News

U.S. Assistant Secretary for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer (L) listens during a meeting at the Arab League in Cairo April 3, 2007. The Arab League on Tuesday said “extremists” should have no role in national reconciliation in Somalia where close to 400 civilians have been killed in recent fighting between insurgents and the Ethiopian-backed government. REUTERS/Nasser Nuri (EGYPT)

MOGADISHU, Somalia – The dominant clan in Somalia’s capital held talks with the Ethiopian military in a bid to prevent further bloodshed in Mogadishu, which remained calm for a second day Tuesday after fighting left nearly 400 people dead.

U.S., European, Arab and African diplomats also were meeting in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, to try and get the warring parties to end the fighting, the worst seen in the capital in 15 years.

The International Contact Group on Somalia conference in Cairo will discuss how the world can help the transitional government restore law and order, Foreign Minister Ismael Hurreh said.

“The most important issue on the table is the security in the country,” he told The Associated Press by telephone from the Egyptian capital.

Even by Somalia’s bloody standards, the violence has been intense. Rotting corpses litter the tiny, dusty alleyways and back streets in the south of the capital where much of the fighting took place.

“We are discussing the cease-fire and how to strengthen it,” Ahmed Diriye, spokesman for the influential Hawiye clan that dominates the ruined coastal capital, said of the talks with Ethiopian military leaders.

Some 565 people have been wounded during four days of heavy fighting. Ethiopian troops used tanks and attack helicopters in an offensive to crush insurgents linked to an Islamic group driven from power in December.

At least 36 Ethiopian soldiers were killed and 48 wounded in the fighting, said a Somali official on condition of anonymity because it related to security matters. The official saw them being taken off two military helicopters at Dolow airport, 317 miles west of Mogadishu and on the border with Ethiopia.

The fighting has hindered aid agencies from responding adequately, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Somalia said.

“Trapped by the fighting, many wounded are unable to access medical facilities and lie unattended in the streets,” the statement said.

Somalis poured out of the city on foot, using donkey carts, cars and trucks, joining the exodus of 47,000 people mainly women and children who have sought safety in the last 10 days, according to the U.N. refugee agency. Almost 100,000 people have fled the violence since February.

The insurgents are linked to the Council of Islamic Courts, which was driven from power in December by Somali and Ethiopian soldiers, accompanied by U.S. special forces. The U.S. has accused the courts of having ties to al-Qaida.

The militants have long rejected any secular government and have sworn to fight until Somalia becomes an Islamic emirate.

The country has been mired in chaos since 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned against each other. A national government was established in 2004, but has failed to assert any real control.

Eritrea tells Uganda to leave Somalia

ASMARA (AFP) – Eritrea’s president urged his Ugandan counterpart to pull out his peacekeeping troops from Somalia, warning that the war-torn country was a trap, a statement said Tuesday after talks between the two in Eritrea.

Relatives take a wounded Somali man on stretcher to Medina Hospital in Mogadishu Somalia, Sunday, April, 1, 2007. Dozens of people have been killed since Thursday and more than 220 wounded, most of them civilians with bullet, grenade and other war wounds, the International Committee of the Red Cross (AP Photo/Mohamed Sheikh Nor)

An offensive by Eritrean arch foe Ethiopia in Mogadishu last week sparked some of the worst fighting in Somalia’s history, during which a first Ugandan African Union peacekeeper was killed.

Some 1,500 Ugandan peacekeepers deployed in Mogadishu last month.

Eritrea on Tuesday repeated the country’s objection to the deployment of African Union peacekeepers in Somalia to help bolster the Ethiopia-backed Somali interim government.

“The so-called deployment of a peacekeeping mission to Somalia is essentially designed to mislead forces that are not very familiar with the real situation there and make them fall into a trap,” said a statement from the information ministry after a summit Monday between Eritrean President Issaias Afeworki and his Ugandan counterpart Yoweri Museveni.

“Uganda needs to take corrective measures regarding the hasty step it took in sending troops to Somalia,” Issaias said, according to the statement published on the ministry’s website.

Eritrea said the situation in Somalia was “escalating from bad to worse”.

Ugandan officials were not immediately available for comment on the meeting.

Eritrea has warned that the continued presence of Ethiopian troops, who helped the Somali government oust an Islamist movement three months ago, would worsen the situation in the country.

Although Ethiopia says it is withdrawing from Somalia, extra Ethiopian troops arrived in Mogadishu on Monday to help battle Islamist insurgents and clan leaders.

Addis Ababa has justified its intervention, saying the Islamists, some of whom are accused of Al-Qaeda links, posed a threat after they declared a holy war against Ethiopia.

Analysts have expressed fears that Ethiopia and Eritrea, still at odds over their unresolved 1998-2000 border conflict, may fight a proxy war in Somalia.

Pirates hijack ship off Somali coast

Somali pirates armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades have hijacked a cargo ship as it was preparing to dock at Mogadishu port, officials said Tuesday, according to Anita Powell of the Associated Press.

The vessel, the MV Nimatullah, was delivering nearly 900 tons of cargo when about 10 pirates in a speedboat overpowered the 14-member crew early Monday, said Andrew Mwangura, head of the Kenyan chapter of the Seafarers Assistance Program.

“The crew told us by telephone that they had been hijacked by Somali pirates,” said Hussein Ali Jillow, a Somali businessman who hired the cargo ship. “The crew did not say anything about their conditions.”

No ransom has been demanded, Mwangura added.

In February, Somali pirates seized a U.N. chartered vessel that had just delivered food aid in northeastern Somalia. The 12 crew still remain hostage.

The 1,860 mile-coast of Somalia, which has had no effective government since warlords ousted a dictatorship in 1991 and then turned on each other, has emerged as one of the most dangerous areas for ships.

Somali pirates are trained fighters, often dressed in military fatigues, using speedboats equipped with satellite phones and Global Positioning System equipment. They are typically armed with automatic weapons, anti-tank rocket launchers and various types of grenades, according to the U.N. Monitoring Group on Somalia.

In 2005, two ships carrying U.N. World Food Program aid were overwhelmed by pirates. The number of overall reported at-sea hijackings that year was 35, compared with two in 2004, according to the International Maritime Bureau.