October 4, 2013 | Daily Monitoring Report.
Somali government postpones reconciliation conference for Jubba region
04 Oct – Source: Radio Mogadishu/SNTV/al Shahid – 104 words
Somali cabinet announced in its weekly meeting on Thursday postponement of the reconciliation conference for the clans in Juba region. This came after members of the Council of Ministers on Thursday discussed with regard to Juba reconciliation conference aimed at reconciliation between the people in Jubba region.
Reconciliation conference was scheduled for Juba in Mogadishu on Saturday, 5th of October as previously announced by the Somali government.
The Somali government has signed an agreement with the interim management of Juba headed Ahmed Madobe, in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa end of last August.
Key Headlines
- Somali government postpones reconciliation conference for Jubba region (Radio Mogadishu)
- AMISOM meets with the Somali Diaspora in Minneapolis (AMISOM)
- Minnesota Somali tells Congress more resources should go toward preventing terror recruiting (AP)
- Ethiopian Foreign Ministry says Nairobi attack will not cause change in policy (Walta Information Center)
- Nairobi secondary schools radicalising young Muslims to al Shabaab– National Intelligence Service report (Standard Media)
- Somalia Takes Teaching to the Extreme (IPS)
- Hundreds of Somalis feared dead in Italy boat sinking (Raxanreeb)
- Somalia’s uphill battle against al Shabaab (Al Jazeera)
- Somali Pirates Jailed by Seychelles Court (Marine Link)
PRESS RELEASE
AMISOM meets with the Somali Diaspora in Minneapolis
03 Oct – Source: AMISOM – 169 words
The Special Representative of the Chairperson of the African Union Commission (SRCC) for Somalia and Head of the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), Ambassador Mahamat Saleh Annadif will, over this weekend, be meeting with the Somali community in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.
The two-day consultative conference is part of AMISOM’s efforts at engaging the global Somali diaspora on developments in Somalia as well as facilitating their contributions to the peace, security, reconciliation and reconstruction of their country.
The consultations will begin with a Town Hall meeting in the evening of Saturday, 5th October during which Ambassador Annadif will provide insights into the mandate and activities of AMISOM while the second day, 6th October will feature workshops on concrete proposal of how the diaspora can contribute to women and youth employment, national reconciliation and institutional development in Somalia.
The meeting will be attended by over two hundred and fifty representatives of the Somali community in North America including Somali Imams, professionals, youths, women and representatives of the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS).
SOMALI MEDIA
Somali government postpones reconciliation conference for Jubba region
04 Oct – Source: Radio Mogadishu/SNTV/al Shahid – 104 words
Somali cabinet announced in its weekly meeting on Thursday postponement of the reconciliation conference for the clans in Juba region. This came after members of the Council of Ministers on Thursday discussed with regard to Juba reconciliation conference aimed at reconciliation between the people in Jubba region.
Reconciliation conference was scheduled for Juba in Mogadishu on Saturday, 5th of October as previously announced by the Somali government. The Somali government has signed an agreement with the interim management of Juba headed Ahmed Madobe, in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa end of last August.
Military tribunal sentences death penalty on two soldiers
04 Oct – Source: Raxanreeb – 108 words
Somali military tribunal has on Thursday sentenced two of the government military for deliberately shooting and killing two police officers on early September, RBC Radio reports.
The military tribunal spokesman Colonel Abdullahi who spoke with the local media after the court ruling said that the military tribunal sentenced the two serving soldiers to death.
“After court findings, and testimonials heard against two serving soldiers in the national army which started on 28th September, the supreme military tribunal of Somalia has convicted Yaxye Sheikh Abdulahi Ahmed 33 and Hussein Ali Ahmed Omar 37 for the killing two police officers in Mogadishu”. Colonel Kayse said.
