MOGADISH, December 28, 2007 – Islamist militia on Friday took control of a town in south-central Somalia after Ethiopian soldiers withdrew overnight, witnesses said.
The Islamists, who briefly controlled much of south and central Somalia before they were ousted by Ethiopia-backed Somali government troops early this year, have since been waging near daily attacks against the joint forces.
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Somalia, whose pirate-haunted international waters in the recent past had become every seafarer’s nightmare, has been readmitted into the Port Management Association of Eastern and Southern Africa.
PMAESA, a regional ports network covering Africa’s eastern seaboard, recently held a two day African Ports and Maritime Conference in Victoria in Seychelles.
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President Dahir Riyale Kahin |
26 December 2007
The leader of Somalia's breakaway sub-state of Somaliland has said that his administration intends to reach the international border established during colonial times.
Dahir Riyale, president of the breakaway Somaliland republic, told the Voice of America's Somali program that Somaliland and Somalia combined to form the first Somali Republic.
Mogadishu, December 26, 2007 - Soldiers from Burundi have started arriving in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, as part of the country’s contribution to the African Union peacekeeping force for the troubled country.
One thousand seven hundred Burundi peacekeepers will join the Ugandan contingent of 1,600 which has been holed up in Mogadishu for some months.
But the number is still considerably short of the 8,000 peacekeepers the AU plans to deploy there..
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ODM-Kenya presidential candidate Kalonzo Musyoka |
Nairobi, December 23, 2007 - ODM-Kenya presidential candidate Kalonzo Musyoka has said that his Government would make sure that the neighboring war torn country of Somalia becomes a member of the East African Community if he forms the next Government.
Mr Musyoka said if ODM Kenya forms the next Government it would ensure that peace returned to Somalia and the country was integrated in the EAC.
MOGADISHU , December 27, 2007 – Somali authorities in the capital Mogadishu yesterday ordered an independent radio station off air, the station’s director said, the latest in a series of restrictions imposed on the media.
The director of Radio Somaliweyn told reporters that the mayor or Mogadishu had ordered his station to stop broadcasting after it "violated media rules."
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GAROWE, Somalia Dec 24, 2007 - Lawmakers in Somalia's sub-state of Puntland continue their debate regarding the situation in Las Anod, the provincial capital of Sool region, the ownership over which is contested by the neighboring breakaway region of Somaliland.
In early November, the Puntland parliament threatened the administration of President Mohamud "Adde" Muse with a confidence vote if Las Anod is not recaptured from Somaliland troops within 30 days.
Burunidan soldiers line up at their base camp in Mogadishu |
ADDIS ABABA, December 27, 2007 - Ethiopia on Thursday welcomed the recent deployment of Burundian peacekeepers to Somalia and asked for more help from the African Union in its struggle with Islamist insurgents there. "The ministry of information commended Burundi's recent efforts in deploying 192 soldiers to join the AU peacekeeping mission in Somalia," said a government statement.
MOGADISHU, Dec 26 2007 - A Somali radio station said the mayor of Somalia's capital shut it down on Wednesday for broadcasting an interview with an Islamist insurgent.
Abdul Qadir, a senior correspondent at Radio Somaliweyn, told Reuters Mogadishu mayor Mohamed Dheere had phoned him and ordered the station to close indefinitely.
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MOGADISHU, December 26, 2007 - Security forces pursued and surrounded kidnappers Wednesday who abducted two foreign aid workers in northern Somalia hours earlier, a regional official said.
A witness said the victims, women from Spain and Argentina, were kidnapped by six gunmen near the building where they worked for the aid group Médecins Sans Frontières, in the Puntland region.
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Bossaaso, Somalia, December 27, 2007 - In the wake of abductions of Journalists, medical Practitioners, I.N.G.O’s Maritime Shipping, vessels and other agencies in the Puntland State.
The so called State of Puntland is in a question mark. That fabric is shredding to pieces so fast in the eyes of the beholders and the message they are sending is that the Port city of Bossaaso is getting out of the hand sooner.
Al Qaeda and other Islamic clerics will control the sea port cities of that region in the coming days and not the coming months.
MADRID, December 27, 2007 – The Medicins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders, MSF) medical charity said authorities in northeastern Somalia were negotiating with the kidnappers of two of its employees seized yesterday.
The charity said it had ordered four of its remaining seven workers to leave Somalia’s breakaway region of Puntland where the kidnapping took place.
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London, December 29, 2007 (SL Times) – The British parliamentarian Lord Avebury has stressed that for the upcoming elections in Somaliland to be recognized as inclusive, the right to campaign and put up candidates should be extended to the QARAN Political Association.
