Ainashe.net

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 obligation’ to support and defend Somalia’s government is dangerously flawed.

The paper concluded by saying:

The best solution to Somalia’s problems is allowing the country to solve its own problems. Interference from Ethiopia or other nosey neighbours and big powers will only exacerbate the crisis.

I could not agree more! I hope more Arab and Muslim papers will flow suite by highlighting the plight of our people.

Click here to the full editorial on Khaleej Times.

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.

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.

Click here to view the full report.

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 regime’s desperation to stop the uprising resistance movement within and outside Ethiopia which has been intensifying since the May 2005 election. The elaborate scheme (fighting the terrorists’ threat) by the dictatorial regime that attempts to justify war against Somalia may play out different this time given the fact that the Ethiopian rulers’ trustworthiness credential has been shattered and their decade’s long democratic pretension has hatched for worse.

Interesting perspective to look at Zenawi’s desperate attempt to deflect attention from the political and economic crisis at home.

Click here to view the full article on the Sudan Times.

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.

Click here to view the full article on the BBC News.

In a statement released on Saturday, Louis Michel, EU Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid said:

I call upon all parties to refrain from engaging in a war that cannot be won by anyone. The spoilers and warmongers of all sorts that seek conflict in order to prevail militarily are fooling themselves as well as the Somali people.

Mr. Michel went on by saying:

A new war in Somalia will have tragic consequences not just for the people of Somalia but for the whole region and beyond. We simply cannot afford to see what is going to happen.

Click here to view the full by the Chinese news agency-Xinhua.

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 the defections are said to have taken place, is about 80 kilometres from Baidoa.

This is a major political and security setback for the TFG and their Ethiopian masters. However, the Islamic Courts forces should not make any military movement that the other side could perceive as an attack. They must hold their fire for now!

Contrary to what Col. Cabdullahi Yuusuf said, there is still a room for dialogue.

Click here to view the full report

Click here to view a full transcript of interview with Melez Zenawi, the Ethiopian Prime Minister.

The Pan-Arab Al Jezeera television network reports:

Leader of Somalia’s Islamic Courts militia and the influential parliament speaker said on Saturday that they had agreed at talks in Yemen to turn to dialogue between the Islamists and the government to resolve differences.” The Islamic Courts are committed to dialogue with the interim federal Somali government as a way of resolving differences … and stopping any moves conducive to military confrontations by any side,” speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden and Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed said in a joint statement. The statement was issued after three days of talks in the southern port city of Aden under the auspices of Ali Abdullah Saleh, the Yemeni president. It said the two sides would resume dialogue to reach a political settlement guaranteeing the participation of all sides in government.

Click here to view the full report.

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.

According to the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations the Bush Administration is worried about Somalia becoming a “Terrorist Haven”:

Because Somalia is a chaotic, poor, battle-weary Muslim country with no central government. As former Secretary of State Colin Powell has said, “terrorist activity might find some fertile ground there, and we don’t want that to happen.” Moreover, U.S. government officials say that Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda terrorist network supported Somali radical Islamists, organized training camps in Somalia, and threatened American troops in Somalia who were there on a U.N. humanitarian mission in the early 1990s.

Click here to view the full “backgrounder” on the CFR.

You may also like to click here to view Eben Kaplan’s note on “Somalia’s Terrorist Infestation” notes.

Stephanie Hanson of the US Council of Foreign Relations writes:

In the disputed border area between Ethiopia and Eritrea, tensions have been high all year but neither side appears willing to break the stalemate. Instead, both countries have been amassing troops in neighboring Somalia in what appears to be a proxy war. The build-up threatens to tip the entire Horn of Africa into a regional war (CSMonitor). Such a conflict appears increasingly imminent: this week Somalia’s Islamists threatened they’ll attack (BBC) if Ethiopian troops don’t leave within seven days. Ethiopia—a Christian nation with a significant Muslim population—sent troops into Somalia in support of the country’s weak, but internationally recognized, transitional government. Since the Islamists’ seizure of Mogadishu in June and the expansion of their area of control, Addis Ababa has been concerned their influence could inflame Ethiopia’s Muslims. Eager to support the enemy of its enemy, Eritrea has provided arms and troops to support the Somali Islamists, as well as other anti-Ethiopian forces in Somalia.

