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By Sahra Abdi
31 December 2006
KISMAYU, Somalia (Reuters) - Somali government forces backed by Ethiopian troops, tanks and jet fighters edged toward the southern port town of Kismayu on Sunday to attack retreating Islamists who have dug in for a last stand.
Mines laid by fighters of the Somalia Islamic Courts Council (SICC) across the routes to Kismayu have slowed the advance of the government forces. That has bought the Islamists time to prepare their defenses and rouse followers with vows of a holy war on the shores of the Indian Ocean.
"We will fight the Ethiopians, God willing, we will remove them from our land," said SICC Kismayu area head of security Ahmed Ali from the frontline just north of the town.
Hundreds of residents have fled in preparation for a showdown that has been building since the Islamists retreated 300 km (190 miles) south to Kismayu after abandoning the capital Mogadishu to advancing government forces on Thursday.
The intervention of Ethiopia has reversed the fortunes of the government and the hardline religious SICC, who just two weeks ago controlled the capital and appeared on the verge of routing a weak interim government stranded in a provincial town.
Now the government has control of Mogadishu and the Islamists -- without tanks or planes -- are on the run with their backs to the sea and Somalia's southern border with Kenya.
Kenya has reinforced its northern border and U.S. forces are also said to be in the region to prevent foreign militants aligned with the Islamists from escaping.
The Islamists are thought to have 3,000-4,000 fighters, including locals and foreign radicals, analysts say.
Ethiopia says it has 4,000 troops in Somalia, though many believe that number could be far higher. The Somali government has not given troop numbers, but is thought by experts to have several thousand.
Overnight, a missile smashed into a family home near one of the Ethiopian military's positions in northern Mogadishu. That attack heightened fears Islamist guerillas will emerge to strike back at pro-government forces.
MINES SLOW ADVANCE
Islamist leaders called their flight to Kismayu a tactical move to avoid civilian bloodshed in Mogadishu. But the Ethiopian and government troops appeared determined to squeeze them there as they march along routes from the north and northwest.
"They are approaching us. People have started fleeing," said Islamist fighter Abdulqadir Yusuf.
The Islamists, who have been offered an amnesty by the government if they surrender, say they are ready to negotiate with the U.N.-endorsed interim government, but that Ethiopian soldiers backing it must first leave.
A Somali government soldier said the attack would begin on Sunday night at the Islamists' northernmost frontline in Jilib, about 45 km (28 miles) north of Kismayu on the coast.
"The Ethiopians plan to shower the Islamist troops with artillery tonight until they run away. They then want to capture Jilib by tomorrow," the soldier told Reuters from the convoy. "We are now 30 km from Jilib."
Born out of sharia courts operating in Mogadishu, the Islamists threw U.S.-backed warlords out of the capital in June before going on to take a swathe of south Somalia.
They brought order to Mogadishu for the first time since 1991 when warlords ousted a dictator. But some of their hardline practices -- like closing cinemas and holding public executions -- angered some Somalis and fueled U.S. and Ethiopian accusations they were a dangerous Taliban-style movement.
Both Addis Ababa and Washington say the SICC is linked to al Qaeda, an accusation the movement says is trumped up to justify foreign intervention. Residents of Mogadishu have greeted the forces of the interim government and their Ethiopian backers with a mixture of jubilation, fear and protests.
President Abdullahi Yusuf and Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi face a monumental task to tame the city that U.S. forces left more than a decade ago after an ill-fated intervention captured in the Hollywood film "Black Hawk Down."
Analysts say it is hard to see how Yusuf and Gedi can establish authority and pacify Somalia without the military presence of Ethiopia, which has vowed to exit as soon as it can.
(Additional reporting by Bryson Hull, Guled Mohamed and Sahal Abdulle in Mogadishu)
