From: Biniam Haile \(SWE\) (eritrea.lave@comhem.se)
Date: Fri Jun 19 2009 - 18:06:20 EDT
Eritrea denies arms claims
2009-06-19 22:04
New York - Eritrea flatly rejects "baseless and fabricated" charges that
it is sending arms and ammunition to hardline extremists in lawless
Somalia, its ambassador to the UN said in a letter on Friday.
"Eritrea confidently reaffirms that it is not sending arms and/or
ammunition to any party in Somalia. It categorically rejects the
baseless and fabricated charges directed against it," Ambassador Araya
Desta said in his letter addressed to the UN Security Council.
"Some countries, hostile to Eritrea, for crimes it had not committed
against Somalia, have been trying to use the Somali fig leaf to persuade
the United Nations Security Council to impose sanctions on Eritrea," he
added.
And in a clear allusion to neighboring arch-foe Ethiopia, Desta said
"there is irrefutable proof that a certain country in the region, in
open violation of the UN arms embargo, is training and arming the
Islamist armed group, the Ahli Asunna and Jami'a, various clan militias
and an assortment of warlords (in Somalia)."
Oust government
His letter said Addis Ababa "has sought to destabilise Somalia, fought
three wars against it and continued to intervene to thwart the emergence
of a united government with popular legitimacy."
"It would, therefore, be a travesty of justice if members of the
Security Council were to condemn a country that has not violated the
United Nations arms embargo on Somalia and to reward Ethiopia, which
should be brought to the dock for its invasion and violation of the arms
embargo and its obligations under international law," the Eritrean
letter said.
Somalia's President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed last month accused Asmara of
arming hardline Islamists fighting to oust his government, a day after
his own palace came under a barrage of mortar shells.
It was the first time he directly blamed Eritrea since some of the
heaviest fighting by the extremists against his government erupted in
early May.
The African Union and the United States have also in recent weeks blamed
Eritrea for fanning the violence in Somalia, a country that has not
known peace for nearly two decades.
A United Nations monitoring group on Somalia has long detailed how
Eritrea supplies arms and cash to opposition forces in the country.
- SAPA
http://www.news24.com/Content/Africa/News/965/2008d273b73a4da38ba7135299
f20f0d/19-06-2009%2010-06/Eritrea_denies_arms_claims_
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