Islamic fighters control southern Somalia

AP via CNN, 14 June 2006

U.S. accuses group of harboring al Qaeda

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP)—Fighters bent on bringing Islamic rule to all of Somalia took the strategic town of Jowhar on Wednesday, after secular rivals fled their last stronghold in the southern part of the nation, witnesses said.

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, the witnesses said.

The Islamic Courts Union and its allies now control all of southern Somalia, except Baidoa, the town where the transitional government sits. Northeastern Somalia is run by an autonomous government allied to President Abdullahi Yusuf's administration and central Somalia, where some warlords have fled, is controlled by several groups.

Hours after the Islamic fighters entered Jowhar, most of the leaders of the secular militias fled. The Islamic militia also took Jowhar's airport, about six miles (10 kilometers) from downtown Jowhar

Residents were fleeing for fear of additional fighting.

There were no immediate reports of casualties.

U.S. officials have acknowledged backing the warlord-led Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counterterrorism against the Islamic group, which the U.S. has accused of harboring three al Qaeda leaders indicted in the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania.

A leader of the warlord alliance, Abdi Hassan Awale, told The Associated Press that he had resigned from the alliance after his clan elders pressured him.

Clan elders in Jowhar had urged the warlords to leave to avoid a confrontation, two Somali officials said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. Witnesses told The Associated Press that the warlords did not 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 along pickups mounted with machine guns and scores of militiamen and are now in El Buur, 200 miles (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. 15 years without effective central government

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 United Nations and including warlords who once fought each other, has failed to assert control outside its base in Baidoa, 155 miles (250 kilometers) from Mogadishu.

The Islamic group's leaders portray themselves as free of links to the turmoil of the past and capable of bringing order and unity. The future of a country accustomed to moderate Islam is uncertain under rulers who have vowed to install an Islamic government.

After taking Mogadishu, the group sent a letter proclaiming it was not an enemy of the United States.

The U.S. administration has not publicly confirmed or denied backing the warlords, saying only that it supports those who fight terror. But U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, have confirmed cooperating with the warlords as part of the global war on terror.

Henry Crumpton, the State Department's counterterrorism coordinator, told the U.S. 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 Qaeda and foreign fighters,” Crumpton said.

With extremists accused of harboring terrorists in control in Mogadishu and sharp questions being asked about its policies in the region, 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 Horn of Africa 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 United States. But he 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.”

The Intergovernmental Authority on Development, known as IGAD, mediated talks in Kenya that led two years ago to the formation of the transitional government. Tuesday, IGAD imposed an immediate travel ban and bank account freeze on nine secular warlords and threatened measures against the Islamic militiamen. IGAD members argued only the transitional government, which is trying to negotiate with the Islamic group, should control fighters.

Like Gedi, Kenya's Foreign Affairs Minister Raphael Tuju did not name the United States in his remarks at the IGAD meeting, but said that the country that had backed the warlords fueled conflict in the Somali capital.

Kenya's Tuju said it was the warlords who had “terrorized” the Somali capital for 15 years, and call the Islamic group's takeover of Mogadishu a “popular uprising.”