Addis Ababa , January 10, 2007 – Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and President of the Somaliland Dahir Rayale Kahin on yesterday held discussions on various bilateral issues.
The discussion the two sides held focused on the economic cooperation that should be created between peoples of Somaliland and Ethiopia.
Arbitrary Arrest And Detention In Somaliland
Dublin, Ireland, January 8, 2007 – Armed police stormed the headquarters of Haatuf Media Network, in Hargeysa city on 2 January and arrested the Editor-in-Chief, Yusuf Abdi Gabobe and the Editor, Ali Abdi Dini for allegedly publishing an article “insulting the President of the republic of Somaliland and his wife.”
Addis Ababa, January 11, 2007 – Foreign Affairs Minister Seyoum Mesfin called upon the international community and donors to extend towards efforts under way to ensure peace in Somalia through broad-based reconciliation.
Speaking to ambassadors of donor countries and representatives of international donor organizations at a meeting held here on Thursday [11 January], Seyoum said this is a historical and unique opportunity for Somalis to ensure peace and stability in Somalia, which remained stateless and rocked by instability for many years.
Official Says Southern Town Falls After Peace Talks And Five Days Of Fighting
MOGADISHU, Somalia Jan 12, 2007 – Ethiopian-backed government forces captured the last remaining stronghold of the Islamic movement in southern Somalia, the Somali defense minister said Friday — hours after warlords met with the president and promised to enlist their militiamen in the army.
The southern town of Ras Kamboni fell after five days of heavy fighting, Defense Minister Col. Barre "Hirale" Aden Shire told The Associated Press. He said government troops backed by Ethiopian forces and MiG fighter jets chased fleeing Islamic fighters into nearby forests and the fighting would continue. He did not give casualty figures.
GENEVA, January 12 2007 – The UN refugee agency has begun airlifting supplies to Somalia and has also dispatched emergency teams to verify reports of new displacement in north-east Somalia and a possible influx of Somali refugees into eastern Ethiopia.
On Wednesday, a four-member UNHCR emergency team reached south Galkayo in Somalia's autonomous Puntland region in advance of a series of joint assessment missions planned by humanitarian agencies to assess the scale of new displacement and to address the needs of displaced Somalis in the south of Puntland, bordering strife-torn central Somalia.
ASMARA, January 13, 2007 – Eritrea warned the United States yesterday that its involvement in Somalia would “incur dangerous consequences” following a US air strike in the Horn of Africa nation targeting Al Qaeda suspects.
Eritrea has in a matter of years gone from being a US ally to one of its staunchest opponents, analysts say, because of what Asmara perceives as Washington’s support for rival Ethiopia in a long-standing border dispute.
MOGADISHU, Somalia, Jan. 13, 2007 — More violence erupted Friday in Mogadishu, Somalia’s bullet-pocked capital, and this time it was literally at the doorstep of the newly arrived government.
According to witnesses, presidential guards killed at least eight men of a rival militia at the gates of the presidential palace as top leaders were sitting inside discussing a new disarmament program.
Read full text...
By Mohamed Olad Hassan
Mogadishu, Somalia. January 13, 2007 - As Somalia's warlords were signing a deal to lay down their weapons, six militiamen were gunned down just yards away in a dispute with government troops over a parking spot.
Their bodies were propped up against a bullet-scarred wall opposite the presidential palace Friday -- a stark reminder of the challenges facing the government as it tries to restore order and establish real authority in this fractious, heavily armed country.
January 08, 2007
My colleague Rosemary Righter wrote last week that the defeat of Somalia’s Islamic courts by Ethiopian forces was the “first piece of potentially good news in two devastating decades”.
As one of the few journalists who has visited Mogadishu recently, I beg to differ. The good news came in June. That is when the courts routed the warlords who had turned Somalia into the world’s most anarchic state during a 15-year civil war that left a million dead.
Addis Ababa, January 11, 2007 – Foreign Affairs Minister Seyoum Mesfin called upon the international community and donors to extend towards efforts under way to ensure peace in Somalia through broad-based reconciliation.