In a letter he wrote on December 27, 2007 to Mr. Malloch-Brown, minister at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Lord Avebury has taken issue with the decision of the Somaliland government to ban QARAN’s three top leaders, who had been released from prison earlier this month, from politics.
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President Dahir Rayale Kahin |
Hargeysa, Somaliland, December 29, 2007 (SL Times) – According to sources close to Somaliland’s ministry of the Presidency, President Dahir Rayale Kahin will be travelling in the first week of January 2008 to the US capital Washington, D.C to hold talks with the US government on issues relating to US and Somaliland relations.
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Hargeysa, Somaliland, December 29, 2007 (SL Times) – Four members of the National Election Commission (NEC) of Somaliland flew to Nairobi last Saturday to be among the many hundreds of international election observers overseeing the Kenyan general elections which took place Thursday.
Mr Hersi Ali Hassan, the deputy-chairman of the NEC spoke briefly to reporters, at Hargeysa Egal international airport, just before leaving for Nairobi on 22/12/07.
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Delegates of Negaad women's conference, Hargeysa |
Hargeysa, Somaliland, December 29, 2007 (SL Times) – Somaliland women leaders have called upon their government to take practical steps to ensure that women play a much greater role in national politics including assumption of leadership roles.
Garowe, Somalia, 29 December 2007 - A Canadian exploration firm with rights in Somalia's northern Puntland enclave has demanded the signature of interim President Abdullahi Yusuf before the exploration project can move forward, inside sources told Garowe Online.
Africa Oil Corp., formerly Canmex Minerals, partnered with Australia-based Range Resources, Ltd, in January to explore for oil and minerals in the relatively stable Puntland region.
PRESS RELEASE
Nairobi, December 28, 2007 – Kenya's December 27, 2007, presidential, parliamentary and local elections were an extremely important milestone in the evolution of Kenyan democracy. The International Republican Institute's (IRI) delegation commends the people of Kenya for the peaceful manner in which Election Day was carried out. However, voting is only one part of the process. The vote count and the acceptance of the results by the people are equally important.
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East Africa Policy Institute
December 23rd, 2007 – We find the news of the release of Dr. Mohamed Abdi Gabose and his vice chairs from jail (Mohamed Hashi Elmi and Jamal Aydeed Ibrahim of the Qaran political association) as a very good step toward Somaliland’s steady progress toward democracy and the rule of law. It is gratifying to see the president choose reason and good judgment and bring to an end the campaign of suppressing the aspiration of nescient political associations by detentions and threats.
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Commentary
By Abdirahman Ahmed Ali
In much analysis, Transitional Government of Somalia (TGS) failed to restored law and order in southern Somalia, including the vicious Mogadishu that paralyzed the country for about two decades. IGAD and Arab League also failed to install government is Somalia after 14 Peace Conferences in Arab and IGAD territories. It is likely that UN Trusteeship System that worked in Italian Somaliland for about ten years in 1950’s will again restore law and order in Italian Somaliland.
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Somali medical personnel carry on a strecher the corpse of a mortar attack victim |
NAIROBI, December 26, 2007 - The escalating Somali conflict is a "second Iraq" for Ethiopia and its international partners who supported the country's invasion, said Eritrea's information ministry a year on from the invasion.
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Mogadishu, December 25, 2007 - It is exactly a year since Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, fell to Ethiopian troops (Dec. 28), and the occupation has been one of the most brutal on record. The resistance started at once, and Ethiopian counterinsurgency tactics are not gentle.
As early as last April Germany’s ambassador to Somalia, Walter Lindner, wrote a public letter condemning the indiscriminate use of air strikes and heavy artillery in densely populated parts of Mogadishu, the systematic rape of women, and even the bombing of hospitals. By now, the Ethiopian Army’s attempts to terrorize the residents of Mogadishu into submission have driven 600,000 of them — 60 percent of the population — to flee the city.
By Helen Tither
Manchester, December 28, 2007 – So all you wanted for Christmas was an iPod - and all you got was a goat. Not even a real goat at that - but a voucher paying for a farmer somewhere in Africa to get a goat. Admit it, how many of you heaved a sigh of slight disappointment at getting one of those worthwhile "ethical gifts" this Christmas?
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Analysis
By Martin Plaut, BBC Africa analyst
Nairobi, December 28, 2007 – The Ethiopian decision to invade Somalia in December 2006 altered the balance of power in the Horn of Africa.
