From: Biniam Haile \(SWE\) (eritrea.lave@comhem.se)
Date: Thu May 21 2009 - 07:43:37 EDT
INTERVIEW-Eritrea sees CIA behind Somalia arms accusations
21 May 2009 09:04:28 GMT
* President says CIA agents spreading lies
* Opposes indictment against Sudan's president
By Andrew Cawthorne
ASMARA, May 21 (Reuters) - Eritrea's President Isaias Afwerki said
renewed accusations that Asmara is arming Somalia's Islamist rebels was
the work of CIA agents in the region bent on blackening his government's
name.
"We don't interfere (in Somalia) and we don't want to see any terrorism
prevail in Somalia," Isaias told Reuters.
Somalia's government has accused Eritrea of supporting al Shabaab
insurgents with planeloads of AK-47 assault rifles, rocket-propelled
grenades and other weapons.
To the anger of Asmara -- which says there is no evidence in accusations
that have been around for several years -- the U.N. has ordered a probe
and east African bloc IGAD wants sanctions on Eritrea including a no-fly
zone.
"It's CIA operatives ... these people are liars," Isaias, a former rebel
commander in power since 1991, said during an interview at Asmara's
colonial-era presidential palace.
"This is a continuation of the old story. I know for sure, even the
individuals behind these things. I don't want to talk about that because
it would poison the whole mood."
Former U.S. president George W. Bush's government had threatened to put
Eritrea on its list of state sponsors of terrorism, and Isaias said old
interest groups were still jostling for influence with President Barack
Obama.
He said Asmara would wait to see the impact of the Bush-Obama
transition, and what he termed a bigger historical transition of U.S.
economic ties and international attitudes.
"It is too early to judge," Isaias said, acknowledging that Washington
had bigger priorities than his country.
"Eritrea is not a big deal. I don't expect the United States and
officials in Washington will be sitting there and talking about how they
formulate their policies with Eritrea.
"This is a transition, a very difficult transition. We need to be
patient. It may take a long time."
Isaias said the new government of Somalia -- the 15th attempt to restore
central rule in the last 18 years -- looked doomed to fail because it
was imposed from outside.
"Leave this for the Somalis," he said.
President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, a moderate Islamist, became Somalia's
latest president earlier this year in a peace process in Djibouti
brokered by the United Nations.
"This is the mentality of a gambler," Isaias said of the repeated
attempts to set up a transitional Somali government with Western
backing.
"This so-called government is not a government in terms of legitimacy.
It cannot even influence one very small neighbourhood in Mogadishu, let
alone Somalia."
"NO RELAXATION" ON ETHIOPIA BORDER
Risking further criticism from the West, Eritrea was in March the first
country to receive Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir after the
International Criminal Court indicted him on accusations of war crimes
in Darfur.
Isaias, like other African leaders, said the case was politically
motivated and risked further destabilising Sudan.
"Whether he is guilty until proven innocent, or innocent until proven
guilty, is another matter. It is a legal matter. That is an issue for
extensive discussion," he said.
"It is purely a political case, it has no legality at all ... It doesn't
serve any purpose for the people of Darfur."
Isaias said the West was not showing the same clamour for justice in
other places, such as Sri Lanka.
"The government did not allow journalists to go there, they did not
allow relief agencies to even operate freely in that very small area,"
he said of recent events in Sri Lanka where the army wiped out Tamil
Tiger rebels.
"The casualties on civilians were huge. No one intervened."
Eritrea's long-running border dispute with Ethiopia, where the two lost
tens of thousands of men in a 1998-2000 war, has taken a back seat in
the headlines of late, with no reports of clashes and rhetoric quieter
on both sides.
Asked if that meant Eritrea could scale down its army and use resources
elsewhere, Isaias shook his head and shot back: "Never relax."
"I will never take any risk ... We retain the allocation of our
resources in spite of the bitterness we have about it. We have no other
option, unless we fully guarantee and see things have changed for good."
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LL935105.htm
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