Ethiopia’s military support to Somali is not open-ended – Zenawi
August 27, 2008 (ADDIS ABABA) — Ethiopia’s military commitment to Somalia is not open-ended, and it has to balance its responsibilities in Mogadishu with domestic political priorities, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said in an interview published Thursday.
Speaking to the Financial Times, Meles said Ethiopia was “not joined at the hip” with Somalia, and added that a stronger and more effective Somali government was “not necessarily a precondition for our withdrawal”.
The Ethiopian prime minister insisted, however, that Ethiopia would do all it could to help stabilise Somalia’s interim government.
“Our obligation towards peace in Somalia is only one aspect,” Meles said.
“There are also requirements of our own, including financial requirements. The operation has been extremely expensive so we will have to balance the domestic pressures on the one hand and pressures in Somalia on the other and try to come up with a balanced solution.”
Ethiopia sent troops into neighbouring Somalia in late 2006 after a request from the beleaguered transitional government in Mogadishu, and ousted an Islamist militia which controlled large parts of the Horn of Africa country.
The Islamists, however, have since reverted to guerilla tactics and have been targeting Somali government forces, Ethiopian soldiers and African Union peacekeepers almost daily.
Civilians have borne the brunt of the fighting. According to international aid organisations and rights groups, at least 6,000 have died over the past year alone.
Asked by the FT where Ethiopia’s plans to stabilise Somalia quickly had gone wrong, Meles blamed the international community: “We didn’t anticipate the international community would be happy riding the Ethiopian horse and flogging it at the same time.”
“We had hoped and expected … that the international community would recognise that this was a unique opportunity for the stabilisation of Somalia and capitalise on it.”
(AFP)