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By MOHAMED SHEIKH NOR, Associated Press Writer
03 January 2007
MOGADISHU, Somalia - Somalia's prime minister said Tuesday that rival Islamic fighters have been scattered and he does not expect any more major fighting. His Ethiopian backer said he would withdraw his troops within weeks.
With attention shifting to suspected al-Qaida fighters believed to be sheltered by the hard-line group, a security official in neighboring Kenya said 10 foreigners who had fought with Somalia's Islamic movement had been captured there and told interrogators the militia had been doomed by internal rifts.
Government forces, backed by Ethiopian troops, were pursuing the remnants of the Islamic militia that until two weeks ago controlled most of southern Somalia and threatened to drive out the internationally backed government.
Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi said some of the militiamen offered to surrender Tuesday.
"We asked our troops to collect them and bring them back home," he said, refusing to provide any details about how many fighters were involved or where they were.
The rest of the "Islamists are scattered in the bush," he said. "Maybe small fights can take place, but we are trying to destroy them."
Meanwhile, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told parliament that his troops were not peacekeepers and it would be too costly to keep them in Somalia for much longer, calling on the international community to quickly send in troops to avoid a vacuum.
Withdrawing will not mean abandoning "the Somali government and its people's ongoing effort to stabilize peace in the country," Zenawi said. "We will stay in Somalia for a few weeks, maybe for two weeks."
In the Kenyan port of Mombasa, Somalia's President Abdullahi Yusuf met with his Kenyan counterpart, Mwai Kibaki. Kibaki said Kenya would not be a refuge for people seeking to destabilize governments in the region — clearly referring to Islamic fighters who may be sought for terrorism and other crimes. He noted that Kenya had already strengthened patrols along the border with Somalia, a statement from the presidential press service said.
The U.N.'s humanitarian agency said about 4,000 Somalis were reported to be in the Dhobley area along the border, waiting to cross into Kenya. The statement released in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, did not give any other details.
Sea routes from southern Somalia were being patrolled by the U.S. Navy to avoid Islamic fighters from fleeing by sea.
Ethiopia's intervention in late December brought a stunning turnaround for Somalia's government. Just weeks ago the government could barely control one town — its base of Baidoa — while the Council of Islamic Courts was solidifying its power in the capital and other key towns.
The Islamic movement's casualties run into the thousands, Ethiopia said.
However, many in Somalia remain wary of Ethiopia's presence in the war. The largely Christian Ethiopia has fought two wars with mostly Muslim Somalia, the last in 1977.
Diplomats from the region were working to arrange the speedy deployment of African peacekeepers to help the interim government establish its authority in Somalia, which has known only anarchy for 15 years. Uganda said it has 1,000 peacekeepers ready to deploy in a few days. Nigeria has also promised troops, Somali government spokesman Abdirahman Dinari said.
As the last remaining stronghold of the Islamic group — the port of Kismayo — was overrun by government troops backed by Ethiopian tanks and MiG fighter jets, attention turned to suspected al-Qaida fighters believed to be sheltered by the hard-line group, including three suspects wanted by the United States in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa.
Somalia's interim government and its Ethiopian allies have long accused Islamic militias of harboring al-Qaida figures, and foreign Islamic fighters — including Pakistanis, Arabs and Chechens — are believed to have come to Somalia to fight on behalf of the Islamic movement in recent months.
Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and his top deputy Ayman al-Zawahri have said they see Somalia as a battleground in their global war on the West.
Islamic movement leaders deny having any links to al-Qaida.
Anthony Kibuchi, the Kenyan provincial police commander on the border, said 10 foreigners were arrested Saturday when they tried to cross into Kenya.
On Tuesday, a security official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the foreigners were fighters with Somalia's Council of Islamic Courts and told interrogators that the militia collapsed because of internal disagreements.
The official, who cannot be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the journalists, said one of the foreigners arrested was identified as Bashir Ali Makhtar, a member of Ethiopian rebel group Ogaden National Liberation Front.
Four of the people arrested are Kenyan Somalis recruited into the Islamic militia and three of them Eritreans, including an army colonel, the official said in the northeastern town of Garissa. He did not give details about the other two fighters.
Defense Minister Col. Barre "Hirale" Aden Shire, said in Kismayo that young men who fought with the Islamic militants are "pardoned" and could join Somalia's national army.
"You have heard a lot of times that the transitional government is weak," Shire told thousands of Kismayo residents gathered at Freedom Park in the town's center. "But I will confirm (to) you that the national army are in control of all regions in the country — east, center and south."
A three-day period began Tuesday for Somalis to voluntarily surrender their arms to government-designated points. Ethiopian troops reported that at one such point in the capital, no one had handed in any weapons in the morning.
Abdirahman Mudey, a spokesman of the Council of Islamic Courts, insisted that any power the government wielded was thanks to its Ethiopian backers. He predicted a return of the chaotic and violent warlord era that Mogadishu knew before his Islamic movement's brief rule.
"Somalia is under the occupation of the Ethiopians," Mudey told The Associated Press by phone, declining to give his whereabouts.
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Associated Press writers Elizabeth A. Kennedy, Mohamed Olad Hassan, Salad Duhul and Les Neuhaus in Mogadishu; Nasteex Dahir Farah in Kismayo; and David Ochomi in Garissa, Kenya, contributed to this report.