Ms. Hanson does not seem to understand the internal political dynamics of the Somali people. The external political and security factors certainly add more fuel to the tragic somali conflict but they are not the cause of the current conflict as Ms. Hanson mistakenly seem to imply!

Click here to view the full note on the Council of Foreign Relations.

Simon Tissdall of the Guardian newspaper writes:

Watching Somalia right now is like standing on a beach, waiting for a category five hurricane to hit. The storm is approaching fast, there seems little that can be done, and the ensuing destruction will be terrible - and far-reaching. The looming Somali cataclysm threatens to spark a regional war, suck in east African and Arab actors, and create a dangerous new theatre in the polarising, global contest between western power and Islamist jihadism. Somalia has the potential to make Darfur look like a little local difficulty.

Mr. Tisdall went on by saying:

Three outcomes were possible at this juncture, the western source said. One was that UN-backed, on-off talks between the UIC and Baidoa government resumed, the African protection force deployed, and a “proper political process” got underway. Another, less improbable scenario was that Ethiopia used its military superiority to secure Baidoa and “clobber” some UIC training camps, enabling the government to negotiate from a stronger position. But a third, nightmare outcome was that “the Ethiopians do the full monty, go in in strength, and get stuck”, the source said. That could lead to spreading, al-Qaida-fuelled guerrilla warfare akin to Iraq, Sudanese-style Arab-African conflict, and ultimately, pressure for direct western intervention.

Click here to view the full analysis on the Guardian.

The International Herald Tribune writes:
Somalia’s president (Col. Cabdullahi Yuusuf ) said Friday that peace talks with the country’s Islamic movement are no longer an option because the group’s leaders have declared war on his government

The paper writes that Col. Cabdullahi Yuusuf of the TFG was quoted as saying:

They are the ones who effectively closed the door to peace talks and they are the ones who are waging the war.

The Colonel continued by saying:

The fighting can happen at any time now.

War should not be the first option. Somali political leaders must make peace and they should not threaten to wage war that could certainly cause the death of thousands of innocent Somalis.

Click here to view the full article on IHT.

David Gollust of Voice of America wries:

In a bleak assessment of the Somali situation, Assistant Secretary Frazer says radicals including al-Qaida figures have taken control of the Islamic Courts movement, and that it may be too late for a plan approved by the U.N. Security Council earlier this month to stabilize the situation. On December 6, the Security Council approved a resolution granting an exemption to the U.N. arms embargo on Somalia to allow an East African military mission to enter the country and shore up the country’s Transitional Federal Government (TFG) based in Baidoa which is under siege from the Islamic Courts. Uganda has agreed to take part in what is termed a protection and training mission by the regional Intergovernmental Authority on Development, IGAD, but the process of assembling the force has been slow. In a talk with reporters, Assistant Secretary Frazer said the United States has lent diplomatic support to the effort, but that it may be too late to achieve the objective of Resolution 1725 - to bolster the transitional government in order to prompt the Union of Islamic Courts to return to talks on the country’s future: “It could possibly be too late,” said Jendayi Frazer. “And I think we need to be very clear that the Africans believe they asked for these two and a half years ago. When the TFG first went back to Somalia from Nairobi, they asked for this exemption. And so there are some African countries that will definitely state that we waited too late.”

Click here to view the full article on Dehai.

Sheikh Yusuf Mohamed Siad “Inda’ade”; the defense chief of the Somali Islamic Nationalists issued an ultimatum and asked Ethiopian troops to leave all Somali territories that they currently occupy within a week or face an all-out war.

Personally, I do not believe that war should be rushed to as it only brings misery and bloodshed. In addition, the TFG is so weak and powerless that it is only a matter of time before it collapses under its own weight. Hence, toppling it by forces will only create more chaos.

Peace must be given a chance!

Sheikh Yusuf Mohamed Siad “Inda’ade”; (on the right).
Copy Right: Shabelle Media/Reuters News Agency.

The Irish Breaking News network reports:

Thousands of Islamic militants today surrounded the only town Somalia’s government controls, the prime minister said. It came as a top Islamic official promised to attack within a week unless troops from neighboring Ethiopia leave the country. The surrounded town of Baidoa was today teeming with soldiers patrolling the city and manning checkpoints. Ethiopian troops are believed to be based around Baidoa.

