=====================
Somali insurgents ignore Ugandan presidents' plead
Somaliweyn Media Center (SMC) The insurgents in the war-ravaged Somalia has dismissed on Wednesday a fresh appeal made by President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda on to spare the upcoming African peacekeeping forces in to the country.
"It is unacceptable request and we hope to implement our earlier commitment of fighting with the invading forces" spokesman for the insurgents in Mogadishu told SMC on condition of anonymity.
The spokesman termed president Museveni's remarks as laughable adding his group will keep on the fight against the presence troops of Ethiopia and the arriving Ugandans as well as the other African peacekeeping forces.
"We are in holy war for defending our country from the enemy and there is no bid on this" the self-nominated spokesman for Somalia insurgents group said during his interview with SMC.
He said insurgents have vowed to kill peacekeepers when they deploy to bolster the fragile government of President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed and that is not changeable
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, who plans to send troops to the African Union peace mission in Somalia, on Tuesday pleaded with the country's insurgents to spare the force designed to help in the restoration of peace.
Museveni said Ugandan forces will take precautionary measures while in Somalia, where insurgents have vowed to kill peacekeepers when they deploy to bolster the fragile government of President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed.
"The militia have no good reason to fear us because we are there to help them rebuild their country," Museveni told reporters in Kampala after holding talks with visiting US General William Ward, the deputy commander of the European Command in charge of Africa.
"We shall engage them and talk to them (telling them) that we are not against them. We are already talking to some of them," he said, without specifying the insurgent group his government is facing in talks.
"We shall definitely take some precautionary measures against any terrorist attack," he added.
Uganda has offered to deploy 1,500 troops under the AU peace mission in Somalia called IGASOM, but has not given a date for the deployment.
Museveni refused to give a deployment date, saying the government will announce it when it is ready.
Somalia, home to 10 million people, has lacked an effective central authority since 1991 coup, after which warlords established their authority and started imposing their own rules.