Hardline Islamist leader tells Kenya not to sent its troops to Somalia
20/11/2008 17:41
Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys, radical Islamist leader of a Somali opposition
faction, has warned Kenya against sending its troops to Somalia to join the
African Union peacekeepers who are already in Mogadishu, local media reports
said today.
Aweys told local Shabelle radio in Mogadishu that Kenya "would
regret" if it went ahead with its promise this week that it would send a
battalion of forces to join the peacekeepers of the African Union mission in
Somalia.
At this week's meeting of the foreign ministers of the regional
grouping, the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development, Ethiopian Foreign
Minister Seyuom Mesfin stated that Kenya pledged to send a battalion of its
soldiers to be part of the UN- authorized African Union peacekeeping forces in
Somalia.
"Ethiopia is desperately looking for a way out of Somalia so we warn
Kenya not to send its forces to our country," Aweys said. "We will fight them
like we fought the Ethiopians."
Aweys is the leader of the breakaway faction
of the opposition coalition known as the Alliance for the Reliberation of
Somalia ( ARS). The other faction of the ARS, led by moderate Islamist leader,
Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed, has signed a series of peace and power-sharing deals
with the Somali transitional government.
More than 3,000 peacekeepers from
Ugandan and Burundi are so far deployed in Somalia, part of the 8,000-strong
peacekeeping mission initially authorized by the UN Security Council early in
2007.
Other African countries which have pledged to contribute troops have
not so far sent their share of the peacekeepers to Somalia, citing security and
logistical considerations.
Most of the Somali Islamist insurgent groups, who
now control much of the south and center of the war-torn country, are opposed to
the deployment of foreign forces on Somali soil and have rejected a ceasefire
agreement with the government.
The Somali government, which now only controls
Mogadishu and the southern town of Baidoa, the seat of the Somali parliament,
has been beset by two-year insurgency and crippling recurring political
infighting.
Xinhua
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