Hundreds of Somalis feared dead in Italy boat sinking
04 Oct – Source: Raxanreeb – 75 words
Hundreds of Somalis are believed to have died after a boat carrying African migrants sank off the southern Italian island of Lampedusa, Somali diplomat says. According to initial figures released by Lampedusa island officials, more than 150 have been rescued but about 200 are missing.
Somali diplomat Mohamed Hussein who is serving at Somali embassy in Rome said they have received reports of hundreds of Somali immigrants involved in the tragic accident.
REGIONAL MEDIA
Ethiopian Foreign Ministry says Nairobi attack will not cause change in policy
04 Oct – Source: Walta Information Centre – 254 words
Spokesperson of Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Dina Mufti said on Thursday al Shabaab’s attack in Nairobi will not cause any change in Ethiopia’s approach to Somalia.
On the Ministry’s press conference for foreign press Dina said Ethiopia remains optimistic about consolidating peace and stability in Somalia. He added that the attack is a sign of al Shabaab’s weakness and its end. Nevertheless, Ethiopia does not underestimate any threats to its security, he stressed.
Regarding the situation inside Somalia, the spokesperson said though the international community’s response towards building the Somalia state has been slow, the recent meeting in Brussels was promising.
Asked about Ethiopia’s impatience with AMISOM’s progress in taking over from Ethiopia, Dina said Ethiopia has reduced its troop size in Somalia, but the remaining troops are very capable of doing their job of securing stability.
Nairobi secondary schools radicalising young Muslims to al Shabaab– National Intelligence Service report
04 Oct – Source: Standard Media – 355 words
A new report seems to have confirmed the worst fears of Nairobians that there are probably hundreds of terrorists being prepared for attacks across the nation.
Prominent secondary schools in Nairobi are radicalising young Muslims for jihad (holy war), a leaked report of the National Intelligence Service says. The report gives a list of the schools and further says they have been identified by al Shabaab as carriers of their mission.
The schools include Moi Forces, State House Girls’ and Limuru Girls’. Security agencies have identified some secondary schools in Nairobi as some of the schools where the militant organisation, al Shabaab, is in a recruitment spree.
Somalia’s uphill battle against al Shabaab
04 Oct – Source: Aljazeera – 2:47 min
The attack on Kenya’s Westgate shopping mall exposed the difficulty in fighting al Shabaab fighters. African Union troops are at the frontline of that battle in Somalia. But as Peter Greste reports the AU mission faces an uphill struggle to land a final blow against the armed group.
Observers decry post-Westgate backlash against Somalis in Kenya
03 Oct – Source: Sabahi Online – 987 words
Following reports of a string of unjustified arrests in Eastleigh, religious leaders and security analysts are urging Kenyan security forces to refrain from using the Westgate terrorist attack as an excuse to harass and intimidate innocent members of the local Somali and Muslim communities.
Rather, strengthening ties with those communities, fostering good will and working with them to gather intelligence is important, they say, to stabilise the nation and ward off future terror plots.
Yet during and after last month’s four-day siege by al Shabaab at the Westgate Mall in Nairobi, security forces reportedly have targeted Muslims and people of Somali origin for detention and questioning.
Mogadishu roads get much needed upgrades
03 Oct – Source: Sabahi Online – 539 words
Construction on a 23-kilometre paved road linking Mogadishu to Aden Adde International Airport is under way and drivers are starting to notice the improvements.
The project is in its second month and is expected to be complete by November, Benadir administration spokesman Mohamed Yusuf told Sabahi.
More than 380 people are working on building the road that joins the airport to Fiat Circle, and both Somali and Turkish engineers are supervising the project, he said.
INTERNATIONAL MEDIA
Minnesota Somali tells Congress more resources should go toward preventing terror recruiting
04 Oct – Source: AP – 158 words
A member of a Somali-American youth group in Minnesota said Thursday that the federal government should provide resources and assist local groups in the “uphill battle” to prevent young people from being recruited into terrorist organizations like al Shabaab.