On 28 December 2006, they helped government forces capture Islamists from the capital, Mogadishu, which they had controlled for six months.
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Nairobi, Dec 23, 2007 – The top United Nations envoy to Somalia has urged the international community to draw up a road map towards lasting peace and stability in the country, Somalia has not had a functioning national government since 1991.
"The situation in Somalia is dangerous and becoming more so each day," Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah special representative of the Secretary-General told the UN Security Council last week.
An Eritrean woman carrying a load of firewood walks in a dusty camp outside Senafe, Eritrea, 2006 file photo. |
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia, 26 December 2007 - Isayas Gabriel remembers when tens of thousands of his fellow soldiers were cut down during Ethiopia's last war with Eritrea, a 2 1/2 year bloodbath over a seemingly insignificant border town called Badme.
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The resources of Africa are too valuable to be left to others, particularly with China extending its commercial reach
DUBAI, UAE, 23 Dec. 2007 - THIS poor country keeps taking one blow after another," Peter Goossens observed two months ago in an interview with The New York Times' Jeffrey Gettleman. "Ultimately, it will break." The country is Somalia, and Goossens directs the World Food Programme, which is now feeding some 1.2 million people there, 15 per cent of the population.
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Asif Ali Zardari, in white cap on left, helps carry the coffin of his wife Benazir Bhutto during Friday's burial. |
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, December 28, 2007 -- Benazir Bhutto died from a fractured skull caused by hitting her head on part of her car's sunroof as a bomb ripped through a crowd of her supporters, a spokesman for Pakistan's Interior Ministry said Friday.
"When she was thrown by the force of the shockwave of the explosion, unfortunately one of the levers of the sunroof hit her," said spokesman Brigadier Javed Iqbal Cheema.
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Employees are escorted out after an early-morning raid by federal immigration officials at the Michael Bianco Inc. textile plant in New Bedford, Mass., in March 2007. |
PHOENIX, USA, Dec. 24, 2007 - Mexican illegal immigrant Lindi sat down with her husband Marco Antonio in the weeks before Christmas to decide when to go back to Mexico.
She has spent three years working as a hairdresser in and around Phoenix, but now she figures it is time to go back to her hometown of Aguascalientes in central Mexico.
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Haatuf Cartoon on 'New Press Law"
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There are unconfirmed reports that Somaliland’s President Dahir Rayale Kahin will depart to the United States on an official visit early January 2008. If that visit materializes, as far as Somaliland is concerned, it could not have come at a better time. We say this for four sets of reasons that have to do with the United States, Somalia, the Horn of Africa region and Somaliland.
The United States
For a number of years, the US has focused on eliminating terrorist threats emanating from Mogadishu. The US tried various approaches including hiring warlords; and when that approach failed, it decided to shore up the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia ( TFG), an entity it had initially ignored. After a year of US support for the TFG and despite the backing of thousands of Ethiopian and Ugandan troops, it is now clear that the US policy towards Somalia has failed to produce any positive results. This glaring failure of US policy toward Somalia has strengthened the position of those within the administration (mainly but not exclusively the department of defense) who have been arguing for a change in US policy which involves recognizing Somaliland.
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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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By Mohamud Samatar
Way before the emergence of ICU, Ethiopia was concerned about the flow of the massive weapon that was streaming from the open market in Mogadishu which was ending up in the hands of the rebel groups fighting the Ethiopia government, such as ONLF and OLF, who had easy to access to purchase the weapon, and create havoc. Since the fall of Siyad Barre regime and the fall of Mangistu Haile Mariam,the current Ethiopian government was eager to heal the wounds afflicted by Barre and Mangistu between the Somali people and the Ethiopian people in order that the two brotherly countries could co-exist side by side at peace with each other.
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By Mohamud Tani
Most of the Sool elite in the diasporra are only now understanding that the political structure of the Puntland society is a classical case of an Orwellian system where “All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others”. The reality is only now sinking in, that Puntland was just the Animal Farm, where the BIGS and the BIGLETS were getting fatter and richer, while the sheep and the rest of the flock were bleating and singing” Two legs bad. Four legs good (Somaliland Bad, Puntland Good), and sometimes all the way to slaughter houses of Mogadishu.. The lost elite of Sool, has only now discovered that the Bigs were always walking on TWO LEGS, and were always trading with the HUMANS on the other side of the fence, behind their backs.
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A Sanitation Education & Advice Article For Somaliland Municipal Officials!
By Noah Arre
The following article is based on information I had just received from reliable friends who recently came back from Somaliland.