Speaking to ambassadors of donor countries and representatives of international donor organizations at a meeting held here on Thursday [11 January], Seyoum said this is a historical and unique opportunity for Somalis to ensure peace and stability in Somalia, which remained stateless and rocked by instability for many years.
Ethiopian soldiers, who are backing up Somali government troops, stand on a street in Kismayu. |
Baidoa, Somalia. 13/01/2007 - Somalia's parliament declared on Saturday a state of emergency for three months to restore security in the Horn of Africa country after several weeks of war ousted rival Islamists.
Members of parliament passed the vote in the government's interim seat of Baidoa - its home until Ethiopian and Somali troops defeated Islamists who had controlled much of the south.
Read full text...
Rwanda, Kigali. January 13, 2007 - The Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) has appealed to Rwanda to send troops to the war-ravaged Somalia to help pacify the Horn of Africa nation.
The request was contained in a message to President Paul Kagame from Kenya's President Mwai Kibaki which was delivered by Special Envoy Musikari Kombo, on Thursday.
Read full text...
January 10, 2007
UNITED NATIONS - International concern over civilian casualties mounted yesterday after the United States launched air strikes in Somalia against what the Pentagon said were "principal" al-Qaeda suspects.
U.S. officials said the offensive was based on "credible intelligence" about the whereabouts of al-Qaeda operatives, while critics note it comes just ahead of President George W. Bush's major address tonight on his administration's new strategy for Iraq and the war on terror.
Read full text...
Jan 7, 2007
Almost every description of Somalia to appear in the corporate U.S. media over the last 15 years or so has included the words “anarchy,” “lawlessness” and “failed state.” What they don’t say is that there has been no functioning national state in this period because the Somali people have refused to accept puppet regimes forced on them by the United States.
Somalia is an arid, largely pastoral country whose grasslands stretch along the east coast of Africa in the area known as the Horn. Imperialist treachery, subversion and military intervention have marked its history and left it in desperate shape.
United Nations, January 12, 2007 - When former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan criticised the U.S. military invasion of Iraq as an "illegal" act, he was blasted by right wing neo-conservatives in the United States.
Annan was implicitly accusing the administration of President George W. Bush of violating the U.N. charter because it did not receive the authorisation of the Security Council to launch a military strike on Iraq four years ago.
|
|
Headlines |
Haatuf Journalists Appear In Court
Crowds gathered last Thursday outside Hargeysa Regional courthouse |
Hargeysa, Somaliland, January 13, 2007 (SL Times) – Haatuf Media Network (HMN) chairman/editor of Somaliland Times Yusuf Abdi Gabobe and the editor of the Somali language Haatuf newspaper, Ali Abdi Dini appeared for their first Hargeysa Regional Court hearing last Thursday.
They were escorted from their CID cells to the courthouse under heavy police presence. All courthouse adjacent and surrounding roads were sealed from local traffic. Somaliland security forces feared the expected large number of crowds coming in support of the journalists would eventually lead to mass demonstrations and public disorder
Read full text...
|
DJIBOUT, Jan. 12 2007 – Djibouti, which hosts a large United States anti-terror base, has condemned this week's US air strikes in neighboring Somalia. Foreign Minister Mahmoud Ali Youssouf told the BBC that the raid was counterproductive to achieving peace.
He said his government had not received prior warning about the strikes, which are reported to have been launched from the US base in Djibouti on Monday.
|
"We would favor our fellow Africans, of any color, because they have an emotional take in the continent"
By Geoff Hill
Harare, January 13, 2007 – Somaliland has become the latest country offering land to Zimbabwean farmers looking for a new start. Foreign minister, Abdillahi Duale told Farmers' Weekly that he was keen to discuss agri-investment with experienced farmers from anywhere in the world, "but I must say we would favor our fellow Africans, of any color, because they have an emotional stake in the continent." Somaliland has amazed observers over the past 15 years by establishing a democratic and tolerant society in the horn of Africa.
|
|
A civilian, centre, walks past two Ethiopian soldiers. left, and Somali government forces on top of a truck outside Villa Somalia where the Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf stay's.(AP Photo/Mohamed Sheikh Nor) |
MOGADISHU, January 9, 2007, Somalia - In the first overt U.S. military action in Somalia since the 1990s, American warplanes have blasted at least two Islamic militia targets near the Kenyan border, officials said Tuesday.
