Saturday, February 28, 2009

Somalia "saddened" by AU peacekeepers' shelling of Mogadishu residential areas

The Somali government Friday said it was saddened by the shelling of residential areas by African Union peacekeepers in Mogadishu which it said led to the death and injury of people and the further displacement of new returnees, according to local media reports.
The statement comes after two days of intense fighting between fighters of the insurgent group of Hezbul Islam, and peacekeepers from the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) backing Somali government forces.

"We are saddened that AMISOM have bombed people who have now started to return to their homes and have restarted to flee again. We hope that would stop," Suleman Olad Roble, the Minister for Youth and Sports in the newly formed government of national unity, was quoted by Shebelle radio in Mogadishu as saying.

Roble also said in a news conference in Mogadishu that the peacekeepers have responsibility to protect the civilians instead of harming them.

The exchange of heavy artillery fire in residential areas early this week caused the death of nearly fifty people mostly civilians and the injury of almost a hundred others.

This is an unprecedented statement from the Somali government which relies mainly on the peacekeepers for its protection against armed insurgent groups opposed to its existence.

Roble said it was important that the Somali people reconcile among themselves so that "the African Union peacekeepers can go home."

The presence of the nearly 34,00 peacekeepers from Uganda and Burundi has been a thorny issue for the new Somali government as influential local clerics have demanded that the government ask the troops to leave the country within 120 days.

Local clan elders have also asked the government to do the same while most opposition groups claimed one of their main reasons for continuing to fight is the presence of foreign forces in Somalia.

Officials of the new Somali government have been repeatedly saying that there would be no need for further foreign forces and those currently present would leave the country if all violence stopped and reconciliation among armed Somali factions has been realized.

Source: Xinhua

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