Somalia's Shabaab 'a serious threat'

Nairobi - A spectacular attack on Sunday by Shabaab Islamists in Mogadishu, unprecedented in Somalia in terms of its operational complexity, has enabled the extremists to show they remain a serious threat.

Though they are widely described as severely weakened, the attack by the al-Qaeda linked militants shows that the authorities have not restored security to Mogadishu as they like to claim.

Nine assailants, wearing police or army uniforms and likely all wearing explosive belts, attacked the main courthouse in the Somali capital.

Three of them blew themselves up to clear the way for the six others, who took hostages and started battling the Somali and African Union troops guarding the courthouse. The gunfight lasted for several hours.

Thirty minutes into the attack, as military reinforcements were arriving and the wounded were being evacuated, a car bomb was detonated in the zone.

The attack, which left at least 34 people dead, is the bloodiest since October 2011, when more than 80 people were killed some two months after the Shabaab abandoned fixed positions in Mogadishu.

Experts said the modus operandi of Sunday's attack is one frequently seen in Afghanistan, but so far unprecedented in Somalia.

"The combined use of suicide bombers, light weapons and car bombs is a first in Somalia," explained a military source in the African Union force (Amisom), who, like all the other sources questioned, asked to remain anonymous.

"There has not been any attack of this level of complexity in Mogadishu. It's a first," confirmed a regional security expert.

Significant efforts

A convoy from the Turkish Red Crescent was also hit by a car bomb on Sunday. According to the regional security expert there is no evidence the Turks were targeted. The car bomb may rather have been destined for the attack on the courthouse.

This "spectacular attack" demonstrates on the part of Somalia's Islamists "a will to regain a foothold in Mogadishu and to prove to the outside world that the situation in Mogadishu is not so good, despite the line often repeated by the president and the prime minister over the past few months", the Amisom source said.

The Shabaab want to "create a threatening climate and show that they're not finished yet", though often described as a spent force, the source added.

The Amisom source went on to say that Sunday's operation probably took four months of "significant efforts" and that it was likely prepared by Amniat, the Shabaab’s intelligence cell, which has agents operating in Mogadishu.

According to the expert questioned by AFP, "over the past month or two the Shabaab have been regaining strength."

He cited a recent spate of attacks on Kismayo, one of the final bastions of the Shabaab that they abandoned at the end of September.

"It seems that they got a new lease of life after the failure of the French commando operation [in January, aimed at freeing a French intelligence agent taken hostage]" and from the announcement of the withdrawal of Ethiopian troops.

This type of attack that the Afghan Taliban is known for would seem to confirm the increasing presence in Shabaab ranks of fighters who have operated in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The increasing sophistication of the explosive devices used by the Shabaab, notably the appearance a few months ago of remote-controlled bombs, would tend to confirm this hypothesis.

State of shock

At least one Pakistani jihadi has been reported in the Shabaab ranks in the past few months, one of the analysts questioned said.

Sunday's attack did not give the Shabaab any tactical advantage but it enabled the Islamists to undermine the impression - both locally and internationally - that the new administration and Somali armed forces are up to the task of ensuring security.

"The population [of Mogadishu] - and probably the security forces as well - are in a state of shock," said another analyst.

But he said only time will tell whether this attack represents a new tactic for the Shabaab, or whether it is a one-off.

One of his colleagues said that Mogadishu is "tremendously more secure than it was" and said that Somali soldiers, backed by Amisom forces, managed to limit the damage on Sunday.

But the military source with Amisom said: "If something like this is repeated, questions will be asked" on infiltration and on the ability of the Somali forces really to maintain security.

"This is clearly a show of force" on the part of the Shabaab, even if "from a military point of view they are really in a critical situation," one analyst said.

"It is indeed difficult to organise this sort of attack, but it is still easier than holding a military front," the expert said.

- AFP

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Brits warned to leave Somalia: Terrorist attack is ‘imminent’

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office believes terrorists are in the final stages of planning attacks in the capital Mogadishu.

Officials have warned against all travel to every part of the war-torn country.

They advised all expat Brits to leave, adding there is a specific threat to Westerners in the autonomous region of Somaliland.

A spokesman for the FCO said: “We have amended our travel advice for Somalia.

“Our advice makes clear that there continues to be a big threat from terrorism and that the FCO believes that terrorists are in the final stages of planning attacks in Mogadishu.”

The high threat from terrorism includes kidnapping. There is no British representation in any part of Somalia and the FCO said it is unable to provide consular assistance there.

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EU delegation arrives in Mogadishu, meets with Somali president

A high-level delegation from the European Union has today torched down in Mogadishu airport, the second visit since the EU has appointed its first ambassador to the horn of Africa nation for more 20 years.

