Islamic insurgents seize 8th Somali town
April 3rd, 2008 | EthioPolitics.com |Associated Press
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) - Islamic insurgents seized an eighth town in Somalia in recent months, killing more than a dozen people Thursday, a resident and a spokesman for the militia said.
The attack on Adado, a town in the central Somali region of Galgudud, killed at least 15 people and wounded 16 others, witness Aden Haji Gedi said.
«Our fighters have taken the town and they have seized 11 trucks mounted with weapons and burned several others,» said Sheik Muqtar Robow, spokesman for al-Shabab.
Al-Shabab, or «the youth,» is the military wing of the Council of Islamic Courts movement. The U.S. State Department considers al-Shabab a terrorist organization. The Council of Islamic Courts was driven out in December 2006 by Somalia’s weak Western-backed government and its Ethiopian allies.
Gedi, a resident of Adado, spoke to The Associated Press by VHF radio because telecommunications in the area had been cut since early Thursday.
«The fighting started at 6:00 a.m. local time (0300 GMT) near checkpoints outside the town and then it spread into the town,» he said. His account was independently confirmed by radio with two other residents.
The fighters were still present Thursday afternoon.
Adado is 660 kilometers (410 miles) north of the capital.
On Wednesday evening, hundreds of Islamic insurgents armed with rocket-propelled grenades and heavy machine-guns briefly seized control of a central Somali town after government soldiers abandoned their post, residents said.
«The government soldiers left as soon as they heard Islamists are on their way,» said Mohamed Elmi Nor, a resident of Jalalaqsi town, 165 kilometers (100 miles) north of the capital.
The fighters entered the town in 10 pickups on Wednesday night, some covering their faces with red turbans, he said by telephone. They seized a police truck and left without shooting anyone.
Elsewhere, a woman and two bodyguards of a government official were killed and eight others wounded when Islamists attacked Abdifatah Mohamed Gesey, the governor of Bay region in southwestern Somalia. Gesey was on an official visit in Qansah Dhere town, some 330 kilometers (205 miles) from the capital,when the attack occurred.
Gesey said, «Islamists … wanted to kill me but my guard gallantly succeeded in repelling them.
Besides hit-and-run attacks on outlying towns in which they usually attack soldiers, free prisoners and voluntarily withdraw, the fighters launch near-daily attacks on government and Ethiopian forces in the capital. They are linked to the Council of Islamic Courts.
In an unrelated incident, the U.N. envoy to Somalia says his organization has been in contact with gunmen believed to have kidnapped a Briton and a Kenyan doing contract work for the United Nations in southern Somalia on Tuesday.
«There are contacts to see how to free these people,» said Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the U.N. envoy to Somalia, speaking to journalists in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi. He said the U.N. will not pay a ransom and are not discussing a ransom with the suspected kidnappers. He declined to give any other details.
Lawless Somalia has not had a functioning government since 1991, when warlords overthrew President Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned their clan-based militias on each other. The impoverished country is awash with weapons and attacks on humanitarian workers are increasing.
On Wednesday, Medecins Sans Frontieres announced the closure of a clinic in the southern city of Kismayo where aid workers had performed over 400 surgeries and conducted 1,200 emergency consultations. Work there had been suspended after the deaths of three staff members of the aid group also known as Doctors Without Borders.
Associated Press writers Salad Duhul in Mogadishu, and Tom Maliti in Nairobi, Kenya contributed to this report.