Many people were reported killed in the attacks, which U.S. officials said were on guerrillas they accused of sheltering suspect in the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa.
Read full text..
|
Fighters loyal to the Islamic Courts Union load up on trucks to head to the front on December, 2006. |
Mogadishu, Somalia, Jan. 10, 2007 – Said Ali, 21, is a volunteer fighter for the Shabab militia, the feared enforcers of the Islamic Courts Union. The U.S. brands the organization as an ally of al-Qaeda; in reality, it is also a nationalist anti-warlord movement that contains many Muslim moderates and has no international ambitions.
|
Hargeysa, Somaliland, January 13, 2007 (SL Times) – Mr. Kayse Ahmed Osman, a close friend of the detained Haatuf Media network journalists, Yusuf Abdi Gabobe and Ali Abdi Dini was arrested while visiting the detained journalists inside the CID Hargeysa compound on Friday, 12/01/07.
Around, 1pm Friday afternoon Mr. Kayse Ahmed Osman was arrested by Somaliland’s chief CID commander, Mr. Suleiman Muse when he spotted Kayse Ahmed inside the CID compound as he was being turned away by security guards, who had refused Kayse Ahmed to visit Yusuf Abdi Gabobe and Ali Abdi Dini, the two Haatuf Media Network journalists arrested, on 2 January 07, for publishing a series of articles in Haatuf daily newspaper relating to the misuse of public property by the family of President Dahir Rayale.
|
The US attack on Somalia was driven by the search for al-Qaida operatives and showed no regard for for Somalia's domestic complexities.
By Ian Black
American policy towards Somalia has been driven for years by the search for the al-Qaida operatives suspected of carrying out the bombings of two US embassies in East Africa in 1998. But the US air strike in the south of the country breaks new ground - and risks opening up a new and volatile front in the "global war on terror".
Read full text...
|
Mogadishu/Nairobi, Jan 13, 2007 - The Somali parliament meeting in the provincial town of Baidoa Saturday declared a 90-day state of emergency to help restore law and order, a government spokesman said.
The MPs also voted to legitimise the presence in Somalia of Ethiopian troops who have been helping government troops in fighting Islamic Courts militiamen since late December.
Read full text...
|
MOGADISHU, Somalia, January 6, 2007 – Authorities in Somaliland have arrested and jailed the publisher of an independent daily and one of its journalists after the paper published an article alleging the president was involved in corruption, officials said.
Police arrested and jailed the publisher of Daily Haatuf, Yusuf Abdi Gabobe, and a journalist at the paper, Ali Abdi Dini, on Jan. 2, said Ahmed Du'ale, a senior editor at the paper, adding police did not produce an arrest warrant.
|
Read full text...
January 10, 2007
This is not a war between Ethiopia and Somalia. This is a war of the USA against all the peoples of the Horn of Africa.
by Mohamed Hassan
To understand what is happening in the Horn of Africa, the nature of the TPLF-regime of Zenawi Meles in Ethiopia that sent its troops into Somalia last month must first be explained.
The Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) was created in 1975. In its first manifesto it said its main objective was to create the Independent republic of Tigray. This is a narrow nationalist and racist approach that makes language the first factor to unite or divide people. There was opposition to this narrow vision within the TPLF itself as well as within the other organisations and fronts that fought against the Mengistu regime, the dictatorship of that time.
|
Read full text...
|
|
International News
|
12 Jan 2007
The US has carried out an air strike on a village in southern Somalia. The US/Ethiopian backed puppet transitional government has announced many people have been killed in the raid. The air strike follows the Ethiopian offensive against the Union of Islamic Courts, which reinstalled Abdillahi Yusuf and his American backed transitional government.
|
Read full text...
|
January 13, 2007
On December 4, General John Abizaid, the commander of US forces from the Middle East through Afghanistan, arrived in Addis Ababa to meet the Ethiopian prime minister, Meles Zenawi. Officially, the trip was a courtesy call to an ally. Three weeks later, however, Ethiopian forces crossed into Somalia in a war on its Islamist rulers, and this week the US launched air strikes against suspected al-Qaida operatives believed to be hiding among the fleeing Islamist fighters.
