Arms embargo lifted, but Somalia cannot afford weapons: minister
By Mohammed Abbas
LONDON | Wed May 8, 2013 3:10pm EDT
(Reuters) - Somalia's armed forces have not received "a single bullet"
despite the partial lifting of a United Nations arms embargo because the
East African country lacks funds, its defense minister said on Wednesday.
Somalia's new leaders aim to train and equip a professional army of around
28,000 soldiers within three years but are hamstrung by a lack of cash,
Abdihakim Fiqi said during a trip to London to drum up donor support.
"The arms embargo was lifted almost two months ago and we haven't received a
single bullet or one single AK-47 or gun. Nothing. Because of lack of
resources," Fiqi told the Royal United Services Institute defense think tank
in London.
The Horn of Africa nation is only just emerging from two decades of civil
war, and is struggling to rebuild a country riven by clan divisions and
whose infrastructure and institutions are in tatters.
A newly appointed parliament last year elected a new president, the first
vote of its kind since the toppling of former military dictator Mohamed Siad
Barre in 1991.
In recognition of the legitimacy of Somalia's new leadership, the United
Nations in March partially lifted an arms embargo on Somalia, allowing it to
buy light weapons.
Somali forces currently number in the low thousands, and are a poorly
equipped and fragmented mixture of state troops and militias struggling to
battle al Shabaab Islamist militants, who want to impose their brand of
Islamic law on Somalia.
"For the last four months our soldiers are just sitting back not doing
anything. Al Shabaab are fighting them, engaging them, attacking them. They
are just in the defense position ... due to a lack of weapons and
ammunition," Fiqi said.
African Union peacekeepers have been largely responsible for pushing al
Qaeda-linked al Shabaab out of the capital Mogadishu and other urban centers
in the past two years, but the group is still able to launch major attacks,
including a suicide bombing on Sunday that killed at least eight people.
Fiqi declined to give an estimate for the number al Shabaab fighters
remaining, but said due to a lack of funding the group was mired in
"leadership wrangling", and was "increasingly weakening, contained and
losing ground every day".
However, al Shabaab is highly mobile, a reason why Somalia aims to build an
army made up of agile light infantry units.
"Our national security stabilization plan indicates up to 28,000 soldiers
within three years," Fiqi said, putting the cost of raising such an army at
about $160 million.
The minister is part of a Somali delegation that includes President Hassan
Sheikh Mohamud, that attended a conference on Somalia in London on Tuesday
to drum up donor funding.
(Reporting by Mohammed Abbas; Editing by Michael Roddy)
South Sudan rebels force army from eastern base and town
By Hereward Holland
JUBA | Wed May 8, 2013 12:53pm EDT
(Reuters) - South Sudanese rebels have seized a military base and town after
clashing with the army in the east in an escalation of violence that has
already uprooted thousands of people and hampered plans to explore for oil.
The rebels, led by David Yau Yau and known as the South Sudan Democratic
Army (SSDA), say they want to end corruption and the one-party system led by
the Sudan People's Liberation Movement.
In March, the army launched an offensive against Yau Yau in the eastern
state of Jonglei, the country's largest, where the government wants to
search for oil with the help of French firm Total.
The recent fighting has uprooted tens of thousands of people, according to
the United Nations.
In an emailed statement, Peter Konyi Kubrin, an SSDA spokesman, said rebels
found the bodies of more than 50 soldiers in Boma town after the army fled.
The figure could not be independently verified.
Army spokesman Philip Aguer said there had been fighting and that the army
withdrew from their base in Boma to the top of a mountain, known as Upper
Boma, around two hours' walk from the main town. He did not give any
casualty figures.
"It's (Boma) divided with the army on the top of the mountain and the rebels
at the bottom," Aguer said. "It's just a matter of time before we chase them
away."
The United Nations said all aid agencies had moved out their staff from
Boma, disrupting health services. "A large proportion of the residents of
Boma town also fled, fearing that violence would spread," the U.N. said in a
statement.
Since winning independence from Sudan in 2011, South Sudan has been
struggling to impose its authority across vast swathes of territory teeming
with weapons after decades of civil war with Khartoum.
Yau Yau, a former theology student, first rebelled in 2010 after failing to
win a seat in state parliament. He accepted an amnesty in 2011 only to take
up arms again a year later.
Despite a recent thaw in relations between Sudan and South Sudan, Aguer said
the rebels were receiving assistance from Sudan's National Intelligence and
Security Services in the form of airdrops of weapons, ammunition and
supplies.
"We are convinced beyond reasonable doubt that Khartoum has been supplying
them up to now," Aguer said.
The Geneva-based Small Arms Survey, which tracks weapon supplies, said in a
recent report much of the rebels' equipment comes from Khartoum. Sudan has
routinely denied the charges.
