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From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Mon Aug 02 2010 - 16:44:46 EDT
Somali Insurgent Groups Say They Plan to Join Forces to Fight Government
By Hamsa Omar -
Aug 2, 2010 2:54 PM GMT+0200
Somalia's two main insurgent groups said they intend to join forces to
oppose the country's Western- backed government and a rejected a report by a
domestic radio station that talks on the proposed merger were in jeopardy.
Al-Shabaab, which the U.S. accuses of having links with al- Qaeda, and
Hisbul Islam, said they began talks last month aimed at amalgamating their
operations. Spokesmen for both groups denied a report yesterday by
<http://www.shabelle.net/news-in-english/41-news-in-english-content/1441-dis
pute-rises-between-al-shabab-hizbul-islam> Radio Shabelle, a Mogadishu-based
broadcaster, that the negotiations had failed.
"There have been meetings for the past eight days to amalgamate the two
sides' holy mujahedeen brothers into one gigantic powerful unit," Sheikh
Hassan Mahdi, an official from Hisbul Islam, told reporters today in
Mogadishu.
Somalia's government has been battling insurgents opposed to the rule of
President
<http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Sheikh%20Sharif%20Sheikh%20Ahmed&site=
wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=
-lang_ja> Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed for the past three years. Most of
southern and central Somalia has been seized by the militants, while
Sharif's administration controls only portions of Mogadishu, with support
from African Union peacekeepers. The country hasn't had a functioning
central administration since the ouster of former dictator
<http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Mohamed%20Siad%20Barre&site=wnews&clie
nt=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&
getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja>
Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
Shabelle reported yesterday that a "great dispute" had derailed talks
between al-Shabaab and Hisbul had failed.
The report is "null and void," Sheikh Muktar Robow Ali Abu Mansor, a
spokesman for al-Shabaab, told reporters at the media briefing today.
Last week, African leaders meeting in Uganda agreed to a recommendation by
the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, an East African body
grouping six countries, that 2,000 peacekeepers be sent to bolster the
existing 6,100 African Union force already in Somalia.
The decision came after a bomb attack in Kampala, the Ugandan capital, a
week earlier that killed 76 people and which al-Shabaab claimed
responsibility for.
To contact the reporter on this story:
<http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Hamsa%20Omar&site=wnews&client=wnews&p
roxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=
wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja> Hamsa Omar
in Mogadishu via Johannesburg at <mailto:pmrichardson@bloomberg.net>
pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.
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