"The meeting was just the final handshake," said a former intelligence officer familiar with the region.
|
|
1/12/2007
The United States yesterday denied claims that it planned to set up a military base in Somalia after getting rid of “terrorists.”
The US ambassador to Kenya, Mr. Michael Rannerberger, maintained that Washington’s long term interest was to ensure that stability was restored in the war-torn country.
The envoy also denied media reports that scores of Somali civilians had been killed in air raids by the US military operating from the Somali coast, on the Indian Ocean.
|
Read full text... |
Courts group targeted by US air strikes had meeting with Foreign Office officials
London, January 13, 2007 – Somalia's Islamist movement, whose leadership is accused by the US of sheltering some of al-Qaida's most wanted operatives, sent a delegation on a fundraising trip to Britain last year, the Guardian has learned. Led by an Islamist minister, the Union of Islamic Courts delegation received pledges of funding from members of Britain's Somali diaspora at a meeting at a north London school in November.
|
|
Ahmed Hashi, owner of Ayan Cafe |
Ahmed Hashi, owner of Ayan Cafe, talks about the current conditions in his home country of Somalia Sunday afternoon at his restaurant.
Dahir Abdi still has a sister and a brother in Somalia. The brother has eight children; the sister has nine. All of them have survived the chaos so far. |
|
WASHINGTON January 10, 2007 –The Bush administration's air strikes on suspected Al Qaeda strongholds in Somalia have raised fears that it may be courting a third, bloody front in its fight against terror.
From the United Nations to European capitals, leaders warned the first U.S. military incursion into Somalia since its doomed 1993 invasion could spark a new wave of the anti-Americanism that's thriving in Iraq and Afghanistan and harden the resolve of Islamic extremists in the Horn of Africa.
Government officials here said the strikes targeted three terrorist leaders suspected of masterminding the 1998 bombing attacks on American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
|
Read full text... |
January 10, 2007
UNITED NATIONS - International concern over civilian casualties mounted Tuesday after the United States launched air strikes in Somalia against what the Pentagon said were ''principal'' al-Qaida suspects.
U.S. officials said the offensive was based on ''credible intelligence'' about the whereabouts of al-Qaida operatives, while critics note it comes just ahead of President George W. Bush's major address tonight on his administration's new strategy for Iraq and the war on terror.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Editorial
|
After a week and half of being held illegally in detention by Somaliland’s government, the editor of the Somaliland Times, Yusuf Gabobe and the editor of Haatuf, Mr. Ali Abdi Dini were finally brought in front of a judge and their trial has started. Since they were held without an arrest warrant, their detention could only be described as abduction or hostage-taking. The reason that the C.I.D officers gave for their despicable action was that the editors defamed the president, a reference to a series of articles written by Muhamad Rashid in Haatuf, detailing massive corruption and embezzlement by the president, his wife, their close family members, and ministers. Many of the charges in Haatuf were corroborated later by Abshir Hasan Hashi, a former employee of the presidential transportation and the first lady’s chauffeur.
|
Read full text...
|
Special Report |
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. |
Read full text.
|
|
Opinions
|
By Saeed Osman, London, UK
Today the dictator Rayale has been called by Miles Zenawi to finish off whatever remains about Somaliland and our beloved country. We all remember annexing Sool was the first step of his grand ambition to merge Somaliland with the Somalia. The meeting between Rayaale and Miles top agenda will be to hand over the power to the Col Abdillahi Yusuf whether we like it or not full stop. At times like this, one would expect a so-called democratic elected government to adhere the nation constitution, but that is not on in the Rayaale dictionary. On the other hand, we don’t see any questions from our side as Somali Landers as to why the Rayaale and his beloved Finance Minster are going to Ethiopia at all, no body seem to be bothered about this trip to which all Somaliland people agree that the trip is to finalize the deal. In these new realities
|
|
Haatuf, The Government of Somaliland and the Legislature...