According to them, one major problem they noticed is that Somaliland cities in general and Hargeysa in particular are devastated by a multitude of pollution problems. Observed problems include: poor municipal waste management (both dry and liquid wastes) and lack or scarcity of sanitary clean water supply. Unfortunately, both problems are a recipe for disaster to public health.
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Puntland: The Epicenter Of Somalia’s Piracy And Human Trafficking
By: Said Shiiq, Ph.D.
Some people blame the semi-autonomous region of Puntland for outsourcing President Abdillahi Yusuf to the national scene after he pitted sub-clans against each other, ditched the results of democratic presidential elections, and threatened the stability of the region.
But I disagree with that charge; Insofar as President Yusuf is being foisted to the national scene by tactful Ethiopian hands, he has always espoused an ambition to become Somalia’s president, irrespective of how he gets there.
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By Guled Ismail
If there is one issue that unites Somalia’s famously quarrelsome politicians, elites and ordinary clansmen it is the issue of Somaliland’s secession: They oppose it to a man, child and warlord.
Members of the ineffectual but secular Transitional Federal Government (TFG) oppose Somaliland’s secession as vehemently as the most fanatical of its Islamist enemies.
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By Iftikhar Ahmad
According to British writer and lecturer, Karen Armstrong, the west is deeply Islamophobic and the Islamophobia is the result of a long process of prejudice, dating back to the Crusades. The recent events have strengthened the prejudiced belief that "Islam is the religion of the sword".
Islamophobia can manifest itself directly in verbal or physical attacks on Muslims but also indirectly in negative images of Muslims presented by the media. Islamophobia was worsened by anti-Islamic policies, publications and activities in Europe and the US. Islamophobia is not only a cause of discrimination against Muslims but also an open threat to world peace. The western media and intellectuals play a significant role in spreading Islamophobia. Hate-mongers have come out of the woodworks in full force.
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By Abdifatah Mohamed Ahmed
Citizen’s of any country in the world can be categorized into three division’s , the first part is the junior citizen’s ,the next part is the middle class citizen’s and the last part is the senior citizen’s which are the aged and senile people. On the other hand also we can discriminate the aboriginal people of any country into two segments. Generation X that comprises (youth + middle class citizens) and generation Y that consists of geriatric and senile citizen’s
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December 28, 2007
I was lucky enough to have met with Benazir Bhutto when she was a guest at a White House Project event nearly ten years ago. Commanding and quick-witted, Bhutto spoke movingly about women's leadership and its integral importance to democracy. The next and last time I would see her would be at this year's Council on Foreign Policy lunch in New York shortly before she was to return to Pakistan.
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Within a decade, the US will be heavily dependent on African oil. Little wonder the Pentagon is preparing a strategy for the region
The Pentagon is to reorganise its military command structure in response to growing fears that the United States is seriously ill-equipped to fight the war against terrorism in Africa. It is a dramatic move, and an admission that the US must reshape its whole military policy if it is to maintain control of Africa for the duration of what Donald Rumsfeld has called "the long war".
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By Brian Mosely
Shelbyville, USA, December 26, 2007 - Sunday marked the start of a series of stories about our new neighbors from Somalia, who have been moving into the community over the past several years. We hope our readers find these stories informative and educational.
Over the past year, this writer has heard many stories and rumors concerning these new additions to Bedford County and decided to try to sort out facts from fiction.
Basra Mohamed, shown in her North Linden office, airs a radio show on Saturday and Sunday nights, and publishes a newspaper, Danjir News, that also is aimed at a local Somali audience. |
Columbus, Dec 20, 2007 - Early in her journalism career in Columbus, Basra Mohamed arrived at news conferences filled with Somali men and reached for her digital recorder, only to be snubbed.
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Alex Boylan, winner of “The Amazing Race” is heading to your part of the world on his trip of a lifetime
December 15 2007, Arusha, Tanzania -- Want to explore the remote wilds of Kruger National Park, South Africa and Arusha, Tanzania without having to leave the comforts of your own home? Around The World Productions introduces a multiplatform interactive reality travel show, Around The World For Free , that allows you to do just that and more.
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By ABDULKADIR KHALIF
Special Correspondent
One inescapable fact about the Horn of Africa is that Hargeysa, the capital of the self-declared Republic of Somaliland, is peaceful, while its sister city Mogadishu, the constitutional capital of Somalia, is in a state of permanent anarchy.
It is no surprise then that lately, American academicians and political writers have taken to writing endless analyses as to why such a reality prevails in the Horn of Africa region, expressing their opinions as to what they would like to see happen.
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