High Profile Businessman Calls for Ethiopian Withdrawal

[michael_ital]

Somalia: High profile businessman calls for Ethiopian withdrawal
Sat. February 17, 2007 01:45 pm.- By Mohamed Abdi Farah. - Send this news article

(SomaliNet) The recently freed Somali business cleric from the jail in Nairobi Haji Abukar Omar Addani warned on Saturday the presence of the Ethiopian forces in Somalia as long as the Somali people are protesting against them.

In a press release given to the media in Nairobi, Haji Addani appealed to the Ethiopian government to pull its troops out of Somalia and urged the interim government to hold national reconciliation conference for all parts in the country.

Addani, 72, the wheelchair bound man, said national dialog is the only way out of misery in Somalia where the government senior officials ruled out several times in the past having talks with the defunct Union of Islamic Courts.

“We have passed six months of unprecedented peace and stability in the country produced by the Islamic Courts but every thing has changed for the worse when the Ethiopian backed interim government has taken control of the country,” said Addani in his statement.

On Thursday, the Kenyan Supreme Court had released Haji Abukar Addani and his son after they were found no guilty.

Addani and his son were arrested at the Kenyan Liboi border town last month after they were accused of entering Kenya illegally.

The international community should put pressure on the Ethiopian government to withdraw its forces from Somalia to avoid more bloodshed, the statement said.

Addani who is believed to have been the major source of financing the ousted Islamists, said if the United Nation does not take actions Somalia would definitely slip back into the anarchy of 1991, encouraging the Somali population to evict the Ethiopian troops from their territory by all means.

He also gave thanks to all individuals that paid efforts of his release.

[Ugaas Diini]

[quote]The recently freed Somali business cleric from the jail in Nairobi[/quote]

In la xiro muu rabaa.

[Koronto91]

[quote="Ugaas Diini"]In la xiro muu rabaa. [/quote]

The guy is a handicapped 76 year old, he got nothing to lose! You only die once in this life, better to die with dignity.