Mohamed Farah, president of Ka Joog, testified during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing about the threat of al Shabaab, an al Qaeda-linked group based in Somalia that has claimed responsibility for the Sept. 21 mall attack in Kenya that killed at least 67 people.
“The number one issue of our community is the recruitment of our youth,” Farah said, according to his prepared testimony. He said al Shabaab has “targeted the disenfranchised, marginalized and socially estranged” youth.
Since 2007, at least 22 young men have left Minnesota to join al Shabaab, including two who left last summer. Ka Joog, which means “stay away,” is one group that has been working to provide positive alternatives for Somali youth through education, the arts and mentorship.
Somalia Takes Teaching to the Extreme
04 Oct – Source: IPS – 1017 words
Mukhatar Jama has been teaching at a secondary school in Mogadishu for the past decade. Religious education is part and parcel of the curriculum of all schools in Somalia, but he says most parents are unaware of exactly what their children are being taught – a radical form of Islam.
“The Islamic studies curriculum you hear is the pure Wahhabism, exported from Saudi Arabia, that teaches children that all those who are not Wahhabi are non-believers, including the children’s parents, and that it is ok to kill non-Muslims,” Jama told IPS.
While there are no statistics on how many schools there are in Somalia, most here follow the Saudi curriculum, which advocates and inculcates Wahhabism. This is a far more radical interpretation of Islam than the moderate Sufi school that older generation of Somalis follows.
Somali Pirates Jailed by Seychelles Court
04 Oct – Source: Marine Link – 100 words
11 pirates have been convicted in the Seychelles Supreme Court of committing acts of piracy and operating a pirate vessel between 7 – 11 May 2012. Their sentences ranged from 18 months to 16 years.
The pirates had been apprehended by the Royal Netherlands Navy frigate, HNLMS Van Amstel, on 11 May 2012, after the warship’s Lynx helicopter sighted a suspicious fishing dhow towing 2 skiffs, 400 nautical miles off the Somali coast.
When the warship’s boarding team approached the dhow, the Dutch Navy crew found 11 suspected pirates of Somali origin and a total of 17 hostages on board.
Go-2-School campaign aims to put one million children in the classroom
03 Oct – Source: Relief Web – 663 words
There was a rare atmosphere of excitement and celebration at the Presidential Palace in Mogadishu for the September launch of the Go-2-School campaign, which aims to send 1 million children and youth to school.
At the back of the hall, 10-year-old Ramla sat with other children from her school. She was inflating a huge white balloon with Adaa dugsiyada scrawled on it (meaning ‘go to school’ in Somali).
“I came here to take part, because education is everything,” Ramla said. “I want to learn, and then I can grow up and teach children and help my country.”
Somalia to mark ‘Turkey-Somalia Day’
03 Oct – Source: World Bulletin – 297 words
In an interview with Turkey’s Yeni Safak newspaper, the Prime Minister of Somalia Abdu Farah Shirdon described Turkey as an ‘irreplaceable friend’ to his country. ‘No one can take Turkey’s place,’ he said, adding ‘Turkey will always been an example nation for us.’
Pointing out the importance of the religious ties between the two countries, he also touched on Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to the country on 19 August 2011. He was the first non-African leader to visit Somalia in almost two decades.
‘On that day, the fate of Somalia changed,’ Shirdon said. ‘Before Erdogan came no one would come to visit us. We were completely isolated…after that day, the world changed its view of us. Other countries and leaders started showing interest in us.’ Continuing, he said, ‘we will declare 19 August 2011 as Turkey-Somalia Day.’
SOCIAL MEDIA
CULTURE / OPINION / EDITORIAL / ANALYSIS / BLOGS/ DISCUSSION BOARDS
“Twenty years later, little has changed. Attempts to build a central government inevitably collapse into fresh clan fighting, and Somali pirates have terrorized commercial ships. And concerns circulate that al Qaeda or other extremist groups may be using the lawless country to regroup and plot attacks.”
