November 30, 2016 | Morning Headlines.
US Fighter Jets Destroy Al-Shabaab Camp In Somalia
29 November – Source: Goobjoog News – 171 Words
US suspected gunships carried out an airstrike on Al-Shabaab training camp in Torotorow village of Lower Shebelle region, killing undisclosed number Al-Shabaab fighters. Locals said fighter jets had attacked a camp on Monday night where Al-Shabaab was recruiting new fighters. A military source said that several Al-Shabaab fighters were killed in the attack and a number of vehicles destroyed. “We received reports that a foreign warplane bombed an Al-Shabaab camp near Torotorow village, leaving several militants dead and destroying cars used by the group,” said the sources.
Another military source said although an assessment was still underway yesterday; the airstrikes destroyed six targets, which included technicals (pickups with mounted machine guns). The strikes were among the largest in a string of attacks that have claimed some of the militant group’s top leaders in recent years,
Al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab, which once ruled much of Somalia, wants to topple the Western-backed government in Mogadishu and drive out AMISOM peacekeepers also made up of soldiers from Kenya, Djibouti, Uganda and other African nations.
Key Headlines
- US Fighter Jets Destroy Al-Shabaab Camp In Somalia (Goobjoog News)
- Puntland Lifts Suspension On Lower House Election (Garowe Online)
- An Elder Shot Dead In Mogadishu (Shabelle News)
- Somalia’s Presidential Election Is Postponed Again. What Now? (Foreign Policy)
- Kenya Police Issue Alert Over Al-Shabaab Attack Plans (Xinhua)
- Bomb Kills Four Somali Soldiers As Forces Mull Attack On Islamic State (Reuters)
- Things To Know About Somalis In The US (The Globe and Mail)
NATIONAL MEDIA
Puntland Lifts Suspension On Lower House Election
29 November – Source: Garowe Online – 373 Words
The President of Puntland regional state, Abdiweli Mohamed Ali has lifted the suspension on the ongoing Lower House elections, following his Vice President’s order to halt the voting on Monday. Puntland Vice President, Abdihakim Abdulahi Haji Omar, issued an order yesterday to the State-Level Indirect Electoral Implementation team (SIEIT) to suspend the parliamentary elections in objection to the outgoing Somali Parliament Speaker Mohamed Shaikh Osman Jawari’s decision to axe native clans in Sool, East Sanag and Buhodle from their seats quota in the Upper House chamber for Somaliland region.
According to the National Leadership Forum (NLF)-comprised of leaders of the Somali government and regional states- communiqué for the Somali electoral process, Jawari’s decision contradicted the seats distributions endorsed by the Somali leaders. But President Ali shifted his position, following discussions between representatives of the international community and Prime Minister Omar Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke on the reasons for the suspension of parliamentary voting in Puntland. Close sources told Garowe Online that international diplomats stressed to the Prime Minister that the electoral process can’t be suspended by Puntland government.
However, Puntland announcement to halt the parliamentary election wasn’t in fact related to the seats quota for native clans in Sool, East Sanag and Buhodole but to the financial support that hasn’t been received by Puntland, said the source. The international community has previously pledged to the regional states of financial support of $ 2 Million for the states that adhere to the 30-percent women quota in the ongoing parliamentary elections. According to a member in the electoral process said, the parliamentary election in Puntland is expected to resume in the coming days, as so far 22 MPs were elected out of 37 MPs representing Puntland in the Lower House chamber of Federal Parliament.
This is not the first time that Puntland President has quickly retreated back from his decisions or his Vice President in several stances. Early this year, Ali accepted the clan-based power sharing formula (4.5) as a model for the Somali electoral process, after firmly opposing it and was widely rejected by Puntland people. As the regional states failed to meet the parliamentary election deadline, Somalia’s electoral body has announced on Monday the postponement of the Somali presidential election again to December.
An Elder Shot Dead In Mogadishu
29 November – Source: Shabelle News – Words
Unknown assailants have shot and killed a renowned traditional elder in Somali capital, Mogadishu on Tuesday, witnesses and police said. A Somali police officer said three men armed with pistols have gunned down the elder at Arafat area in Mogadishu’s Yaqshid district.The elder who was identified as Mohamed Abdi Jimale died on the spot after he was shot in the head several times by the gunmen, according to a witness who spoke to Radio Shabelle.The motive behind the Elder’s killing and identity of the assassins are yet unclear. Mogadishu has seen increasing assassinations and attacks blamed on Al shabaab militants, who had been driven out of the capital in 2011 after joint offensive by AMISOM and SNA.
INTERNATIONAL MEDIA
Somalia’s Presidential Election Is Postponed Again. What Now?
29 November – Source: Foreign Policy – 293 Words
Somalia’s presidential election, which had already been postponed, was scheduled to be held on Wednesday of this week. It will not be. On Monday, the Somali electoral body postponed the vote yet again. Why? Because members of parliament are supposed to elect the president, and parliamentary elections have not yet been completed, complicated, as they were, by corruption. The beleaguered electoral body is currently investigating malpractice.
The electoral body has issued assurances that the presidential elections will indeed take place before the end of 2016, but did not specify a date. Back in September, Somalia announced elections would be moved from October to November. That prompted Michael Keating, the United Nations special representative for Somalia, to warn the U.N. Security Council.“The renewed delay raises a number of fears,” Keating said back then. “Let me name just two: that the process is being politically manipulated, and that this delay may only be one of yet further ‘rolling delays.’” Clearly, those fears were not unfounded.