I think the Somali Islamic Nationalists should not attack Baydhabo; the provincial seat of the failed TFG. However, I do believe that Somalia’s territorial integrity must be respected. More importantly, I do believe that Somalis must have, like everyone else, the right to self defense and they must be allowed to push back Ethiopia’s aggressive attempt to annex Somalia by military force.

I also believe that the TFG must disband and choose honorable exit. Otherwise, they will be forced to go away. Hopefully, that will happen through the ballot box rather than the barrel of the gun.

Click here to view the full article.

Oryem Okello; the Ugandans Minister of State for Foreign Affairs was quoted as saying:

We have decided that at this particular time, we should not go to Somalia.

The Minister went on by saying:

The situation has deteriorated rapidly — it risks all-out war.

This is a great victory for the Somali people. No country should help facilitate Ethiopian invasion of Somalia. I hope other countries will act wisely and follow Uganda’s lead.

Click here to view the article on the Reuters’ Alertnet.

A new, yet to be released UN Report is claiming that the Iranian Government is secretly trying to exploit Uranium deposits in middle Somalia.

Click here to view the full report (PDF) on the Pajamas Media.

Liam Bailey of Desicritics writes:

The 15 Member United Nations Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 1725 Dec. 6 2006. The U.S led resolution authorizes a regional force from the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and the African Union (AU) to establish a protection and training mission in Somalia. And the lifting of the UN arms embargo in relation to supplying the peacekeeping force. The previous UN mission in the country, started similarly but ended in a bloody battle and the death of 18 Marines attempting to disarm rival factions. The current resolution states its intention to consider taking measures against those that seek to prevent or block a peaceful dialogue process, overthrow the Transitional Federal Institutions by force, or take action that further threatens regional stability. Suggesting that, like its predecessor it could become far more than a protection and training mission, which may well have an adverse effect regional stability.

I agree entirely with Liam. The UN resolution is just a farce!

Click here to view the full article on Desicritics.org

Sayid Qutb; the intellectual father of radical political Islam wrote:

In summary, anything that requires a touch of elegance is not for the American, even haircuts! For there was not one instance in which I had a haircut when I did not return home to even with my own hands what the barber had wrought, and fix what the barber had ruined with his awful taste.

Does this mean that Sayid Qutb’s rejection of Western values stems from the fact that he got a bad hair cut in Greeley, Colorado, while he was a visiting scholar in United States in 1948-50? I am not so sure but some are saying so!

Click here to view full article on Rolf Putts website.

In an editorial the Arab News says:

The Arab League’s decision Sunday in Cairo to break the economic embargo imposed by the United States and Europe on the Hamas-led Palestinian administration was long overdue. Indeed it may be asked why any Arab state ever subscribed to this unjust punishment of a country, simply because its people had elected a government that Washington did not like. Hamas’ crime in American eyes was that it refused to recognize Israel and had used terror tactics, including suicide bombers. Yet no such sanctions were ever contemplated against Israel, which does not recognize Palestine and uses its own terror tactics to slay far greater number of Palestinians than the number of Israelis who fall victim to militant violence.

The people in the United States voted for Bush and the Palestinians elected Hamas led government. I am not a big fan of the Bush Adminstration or Hamas!

However, democracy is an expression of the political will of free people and sometimes it produces what some people may perceive as undesirable outcomes. However, the West cannot say, “We want to see democratized Middle East” and at the same time oppose the verdict that the very democratic political process they claim to advocate has delivered. To me that is an immoral double standard which the Muslim world must reject outright!

In short, the Arab League did the right thing to reject the misguided US policy towards the Palestinian people.

Click here to view the full editorial on the Arab News.

The Spero News reports:

A large deployment of forces is underway along the border between Kenya and Somalia. The Kenyan armed forces were widely deployed along the border with the Gedo region (extreme south of Somalia) and particularly at the El-Wakh border pass. “Military troops, police and armoured vehicles are massed at the El-Wakh village in Kenya”, said this morning a local correspondent of a top Mogadishu radio. Residents of villages of the Gedo region along the border confirmed the troop movements on the other side of the border, specifying that the first reinforcements began arriving in the zone shortly after the militants of the Islamic Courts on September 25 seized the city of Kismaayo.

It looks like that Somalia is under attack from many fronts!

