Mogadishu falls to Somali government troops

[cali]

By Guled Mohamed

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Triumphant Somali government forces marched into Mogadishu on Thursday after Islamist rivals abandoned the war-scarred city they held for six months before an Ethiopian-backed advance.

The flight of the Islamists was a dramatic turn-around in the volatile Horn of Africa nation after they took Mogadishu in June and spread across the south imposing sharia rule.

Terrified of yet more violence in a city that has become a byword for chaos, some Mogadishu residents greeted the arriving government troops, while others hid.


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"People are cheering as they wave flowers to the troops," said resident Abdikadar Abdulle, adding scores of government military vehicles had passed the Somalia National University west of the city center.

<snip>

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2006-12-28T134412Z_01_L28593467_RTRUKOC_0_US-SOMALIA-CONFLICT-1.xml&WTmodLoc=IntNewsHome_C1_%5BFeed%5D-6

[dave_p]

1. This won't end happily

The so-called "government" was a joke from day 1 (the US had pretty much finished the warlords' work of making the country ungovernable in 1993), and Ethiopia will have to pull out one day, leaving the UIC as not only the people who'd previously restored some semblance of order but also those who's resisted foreign invasion. It's now become a mini-Iraq. The UIC weren't the Taliban, and the US should have struck a deal with them when it had the chance. Some things are best kept out in the open where you can keep an eye on them.

[MidwestTransplant]

2. I bet the "flight" of the militants was into the population...

They have learned much from Iraq.

[maxsolomon]

4. i think the teenagers who comprised their forces did.

getting mowed down by helicopter gunships sobered them up. a little different than enforcing sharia law around the neighborhood.

whether an insurgency starts now is the crux of the matter - supposedly the clan leaders & warlords who lent the islamists their arsenal of armed pickup trucks have withdrawn the loan.

ethiopia should say every day how they're just about to get the fuck out. and then they should. good move letting the government occupy mogadishu.

[Mudoria]

3. Excellent news

Now if the Ethiopian's can help the UN supported government set up security measures for the people maybe some peace and stability can come to this poor nation.

[The Stranger]

7. Is the Bush Administration is supporting the government because the rebels are Muslim?

News reports indicate that the African Union and the Arab League have called for a cessation of violence -- as opposed to cheering on one side or the other.

[dave_p]

8. They're both Muslim

Both Somali parties are Muslim: the UIC's the more Islamist, though in a traditionalist rather than jihadist sense: in fact on taking power last June it emphasised its readiness for good relations with the west.

"Governnment" and "rebels" are misnomers here. The UIC has as much claim to be the lawful government as the ramshackle fiasco supported by the west - and unlike its opponents, it isn'r relying on foreign backing.

The tragedy is that this one's just going to run and run. "Mission accomplished", 1993-style.

[The Stranger]

10. Thanks for the information.

I wonder why some Muslims are "Islamist" while others are simply "Muslim" or "Islamic."

There is that whole language label issue again, raising its ugly head, and all of the connotations.

[maxsolomon]

11. "Islamist" implies looking to religion for the form of the gov't.

a la Iran's ruling mullahs.

a muslim could be a capitalist or communist.

[dave_p]

13. Some definitions

Islam is the faith.

Muslim just means anyone who believes in the faith: a Muslim can be secular (ie believing in government & law broadly independent of religion), like a secular Christian or Jew.

Islamist denotes those Muslims who advocate government & law founded on Islam. Most Islamists aren't jihadists, but see Islamic institutions as desirable in their own society. Jihadism's just one strain of radical Islamism, not representative of Islamist thought generally.

"Islamic" properly denotes the wider culture of the societies shaped by Islam, and is inappropriate as a religious or political label. Christians may make Islamic art without being irreligious, for instance, because of Islamic elements in their local culture.

[independentpiney]

14. Thanks for posting those

Alot of people don't understand that Islamist doesn't equate with jihadist or extreme fundamentalist.

[The Stranger]

16. Then why aren't "Christians" who advocate government, law based on Xianity called "Christianists"?

Why doesn't the media refer to the Fundamentalist Cabal of Christians that have infiltrated the U.S. government and the U.S. military "Christianists" or "Dominionists"?