By Ahmed Kheyre, London, UK
Sir,
Now that the matter between Haatuf Media Group and the Government of Somaliland has resumed its normal process through the proper channels of the judiciary system. I feel that this appropriate moment to make a few comments on the subject.
I believe that both sides must share the blame. In fact there is a enough blame to spread around the political typography of Somaliland.
There would be those who would immediately point out that the government's high-handed manner in which the Haatuf editor and other staff members were placed under arrest places all the blame on its shoulders. But, I beg to differ. |
|
A Call To Overseas Somalilanders
By Abdisalam Mohamed
A few days ago, I read an article written by David Ignatius in the Washington Post. The article was entitled, "Will the US Leave Iraqi Allies Behind Like it Did in Vietnam", and it was comparing the American military involvements in the two countries, warning the US not to repeat some of the disgraceful policies that it carried out when it realized that it lost the war. Part of the analysis of those policies inspired me to write this article. It was the part that dealt with the aftermath of its chaotic pull out. The author writes, "The brutal policies of the North Vietnamese [after the pull out] created waves of refugees who became known as "boat people".
|
|
By Jamal Madar
Jan 6, 2006 — Meles Zenawi may be celebrating in his palace in Addis Ababa for his lightning victory over the poorly armed and ill-trained forces of Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) but his victory may soon prove to be hollow.
Zenawi’s US backed war aim was essentially two folds: First, to disrupt or destroy the ruling apparatus of the UIC and, depending on the success of combat operations, decapitate the whole UIC regime. Second, to replace the UIC with the Somali Transitional Federal Government (TFG) headed by Abdillahi Yusuf, which is more receptively attuned to the Ethio-US interests and provide protection to it until such time when it has reasonably attained the capability to defend itself from Islamists.
|
Read full text... |
By Rashid Nur, Herndon, VA - USA
The Somaliland government imprisoned Mr. Yusuf Abdi Gabobe, the managing editor of the daily newspaper Haatuf in Hargeisa and Mr. Ali Abdi Dini, the Editor of the same newspaper and Mr. Hussein Kh. Abdillahi, staff at Haatuf newspaper. This is not the first time Somaliland government have used despicable tactics to subject harassment, intimidation, and jail time against the media for exercising their right to publish newspapers. This is not a matter of whether Haatuf’s work is factual or whether Haatuf made a mistake; needless to say there are laws that provide recourse to the government and to the citizens at large against the media, when they believe to have a legitimate grievances against media.
|
Read full text... |
By Ahmed Abdi
Democracy means people power. It is narrowly defined where the citizens freely elect their leaders. To have that status there are conditions to be met.
There must be institutions that independently safeguard rule of law. In this regard the segregation of law making parliament, executive branch and judiciary is a must. Does that exist in Somaliland?
|
Read full text... |
By Mowliid Magare, Seattle
Part 1
Ever since the UIC won control of Mogadishu over the cohort of warlords, who reined peace in Mogadishu for the last 16years, it has become hard for ordinary Southern Somali to see where the path to Democracy and away from the precipice lies. Yet there can be no doubt the incessant endeavors of UIC to restore peace and security needed to all the territories under their control, though this peace did not come without a cost, which spawned controversy – that sees it unfertile in the pastures of a liberal Somali culture known for its personal freedom.
|
|
By Mohamud Tani — Ottawa, Canada
It is a high time that the KULMIYE party sheds it's heinous image. What has been projecting from the extreme wing of the KULMIYE party from its inception can be termed as nothing but politics of hate, anger, desperation, treachery, bigotry and fascism. -Some flew over the Cuckoo nest to Mogadishu, saying "If we can not win let everybody in Somaliland be the loser"
|
|
By Noah Arre
According to an article published in the Gulf News of November 2006, in the United Arab Emirates, over fourteen thousand Somalis landed in Yemen from January to November 2006 alone but were immediately apprehended for illegal infiltration and breach of the national laws of that country. Of course, that number does not include the thousands more who died in the countless number of boats that capsized at the high tides of the Red Sea and who never made to safety!
