Djibouti, the northern neighbor of Somalia.
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Somalia’s New Islamic Leadership
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By Harun Hassan
A more nuanced United States response to the success of the Islamic courts militias in Somalia could help the country and save itself from another humiliation there, reports Harun Hassan.
The situation in Somalia has taken a further twist with the victory of the Union of Islamic Courts. After months of intermittent fighting with militias controlled by various warlords, the courts's own forces took control of most of the capital, Mogadishu, on 5 June 2006 and established the rudiments of a new government. But is this the endgame, or merely the latest phase, of the fifteen-year-old conflict?
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Fun Time Is Over In Mogadishu
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By Alykhan Velshi
After assuring the world that they had no intention of introducing Sharia law, the new Islamist junta in Mogadishu banned Somalis from watching the World Cup.
Comparisons are already being made between the Islamists in Mogadishu and the Taliban in Afghanistan. At some point, the United States government will have to make an unsavory decision about how to handle the jihadists in Mogadishu. It will almost certainly be necessary to have allies on the ground willing to offer the United States assistance, local information, access to territory, and so on.
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By: Said Mohamed Dahir (Dhawal)
States parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measure, to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child. Article 19 section 1 (Convention on the Rights of the Child)
The endorsement of this convention evidenced that world came together to engulf children with kindness and warm treatment because they all got from their minds the need for protecting children to the fullest way possible. Otherwise, children would receive the full brunt of human evils and adult’s trouble manifestation.
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| FEATURES & COMMENTARY |
The New Taliban
By J. Peter Pham, Ph.D.
Breaking News: Lawmakers approved a peacekeeping mission for Somalia, the parliament speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden said. Islamic Fighters oppose this transitional government's decision. The presence of foreign peacekeepers from Sudan and Uganda can lead to a major confrontation between islamic militants and warlords who fled Mogadishu and Jowhar. Officials told recent combats in the past few months have killed 400+ people. A figure that'd be underestimated. An islamic offensive could be launched against the transitional government in the western city of Baidoa. Neighboring countries want sanctions against warlords as Europeans call for an arms embargo.
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Flags Have Us All A-Flutter
David Henriques proudly supports four countries with flags flapping from his Jeep. (Veronica Henri/Sun)
Munich, Germany, June 18, 2006 – It's a simmering flag flap that boils just under the surface of this city's World Cup fever.
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By Rageh Omaar
On the face of it Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan have little in common besides their predominantly Muslim populations. Even the nature and the traditions of Islam practiced in each country, to say nothing of their economic and social backgrounds, are different.
However, there is one thing these countries have in common, and it gives rise to the most important geo-strategic question in the world. Why is it that in all the places in the Islamic world where America has intervened militarily over the past two decades, radical Islamists are either in power or on the rise?
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Peace has been achieved on the streets of Mogadishu by an unintended factor: American policy
Suddenly, after more than 15 years of vicious, vengeful war, there is a chance of peace in Mogadishu, and perhaps in the rest of Somalia. The warlords have fled. In May, as the battles raged, such an outcome was as improbable as Somalia winning the World Cup.
Today, peace reigns on Mogadishu's streets and the city has a single authority. This has been achieved by an even more unimaginable and unintended factor: American policy.
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Why the International Contact Group Should Support the Islamic Courts Union
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Abukar Arman
Between euphoria and frustration, clarity and confusion, moderates must develop a sustainable alternative solution to the lawlessness that paralyzed Somalia for over 15 years, and find a platform to showcase that. Of course the quest to accomplish that would not only require willpower and resilience to paddle against the ferocious waves of suspicion, fear, and hate, but also a real support (of moral and material value).
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By Jamal Gabobe
Seattle, Washington, June 24, 2006 – No doubt most Somalilanders were shocked and angered by the forced entry into the House of Parliament by armed members of the unit for the protection of foreign personnel. It was to say the least, a criminal and seditious act. But if we reflect upon what has been happening lately in Somaliland it should not have come as a complete surprise, for already a precedent was set when Somaliland’s government sent the police force to disperse the parliament’s meeting.
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