Islamists drive secular militia from Somalia town
June 14, 2006 (MOGADISHU, Somalia) — Islamic fighters drove secular militias out of a strategic town in southern Somalia following a brief fire fight early Wednesday, witnesses said.
Just hours earlier, the leaders of the secular militias fled Jowhar, which had been their last remaining stronghold in southern Somalia.
There were no immediate reports of casualties, but residents were fleeing for fear of additional fighting for the town 90 kilometers from Mogadishu, the country’s capital which the Islamic fighters seized last week.
The Islamic militiamen attacked the town from three directions and the remaining forces of the secular warlords, who the Islamic fighters routed out of the capital, Mogadishu, last week, fled east, witnesses said.
The Islamic Courts Union has been building up troops around Jowhar in recent days to finish off their rivals, the warlord-led Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counterterrorism.
Clan elders in Jowhar had urged the warlords to leave to avoid a confrontation, two Somali officials said. Witnesses told The Associated Press that the warlords didn’t want to be disarmed by the Islamic fighters and fought their way out.
Mohamed Jama, a militiaman loyal to Mohamed Qanyare Afrah, told The Associated Press that Afrah and another warlord, Botan Isse Allen, had left Jowhar Tuesday night, taking pickup trucks mounted with machine guns and scores of militiamen, and are now in El Bur, 330 kilometers northeast of Mogadishu.
Afrah and Allen are former members of Somalia’s transitional government. They were loyal to Mohammed Dheere, the alliance’s main leader, who was reportedly in Ethiopia trying to raise support for his forces.
Issa Ahmed, a member of the warlords’ alliance, said that he was still in Jowhar, his hometown, and that he will defend it if anybody attacks.
Somalia has been without an effective central government since 1991, when largely clan-based warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned on one another. An interim government, formed with the support of the U.N. and including warlords who once fought each other, has failed to assert control outside its base in Baidoa, 250 kilometers from Mogadishu.
After taking Mogadishu, the Islamic group sent a letter saying it wasn’t an enemy of the U.S.
Henry Crumpton, the U.S. State Department’s so-called counterterrorism coordinator, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Tuesday that his department didn’t anticipate the events in Somalia and has an “imperfect understanding” of the Islamic group.
“We expect them to work with the transitional government, and we also expect them to work with us to hand over al-Qaida and foreign fighters,” Crumpton said.
Crumpton said the U.S. government has three objectives in Somalia: to deny al-Qaida haven; to support the transitional government; and to provide humanitarian aid.
The U.S. is convening a meeting on Somalia in New York Thursday. Only one African country – Tanzania – was expected at the first meeting of the Somalia Contact Group. But U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said other countries may be added.
Washington’s alleged support for the warlords came in for veiled criticism Tuesday by Somali and Kenyan leaders, who said it undermined their efforts to rebuild the nation.
Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi, speaking at a meeting on Somalia of the seven-nation Intergovernmental Authority on Development, which works for political and economic stability in the region, did not name the U.S.
But Gedi appeared to refer to Washington when he said his “transitional federal government will not accept and will not support those who may seek to bypass the administration.”
(ST/AP)