ICU's Accomplishments Tops 2006 Good News....
Posted: Sat Aug 25, 2007 3:03 pm
The Top Ten Good News Stories Of 2006:
Putting aside for a moment the misery of war that afflicts the Muslim world, we have found some bright spots where good things happened in the Muslim world in 2006.
1. Somalia Tastes A Moment Of Security And, Yes, Prosperity:
For the first time in 15 years, you could walk safely and freely down the streets of Mogadishu, Somalia's largest city, without fear, according to the New York Times, Washington Post, BBC, and Democracy Now. Mogadishu's one million plus residents, accustomed to living in one of the world's most dangerous cities, suddenly found themselves basking in the calm of safety. "Before, women were kidnapped, raped, killed and tortured," said businesswoman Hakima Mohamud Abdi, 52, in late June. "Now we've seen a great change and we're very satisfied." That's because Mogadishu's thuggish warlords and their private armies were finally gone.
Defeating them was the Islamic Courts Union, a network of traditional courts supported by clans and the business community. ICU members had individually established law, order, and security since the late 1990s. Despite the specter of a very bloody conflict on the horizon, life in Mogadishu was intriguing and — compared to the warlording 1990s — fabulous.
With the taxation and corruption that accompanies modern, central governments gone (because the central government itself had vanished), Somali free enterprise and initiative thrived. The new order of law and security had boosted confidence, spurring a construction and business boom. Private schools and colleges opened. Mogadishu University celebrated two Somali firsts: a graduating class of nurses and the launch of an MBA program. Unlike most African countries, which usually have one badly-run government-owned airline, Mogadishu airport offered no less than six private airlines. Without telecom regulation, Somalia reportedly had the best phone and internet service in East Africa. Mogadishu had about a dozen internet cafés. DHL provided international postal service. The ICU cleared Mogadishu's streets of debris and trash, the first time that occurred in over a decade. The UN announced that Somalia had the highest rate of immunization since 1991. And, the full were feeding the hungry. With the deleterious hand of the World Bank absent, Somalia may have had the lowest rate of extreme poverty in Africa — no small feat. Moreover, despite long years of conflict, Somalia still has one of the lowest rates of AIDS in Africa.
Unfortunately, the international community led by the United States predictably acted to quash what they perceived to be a Taliban avatar and Al-Qaeda puppet in Somalia (a perception contributed to by the wayward activities of the ICU's hotheaded youth wing). The ICU itself challenged that view in two letters to Washington. ICU leader Sharif Ahmed insisted to the New York Times that the Taliban was not his model and that, contrary to Western media reports of draconian ICU measures, the ICU supported World Cup soccer. "We are a Muslim people, we want to live in a peaceful way, we want to live with the rest of the world in a peaceful way," Ahmed told the Times. "We are not terrorists and we do not associate with terrorists."
Some Western voices called for engagement with the ICU. "It would be wrong," Mario Raffaelli, the Italian special envoy to Somalia, told the Washington Post, "to target all [of the Islamic Courts Union] as extremists." "The Islamists aren't going away," incoming House Subcommittee on Africa chairman Donald M. Payne (D-NJ), told the New York Times on December 14, "so the sooner we talk to them, the better."
Instead, the last year saw Washington arming and funding Somalia's terrorizing and narco-trafficking warlords (a page from the Afghan strategy book). ICU militiamen defeated the American-backed warlords in June. By December, American general John Abizaid green-lighted Ethiopia to invade Somalia as a proxy. Somalia's brief, fascinating experiment in peace and prosperity, its Prague Spring, had come to a hasty end.
Note: the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia as we went to press forced us to change from the present tense to the past tense. Uncertainty and mayhem have unfortunately returned to much of Somalia.
Source: http://www.eng-forum.com/News/Dec06/301206.htm
Putting aside for a moment the misery of war that afflicts the Muslim world, we have found some bright spots where good things happened in the Muslim world in 2006.
1. Somalia Tastes A Moment Of Security And, Yes, Prosperity:
For the first time in 15 years, you could walk safely and freely down the streets of Mogadishu, Somalia's largest city, without fear, according to the New York Times, Washington Post, BBC, and Democracy Now. Mogadishu's one million plus residents, accustomed to living in one of the world's most dangerous cities, suddenly found themselves basking in the calm of safety. "Before, women were kidnapped, raped, killed and tortured," said businesswoman Hakima Mohamud Abdi, 52, in late June. "Now we've seen a great change and we're very satisfied." That's because Mogadishu's thuggish warlords and their private armies were finally gone.
Defeating them was the Islamic Courts Union, a network of traditional courts supported by clans and the business community. ICU members had individually established law, order, and security since the late 1990s. Despite the specter of a very bloody conflict on the horizon, life in Mogadishu was intriguing and — compared to the warlording 1990s — fabulous.
With the taxation and corruption that accompanies modern, central governments gone (because the central government itself had vanished), Somali free enterprise and initiative thrived. The new order of law and security had boosted confidence, spurring a construction and business boom. Private schools and colleges opened. Mogadishu University celebrated two Somali firsts: a graduating class of nurses and the launch of an MBA program. Unlike most African countries, which usually have one badly-run government-owned airline, Mogadishu airport offered no less than six private airlines. Without telecom regulation, Somalia reportedly had the best phone and internet service in East Africa. Mogadishu had about a dozen internet cafés. DHL provided international postal service. The ICU cleared Mogadishu's streets of debris and trash, the first time that occurred in over a decade. The UN announced that Somalia had the highest rate of immunization since 1991. And, the full were feeding the hungry. With the deleterious hand of the World Bank absent, Somalia may have had the lowest rate of extreme poverty in Africa — no small feat. Moreover, despite long years of conflict, Somalia still has one of the lowest rates of AIDS in Africa.
Unfortunately, the international community led by the United States predictably acted to quash what they perceived to be a Taliban avatar and Al-Qaeda puppet in Somalia (a perception contributed to by the wayward activities of the ICU's hotheaded youth wing). The ICU itself challenged that view in two letters to Washington. ICU leader Sharif Ahmed insisted to the New York Times that the Taliban was not his model and that, contrary to Western media reports of draconian ICU measures, the ICU supported World Cup soccer. "We are a Muslim people, we want to live in a peaceful way, we want to live with the rest of the world in a peaceful way," Ahmed told the Times. "We are not terrorists and we do not associate with terrorists."
Some Western voices called for engagement with the ICU. "It would be wrong," Mario Raffaelli, the Italian special envoy to Somalia, told the Washington Post, "to target all [of the Islamic Courts Union] as extremists." "The Islamists aren't going away," incoming House Subcommittee on Africa chairman Donald M. Payne (D-NJ), told the New York Times on December 14, "so the sooner we talk to them, the better."
Instead, the last year saw Washington arming and funding Somalia's terrorizing and narco-trafficking warlords (a page from the Afghan strategy book). ICU militiamen defeated the American-backed warlords in June. By December, American general John Abizaid green-lighted Ethiopia to invade Somalia as a proxy. Somalia's brief, fascinating experiment in peace and prosperity, its Prague Spring, had come to a hasty end.
Note: the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia as we went to press forced us to change from the present tense to the past tense. Uncertainty and mayhem have unfortunately returned to much of Somalia.
Source: http://www.eng-forum.com/News/Dec06/301206.htm
