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Swathes of Mogadishu are skeletons of bombed-out buildings

By Mark Doyle
BBC World Affairs Correspondent

The world should be shocked at the systematic destruction of Somalia's capital Mogadishu and its residents, says lobby group Human Rights Watch.

The organisation told the BBC the city had become a zone of free-fire between government and insurgent forces.

It said if such a situation was happening anywhere else in the world, like Georgia or Lebanon for example, it would be considered a travesty.

Instead Somalia was the most ignored tragedy in the world today, HRW said.

Mogadishu is dying.

It is a city on the Indian Ocean coast that used to be one of Africa's trading hubs with the Middle East.

Now whole swathes of it are rubble or skeletons of buildings without doors or windows or roofs.

The most shocking, eerie aspect of it is that in many parts of the capital all the people have fled.

Aid vacuum

The fighting is between the US-backed government and Islamist and nationalist insurgents, who Washington accuses of having links with al-Qaeda.
The Somali government has no capacity to count the number of people who have fled and there are no international aid workers left to do the job because they would be kidnapped for ransom or murdered.

But the fighting has been worse for the ordinary residents of Mogadishu than even the infamous period in the early 1990s that spawned the film Black Hawk Down, a portrayal of American troops killed in Somalia at that time.

Today is worse than Black Hawk Down for the people of Mogadishu, much worse.

I was in the city in the early 1990s. It was an extremely violent time.

Not a night passed without explosions lighting up the sky but even that did not empty the capital of Somalia like the daily fratricidal confrontations now taking place between the government and its armed opponents.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7653928.stm

sufi we are the only nation who take bride destying in the name of clan and also in the name od religion.

Can you rephrase that again? I didnt get what you are trying to say.

indeed hyper, we also have al shabab who are arrogant and make every situation worse.

Aid agencies decry humanitarian crisis in Somalia

Over 50 aid agencies working in Somalia on Monday decried the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian crisis unfolding in Somalia and called on warring parties to cease-fire to allow unhindered relief supplies to the affected populations.

In a joint statement issued in Nairobi, the 52 aid agencies said nearly half of Somalia's population, or 3.25 million people, are now in need of emergency aid, a 77 percent increase since the beginning of 2008.

The organizations said the number has increased dramatically over the past year due to the destructive combination of extreme insecurity, drought and record-high food prices, warning that the situation is expected to deteriorate further with ordinary Somalis bearing the brunt of the cost.

"Despite the ongoing political process we have not witnessed any lessening of the violence that continues to have a horrendous impact on civilians," the relief agencies said in a statement.

In the last few weeks, renewed shelling in Mogadishu has displaced approximately 37,000 civilians from their homes.

Over the past nine months, 870,000 have fled for their lives. A total of 1.1 million people are currently displaced in Somalia today.

"We are appalled by the indiscriminate and disproportional use of force by all armed parties to the conflict, which is further exacerbating the humanitarian crisis," he said.

The organizations said the poorest of Mogadishu 's residents have no means to flee the extreme violence and have limited means to earn a living leaving them completely dependent on humanitarian assistance.

"This while the average Somali has seen price increases for food and water of up to 1,000 percent, plunging many into worsening poverty. One in six children under five, or approximately 180,000 children, is acutely malnourished in South and Central Somalia," he said.

Aid workers are increasingly the victims of assassination and kidnapping and are now seen as legitimate targets.

"This year alone 24 aid workers, of which 20 are Somali nationals, have been killed whilst carrying out their work. The whereabouts of another ten are unknown. There have been 111 reported security incidents directly targeting aid agencies," the agencies said.

"National and international aid agencies are prevented from responding effectively to the needs of ordinary Somalis because of violence and severely limited access," they said.

The relief agencies called on parties to the conflict to allow aid agencies unhindered access to Somalis who are in desperate need of emergency assistance.

"The international community has completely failed Somali civilians. We call on the international community to make the protection of Somali civilians a top priority now," the agencies said.

Source: Xinhua

http://english.people.com.cn/90001/9077 ... 10419.html

Golaha Odayaasha Dhaqanka Gobalka Hiiraan oo si kulul u canbaareeyay hanjabaadyo loo jeediyay qaar ka mid ah Hay'adaha Samafalka

Dhawaan ayay aheyd markii Af-hayeenka Koox Diimeedka Al-Shabaab Shiikh Muqtaar Roobow Abuu Mansuur uu ku dhawaaqay in hay'adaha Care iyo IMC aysan ka howlgali karin deegaannada ay ka taliyaan sida uu hadalka u dhigay Mujaahidiinta, waxaana sidoo kale xusid mudan in hadalkaas ka soo yeeray kooxda Al-shabaab si weyn uga xumaadeen dadka Barakcayaasha ah ee ku sugan Gobalka Hiiraan kuwaas oo sheegay in
u jeedadu tahay sidii laysu hortaagi lahaa kaalmada yar ee la soo gaarsiiyo.

C/raxmaan Diini, Hiiraan Online
diini@hiiraan.com
Beledweyn, Somalia

http://hiiraan.com/news/2008/Oct/warark ... 6-4742.htm

THank god we are not somalis look how different we are

Somali Islamists want weapons on ship, say residents

Sunday, October 05, 2008

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Islamist insurgents have demanded to be given some of the weapons aboard a hijacked Ukrainian ship carrying 33 tanks but the pirates holding it have refused, a local official said on Sunday.

The Islamist gunmen from the al Shabaab group opposing Somalia's weak interim government have also received a five percent cut of the $1.5 million paid out for a Spanish ship released several months ago, a resident told Reuters.

http://hiiraan.com/news2/2008/Oct/somal ... dents.aspx

Mortars kill 15 more in Mogadishu, 50 NGOs appeal.

Residents in Mogadishu said insurgents fired artillery rounds at the presidential palace from the city's Bakara Market, prompting guards at the hilltop compound to return fire.

Witnesses said three soldiers were killed at the palace, while a dozen civilians died in the streets below.

Abdinasir Said, a Bakara shopkeeper, said he saw six people blown to pieces by a mortar bomb that detonated in the market.

"We have been carrying the injured ones to safety after the shelling stopped," he told Reuters by telephone.

Another man was killed in the market. Nearby, residents said a woman, her three children and a family friend were killed when another mortar bomb crashed onto their home.

The barrages were just the latest example of violence in the Somali capital that has displaced some 37,000 people in recent weeks, swelling an internal refugee population of 1.1 million, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) said on Monday.

http://asia.news.yahoo.com/081006/3/3q33l.htm

The_Emperior5 wrote:

THank god we are not somalis look how different we are

to the outside world you are somalis soo

No we are known as somalilanders every one knows that
you want us to be the same as you inanu xaarka idin la walaaqano