September’s delay was blamed on security concerns — specifically, on al-Shabab, which has increased attacks in particular parts of Somalia, including the capital Mogadishu. (The United States government recently empowered itself to make “collective self-defense” strikes in Somalia against Shabab). These security concerns were also, at least in part, the stated reason that legislators, and not Somali citizens, were charged with electing the president.And so Somalia is left not only with rampant security concerns, but also by corruption so pervasive that it could believably be the reason for postponing presidential elections. But there is at least one person who benefits from the perpetual postponement: Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, who is up for re-election.
Kenya Police Issue Alert Over Al-Shabaab Attack Plans
29 November – Source: Xinhua – 182 Words
Kenyan police have issued an alert and tightened security, saying Somalia-based Islamist group Al-Shabaab is planning to launch attacks in the country ahead of the festive season.Inspector General of Police, Joseph Boinnet, said on Tuesday Al-Shabaab militants were planning to launch attack in the border region and the tourist resort coastal region of Mombasa, with targets including security personnel and public service vehicles. “We are also aware Al-Shabaab is planning to amass its militants in Jedahaley area in Somalia with intention of infiltrating into the country for attacks,” Boinett said. “Some are hiding in small groups pretending to be herders around Hida and Dambala in Somalia while plotting to sneak into the country,” he added.
The police chief said Al-Shabaab remains the major threat, particularly in areas along the border with Somalia. “We have since heightened security alertness to avert any attacks and equally appeal to the public to continue cooperating with security agencies and remain vigilant,” he said.Al-Shabaab has carried out a series of attacks in Kenya since Kenyan peacekeeping troops entered Somalia to battle the group in 2011.
Bomb Kills Four Somali Soldiers As Forces Mull Attack On Islamic State
29 November – Source: Reuters – 327 Words
Islamist insurgents killed four pro-government Somali soldiers and injured 11 others when a roadside bomb destroyed a military pickup in the north of the country on Tuesday, the military said. Al Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attack in the Galgala hills, an insurgent stronghold about 30 km (20 miles) to the southwest of Bosaso, the largest city in the region. “A roadside bomb destroyed our pickup as we drove from Galgala hills today. We lost four soldiers, including a female soldier, and 11 men from our forces were injured,” Major Mohamed Ibrahim, a military officer in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland, told Reuters.
Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab, al Shabaab’s military operation spokesman told Reuters by telephone: “We completely destroyed the military pickup outside Bosaso – none escaped – all 17 soldiers on board perished.” The insurgency routinely exaggerates the number of casualties killed in its attacks.The deaths come as hundreds of forces allied to the Western-backed government prepare to retake the northern port town of Qandala from a group that has splintered from al Shabaab and pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group. Qandala is about 70 km to the east of Bosaso and has been under the control of Abdiqadir Mumin, a Somali insurgent leader, for about a month. “We are also evaluating the situation and we shall attack the ISIS as soon as possible,” Jamac Mohamed Khurshe, the mayor of Qandala told Reuters on Tuesday.
Hundreds of pro-government militia began moving towards Qandala on Monday.Somalia has been riven by civil war for more than 25 years. Al Shabaab, which has ties to al Qaeda, is fighting the government to impose their own strict version of Islamic law but has lost much of the territory they used to control. Mumin’s group, which renounced al Shabaab in favor of Islamic State, is not thought to number more than a couple of hundred fighters. It has no publicly known operational links to Islamic State in the Middle East.
OPINION , CULTURE & ANALYSIS
“In the past decade, law enforcement and Somali community leaders around the country have struggled with terrorist groups luring some of its young men overseas. The problem first surfaced in 2007, when more than 20 young men from Minnesota began going to Somalia to join al-Shabab, which is classified as a terror group by the U.S. government.”
Things To Know About Somalis In The US
29 November – Source: The Globe and Mail – 968 Words
Authorities are investigating whether the car-and-knife attack at Ohio State University that injured 11 people was an act of terror. The attacker, Abdule Razak Ali Artan, was killed Monday after he drove into a group of pedestrians on campus, then began stabbing people with a butcher knife. Artan was born in Somalia and was a legal permanent resident of the U.S., according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to discuss the case and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. He was a student at Ohio State who had once criticized the media for its portrayal of Muslims.
Artan’s motives for Monday’s attack aren’t clear, and it’s not known if he was radicalized. But young Somalis in the U.S., particularly in Minnesota and Ohio, have been a target for terror recruiters for the Islamic State group and the east Africa-based militant group al-Shabab. Here are things to know about Somalis in the U.S.:
Somali diaspora: Minnesota has the nation’s largest Somali community, followed by Ohio. Census numbers place the population in Minnesota at 57,000, concentrated in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, though community activists say the number is higher. Somalis began coming to Minnesota in the 1990s after a civil war broke out in Somalia.
Other waves of refugees followed and the community prospered, thanks to the state’s welcoming social programs.
Job opportunities and the relatively low cost of living also drew Somali immigrants to Columbus, Ohio, which has the second-largest Somali population in the U.S., estimated at anywhere from 13,000 to 40,000. Large Somali communities are also concentrated in Lewiston and in Portland, Maine, and in the Seattle and Washington, D.C., metro areas. The community has largely prospered. Somali-owned restaurants, mosques, clothing shops, coffee shops and other businesses are well-established in some Minneapolis neighbourhoods, including one dubbed “Little Mogadishu,” named after the capital of Somalia.
In the past decade, law enforcement and Somali community leaders around the country have struggled with terrorist groups luring some of its young men overseas. The problem first surfaced in 2007, when more than 20 young men from Minnesota began going to Somalia to join al-Shabab, which is classified as a terror group by the U.S. government. The group wooed young Americans with jihadist videos that appealed to patriotic and religious ideals. In more recent years, the Islamic State has found recruits in the U.S. Roughly a dozen young men and women from Minnesota have left to join militants in Syria, and nine Minnesota men were recently sentenced on terror charges for plotting to join the Islamic State group.