The delegation which headed by Michele Cervone d’Urso, EU’s new envoy to Somalia, has held a closed door meeting with president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and other government top officials.

A joint press conference after the meeting, Somali president Mohamud praised EU commitments on Somalia. He said it, however will open a new chapter in the relations between Somalia and the EU, aiming at a true and balanced partnership.

For his part, Michele Cervone d’Urso, told reporters that EU is committed to help Somalia restoring peace and order and end long running crises.

In October 20, Michele Cervone d’Urso presented his credentials as new envoy to Somalia to President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud.

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MAIN NEWS Two suicide explosions at cafe kill 4 in Mogadishu

At least four people have been killed and many others injured in double suicide explosions at a hotel in Somali capital Mogadishu, police and Witnesses said.

Witnesses said two bombers blew themselves up at the entrance of Village restaurant in Mogadishu’s Hodon district that is frequented by government official and residents, killing a security guard and a civilian customer.

Abdullah Hassan Barise, the spokesman of Somali police said two bombers have carried out the attack. “The bombers were shot dead before they reached their target by the security guards during a shootout,” he added.

The two suicide bombers, a security guard and a civilian person dead in the attacks and no group has yet claimed responsibility for the double blasts

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Uganda threatens Somalia troop withdrawal

Uganda has threatened to pull its peacekeeping troops out of Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) after a UN report accused it of backing M23 rebels in the central African country.

In a statement to parliament, Prime Minister Amama Mbabazi said on Friday that the UN report carried baseless, unfair and malicious allegations.

The report, leaked to the media last month, also accused Rwanda, Uganda's southern neighbour, of supporting M23 rebels, who are based in eastern DRC and take their name after a peace agreement they signed with the Congolese government on March 23, 2009.

M23, commanded by Bosco Ntaganda, a warlord indicted by the International Criminal Court, have been battling Congolese troops since March, seizing towns in fighting that has displaced thousands of civilians. 

The group is made up of former fighters in the National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), an ethnic Tutsi rebel movement.

Mbabazi said Uganda was acting in good faith and sacrificing a lot to bring peace to the region and deserved better understanding from the UN and the region, reported the state-run New Vision newspaper.

"We have now decided, after due consultations with our brothers in the AU and the region, to completely withdraw from these regional peace efforts; that is to say DRC, Somalia and others," Mbabazi said, according to the paper.

Findings 'absurd'

Asuman Kiyingi, Uganda's state minister for regional co-operation, said: "We are saying that if these allegations, which are malicious and unfounded, are not withdrawn then we are considering withdrawing not only from Somalia but from all peacekeeping missions we are involved in."

Uganda, along with Burundi, sent peacekeeping troops to Somalia in 2007 under an African Union mandate backed by the UN.

The peacekeepers have been credited with driving the al-Qaeda-linked rebel group al-Shabab from Mogadishu, Somalia's war-ravaged capital. 

A sudden reduction in the peacekeeping force, especially in Mogadishu, would risk unravelling the security gains that allowed the first presidential elections in more than four decades to be held in the capital in September.

Somalia's poorly equipped and ill-disciplined army is more a loose affiliation of rival militias than a cohesive fighting force loyal to a single president.

Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab, the spokesman for al Shabaab's military operation, said it was unaware of Uganda's intention to withdraw and that it would keep fighting the African peacekeepers.

"After Ugandans leave, what else, it will be easier to fight the remaining invaders. We shall finish them," he told the Reuters news agency. 

Financial rewards

Uganda has earned significant Western support for deploying its soldiers to a warzone few foreign powers outside the region have the stomach for.

It also benefits financially for its AMISOM contribution while at the same time a troop presence in Somalia, Central African Republic and South Sudan gives the Ugandan military a big footprint across the region.

"It's just politics and playing to the gallery. They won't pull out. Things will be quietly settled behind closed doors with perhaps future reports not being so critical," said London-based Somali-analyst Hamza Mohamed. 

The UN Security Council's Group of Experts said in their report that despite their strong denials, Uganda and Rwanda had continued to support M23 rebels in North Kivu province.

The group, who monitor compliance with sanctions and an arms embargo on the DRC, delivered their report to the Security Council's Congo sanctions committee at the beginning of October.

Both Uganda and Rwanda dismissed the allegation, with Okello Oryem, Uganda's state minister for foreign affairs, saying that the experts' findings were "rubbish and absurd".

"Some of those so-called experts came here [to Uganda] and did not interview anyone," Oryem said.

Mbabazi said Uganda, which shares a border with the DRC, got involved with mediating with M23 rebels following a request by Ban Ki-Moon, the UN chief and Joseph Kabila, the president of the DRC.

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