|
|
| FEATURES & COMMENTARY |
By Jonathan Katzenellenbogen
12 January 2007
THE Ethiopian-led and US-backed overthrow of the Union of Islamic Courts in Somalia has been swift, but the question of Somalia’s future is still wide open. The answer is important to the peace and security of much of east Africa, Washington’s war on terror and the millions of Somalis in need of humanitarian assistance. In the absence of a political deal between the transitional government, the more moderate elements in the Union of Islamic Courts and clans, the country stands to return to warlordism. And even if there is a deal, the government could suffer a radical Islamic insurgency. Al- Qaeda has called for an Iraq type insurgency to dislodge the Ethiopian “crusaders” from Somalia.
|
Read full text... |
The folly of U.S. meddling in the Horn of Africa.
By Alex P. Kellogg
01.12.07
The dissolution of Somalia into further violence thanks to Ethiopia's invasion of it in the last few weeks is a horrific development for East Africa. It's devastating to the perception of the United States abroad as well. Ethiopia said that, beyond a concern for the integrity of its borders, tacit U.S. support led it to invade Somalia. That support became even more explicit when the United States tried to capture Fazul Mohammed and two other alleged high level al-Qaeda terrorists Monday with military strikes in southern Somalia.
|
|
By J. Peter Pham
As of this week, the United States is directly engaged in Somalia, Ethiopian forces are successfully advancing and Al-Qaeda and Islamic Courts Union (ICU) fighters have been effectively cornered—and yet Somalia still runs a risk of going the way of that most commemorated Black Hawk: down.
The United States and other parties interested in the fate of geopolitically important Somalia must heed the historical and ethno-sociological realities of the country and other lessons of the recent past. In Afghanistan, for example, the cupidity of competing warlords, coupled with the ineffectiveness of the Hamid Karzai government, have led to renewed popularity for the ousted Taliban
|
|
By JOHN MBARIA
Mogadishu, Somalia, January 8, 2007 – Even with the recent military success, reports indicate that the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and its major backer – Ethiopia — will struggle to resolve the many multidimensional conflicts facing Somalia.
By defeating and running the Islamists out of key towns, Ethiopia has secured its strategic interests. However, the powers that be in Addis Ababa are also apparently aware of their inability to handle the emerging post-war scenario in Somalia and have called for the speedy deployment of a peacekeeping force.
|
|
A US air force AC-130 gunship like the one reported to have attacked sites in Somalia. Photograph: US air force/EPA |
1/12/2007 A US air strike in Somalia missed its main target of three top al Qaeda suspects but killed up to 10 of their allies, a senior American official said yesterday.
A US warplane on Monday attacked a village in southern Somalia in an attempt to destroy an al Qaeda cell accused of bombing two US embassies and an Israeli-owned hotel in East Africa.
|
|
By Khaled Mahmoud
Cairo, January 10, 2007 – Djibouti has described the current situation in Somalia as extremely complicated. In an interview with Asharq Al Awsat, Djibouti’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mahamoud Ali Youssouf, expressed his concern and pessimism over the repercussions in terms of security and stability in the Horn of Africa.
Youssouf refuted claims that the American troops present in Djibouti since September 11, 2001, had participated in the military operations that were recently carried out by the Ethiopian forces, in collaboration with Somalia’s interim government led by Somali President Abdillahi Yusuf, during their invasion of Somalia in an attempt to defeat the Islamic Courts’ forces.
|
Read full text... |
|
|
ANALYSIS
By Gitau Warigi
Nairobi, January 7, 2007 – Despite the negative international image it acquired of being extremist, the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) was not entirely a bag of rotten apples. Indeed there were high-ranking moderates within.
One of them was the movement's chairman Sheikh Sharif Ahmed. Another was Sheikh Noor Barud, a blind cleric who initially was the courts' ideologue before his voice and that of fellow moderates got increasingly drowned out by hardliners like Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys.
|
Read full text...
|
|