Click here to view the full article on Spero News

The Economist Magazine reports:

Eyewitness reports on Monday October 9th suggested that “several hundred” Ethiopian soldiers, perhaps three battalions, had entered the small town of Burhakaba, well inside Somali territory. There have long been reports of Ethiopian troops at the town of Baidoa, 65km to the north, where a UN-recognised (but not widely Somali-recognised) transitional government sits. And there have been regular and credible reports of Ethiopian military planes landing on dirt strips up and down the country. Ethiopia has claimed, not very convincingly, that it has no soldiers inside Somalia. In fact it seems that the soldiers were sent in as a response to an approach by Islamist forces, soldiers under the control of a de facto government in Mogadishu, known as the Islamic courts, to within 20km of Baidoa late last week. There has been no fighting, yet. The Islamists were undermanned in the town and retreated without a shot being fired. But such calm is unlikely to last. Burhakaba is a strategically useful forward base for any attack on Mogadishu. Islamist leaders have vowed to take back the town; some unconfirmed accounts say they already have.

Click here to view the full article.

Copy Right: The Economist

The Malaysian News Agency (Bernama) reports:

Somalia’s powerful Islamist movement declared “holy war” against neighboring Ethiopia after a Muslim-held town near the seat of the weak government fell to Ethiopian and Somali troops. A day after warning of a regional war if Addis Ababa does not withdraw from Somali territory, the Islamists escalated their rhetoric, vowing to repel Ethiopian soldiers in a tacit warning to the transitional government. “From today, I am declaring jihad against Ethiopia, which has invaded our country and taken parts of our homeland,” said Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, chair of the executive committee of the Supreme Islamic Council of Somalia (SICS). “The jihad is on from now (and) application of that will be directed by the supreme council,” he said in Mogadishu, which the Islamists seized in June and have used as a base to expand through most of south and central Somalia.

War is not the solution to Somalia’s tragic political conflict. However, Ethiopian invasion of Somalia must not be allowed to happen at any cost! Somalia must be allowed to exist as a free nation. Hence, Ethiopia must respect Somalia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Click here for the full article

The Economist magazine writes:

Although Somalia’s Islamists say that their aim is nothing more threatening than to remake the country as a peaceful and tolerant Islamic state, Somalia’s internationally recognised (but dreadfully weak) transitional government insists that they are an “al-Qaeda network”. A recent suicide bombing which narrowly missed the transitional president, Abdullahi Yusuf, and the killing of an elderly Italian nun working at a Mogadishu hospital, probably in retaliation for Pope Benedict XVI’s remarks on violence and Islam, confirmed the worst fears of some, including the United States. The Kenyan coast already has direct experience of al-Qaeda’s brand of violence—in 2002 it bombed a hotel full of Israelis in Mombasa, killing 16, and tried to shoot down an Israeli airliner—and the Nairobi-based intelligence community expects more. So people are nervous.

The paper went on by saying:

Kenya’s Muslims feel disenfranchised. They have had little access to national power, in contrast to neighbouring Tanzania, where Islamist rhetoric has been blunted by socialism and Muslims have held most of the high offices of state (see article). So far, however, Muslims on the Kenyan coast have usually been repulsed by jihadist rhetoric. But a revival of Arabic and access to Arab satellite television, linking local backwaters to a sometimes inflammatory message of Islam under siege, could change that.

The Economist is right to say that one of the reasons the Kenyans are nervous is the fact that “Kenya’s Muslims feel disenfranchised”. However, there is another reason which is far more important than anything else: Kenya occupies a large portion of Somali territory! And the Somali islamic nationalists want that territory to be FREE from Kenyan oppression.

Click here to view the full article on the Economist magazine.

The online “Peace Peporter” writes:

The moment feared so much may have arrived. Monday morning, following the conquest of the center of Buur Hakaba on the part of joint Somali and Ethiopian forces, the Islamic courts have declared a holy war against Ethiopia, accused of having invaded the country and of being the party responsible for Somali instability.

Click here to view the full article.

The Houston Chronicles quoted a resident of the Somali port town of Kismaayo as saying “We welcome the Islamic courts”. The paper also reported Hirale’s deputy, Yusuf Mire Mohamud, as saying “the Juba Valley Alliance has collapsed today.”.

Could Bosaaso and Berbera be next? It is unbelievable to see the speed of political and military advancement of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU)!

Click here to view the article.