[SemperEadem]

17. they should

since there seems to be a distinct difference and moderate christians don't like being painted with the wide, generalizing brush that fundamentals have insisted be used. Christianists or Christites is good for me.

[daleo]

18. There is a troubling religious angle, though it is being played down

"The majority of Ethiopian believers are Christian, with a large Muslim minority. There are still a few small Felasha Jewish communities in Ethiopia, as well. Animists are rare in Ethiopia today."

http://www.imperialethiopia.org/religions.htm

On edit:
Here is the CIA's breakdown:
Religions: Muslim 45%-50%, Ethiopian Orthodox 35%-40%, animist 12%, other 3%-8%

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/print/et.html

Here's what the CIA gives for Somalia:
Religions: Sunni Muslim

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/print/so.html

[RestoreGore]

5. GIVE THE PEOPLE WATER

Somalia and Ethiopia have been going through the worst drought they have ever seen. Children are dying for lack of water! It is also fact that Somalia's water comes from a source in Ethiopia, and WARLORDS have been controlling it with people dying for it. It is time to stop this BS fighting and give the people WATER. And I have no doubt that the fighting in the horn of Africa has the control of water as one of it's objectives in an area of the world where water wars are already happening. Of course, this is kept out of the media and the consciousness of the people as so much is, but we better start paying attention to it.

http://water-is-life.blogspot.com

[Igel]

6. Your subject line seems almost sick given recent events.

I assume you haven't been paying attention for the last couple of months.

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Killer_Somali_Floods_Worse_Than_Searing_Drought_999.html

It may not have solved the problem of potable water, but for a while they needed much less water. This will also help recharge the aquifers--not as much as an inch every week or two, but some surely sank in.

Drought, flood, war....

[haele]

9. Actually, floods don't help much.

If the ground is parched, even a few days worth of floodwater just runs over the ground to the lowest point (ocean, dry riverbed, basements) and evaporates within a week or so. Floodwater also tends to be full of bacteria and diseases from the dead vegetation/animals and waste products and is dangerous to use for drinking or irrigation - unless you're growing food that require a flood condition, like rice. Look at history - many of the persistently drought-wracked countries experience annual monsoons or floods - Bangladesh, southern India, Pakistan, Egypt, the Sahara basin areas...
What fills springs and aquifers is a long, sustained, steady rainfall; even a average of quarter to half an inch a day over a period of a month or two will make enough potable water to drink.
Subsistence agriculture requires at least 6 months a year worth of rainfall that has built up at least three years worth at that rate.
We in California know that just because a "drought" is declared over because of a good snowpack that year, it doesn't mean that you can go back to "normal" usage any time soon.
A smart farmer or land owner that relies on spring fed or run-off irrigation - and there are a few of them in the foothills or up near the mountains - will generally wait out expanding his or her water usage for a good two years before easing the farm off drought water usage.

With the current climate trends, it doesn't look as if Africa will be seeing any real drought relief within our lifetime. No matter how many annual floods they might have.

Haele

[RestoreGore]

19. SICK, YES

PEOPLE get sick from flood waters that then carry dysentery and cholera and other diseases, besides washing away EVERYTHING THEY HAVE and causing millions to flee their homes that they cannot return to. These people need a safe, clean, NORMAL supply of potable water. You sound sick for not even being able to comprehend the magnitude of this crisis.

[Extend a Hand]

12. it's all about the oil

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Project%20Censored/CensoredNews_1994.html

In a 1991 World Bank-coordinated study, intended to encourage private investment in the petroleum potential of eight African nations, the geologists put Somalia and Sudan at the top of the list of prospective commercial oil producers.

[alfredo]

15. Somalia has always been a hell hole. I'm surprised people are

willing to fight over it.

[bigworld]

20. Take notes

Well that certainly didn;t take long, did it?

Note to Ethipoia: Take a lesson from the US experience in Iraq. Do your liberating, hand control back to the native population, and get the hell out.