Fallout from Somalia still haunts US policy 20 years later
03 Oct – Source: Star and Stripes – 1898 Words
U.S. and U.N. officials had high hopes for the cauldron of famine, venom and easy death that Somalia had become by late 1992. First, a U.S.-led multinational military coalition went in to provide security and ensure food relief was getting to the starving. Early success in that United Nations humanitarian mission created a chance to take peacekeeping to a new level, to peacemaking and nation-building. A matrix could be crafted for future operations in other global hot spots.
There were early warnings of impending disaster. Smith Hempstone, the U.S. ambassador to neighboring Kenya at the time, noted in a diplomatic cable that was later leaked to the press that he had heard estimates he did not think unreasonable that it would “take 5 years to get Somalia not on its feet but just on its knees.’’
“I do not think Somalia is amenable to the quick fix so beloved of Americans,’’ he wrote. And he warned of violence to come against U.S. troops. “If you liked Beirut, you’ll love Mogadishu,’’ Hempstone warned in the cable that ended with this advice: “Leave them alone, in short, to work out their own destiny, brutal as it may be. … Think once, twice and three times before you embrace the Somali tarbaby.’’
“The road ahead is difficult, but with appropriate coordination based on the Somali Compact, the necessary “baby-steps” are beginning to provide hope.”
Somalia’s Economy: from Foreign Aid to Recovery through Capacity Building
03 Oct – Source: Eurasia Review – 1220 Words
Somalia’s unique history has made the country dependent on international aid, in particular since the collapse of Siad Barre’s government in 1991. The absence of an effective central government able to provide basic services and institutions necessary for economic progress has led the country and its population to rely totally on foreign aid for their basic needs.
Historically, international aid programs faced many challenges in terms of impact and expected results. Aid workers and groups confronted many obstacles on the ground in the delivery of effective humanitarian and development aid largely due to the ongoing conflict, lack of security, and fragmented and weak government full of corruption with little transparency. As a result, approximately 70 percent of all international assistance to Somalia is being delivered through the United Nations.
Return to Mogadishu: Former Army ranger revisits ‘Black Hawk Down’ 20 years later
03 Oct – Source: Yahoo News/ABC – 366 Words
Twenty years after retired U.S. Army Ranger Jeff Struecker led a squad of elite forces into Mogadishu on a failed rescue mission that inspired the film “Black Hawk Down,” he returned to the site of the battle in Somalia and said the memories of the 17-hour-long firefight came rushing back.
“When I went back there this spring and turned the corner into the Bakaara Market, immediately the emotions, the smells, the thoughts from Mogadishu came flooding back like I was just there yesterday,” Struecker said.
Struecker sat down with “Power Players” to discuss a new documentary, “Return to Mogadishu: Remembering Black Hawk Down,” that follows his trip back to Somalia. Struecker recalled that the mission — which took place 20 years ago today and began as an effort to seize key Somali military lieutenants loyal to the self-proclaimed Somali president at the time, Mohamed Farrah Hassan Aidid — quickly spiraled out of control.
Top tweets
@Real_Axmed As we continue to hope for #Peace, we must seek peace through peaceful means. Otherwise it’s unsustainable. #Somalia.
@alexisak Italy day of mourning to mark deaths of around 300 African migrants in Lampedusa sinking http://buff.ly/1g9y5Wg #Somalia #Eritrea.
@myfairobserver The root causes of piracy must be understood and addressed if progress is to be lasting. http://bit.ly/1bHZ9fN #Somalia #Africa.
@bbcworldservice A psychiatric nurse talks about his lonely campaign to promote mental health in war-torn #Somaliahttp://bbc.in/1a2IOx4.
@amisomsomalia AMISOM meets with the #Somali Diaspora in #Minneapolis #AmisomDiaspora http://bit.ly/19YlShd.
Image of the day
Amazing reception for the delegation of Foreign Minister of Somalia in Toronto. Photo: @HibaqG