Hassan Turki, Dahir Aweys, Omar Iman, and Others Join to Form Hisbal Islam

february 7th, 2009

A newly formed group known as Hisbal Islam (Islamic Party) vowed Saturday fighting against Somali’s new government led by president Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed and the AU forces in Mogadishu.

• Four insurgent factions agreed Wednesday to merge and continue fighting against the anticipated unity government of Somalia.
  

“The so-called government led by Sharif SheikAhmed is not different from the one of Abdulahi Yusuf,” said Dr. Omar Iman, who chairs Hisbal Islam.“The country was not freed from the enemy and Sharia law was not imposed, how we can stop Jihad (holy war),” Mr Iman added.

Somali’s new president Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed arrived in Mogadishu on Saturday for the first time since he was elected president in Djibouti by the Somali Parliament last Saturday.

President Sharif briefed reporters and said he came to Mogadishu to form unity government in Mogadishu and to work for the peace.


The new, anti-government Islamic Party is composed of four factions –

• the Asmara wing of the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia led by Hassan Dahir Aweys,


• Ras Kamboni Brigade, a southern Somali Islamist group affiliated with radical military leader Hassan Turki, (Shimronletters Editor's note: Turki was a senior leader in the Islamic Courts and its predecessor, al Itihaad al Islamiyah, was believed to be running a military training camp on the Kenyan-Somali border in March of 2008.)
  
• the Islamic Front, an insurgent group formed in 2007 to oppose Ethiopian troop presence in Somalia,


• and a little-known, clan-based group called Anole, which is said to have been founded just weeks ago.

Al-Shabab group which controls the port town of Kismayo is not a member of the new Islamic Party.

The Rest f@ Anikah

(editor's note: they claim their source is mareeg.com but I cannot find this news anywhere there)

Part of TGS and Part of ARS Form ANOTHER Agreement

The parties to the peace talks aimed at ending the conflict in Somalia have reached a power-sharing deal in Djibouti that doubles the size of parliament, observers said. However, analysts feared the deal was unworkable and seems to have widened the split within the TFG.


Representatives of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and a faction of the Eritrea-based Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS), led by Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, began their latest talks on 22 November.

"It was not perfect, but it was a compromise deal to get a unity government," Mohamed Abdi Yusuf, a member of the ARS central committee and one of the negotiators, told IRIN on 26 November. "It is a bitter pill but we have to swallow it for the good of the country and the people."

Other sources, however, said interim President Abdullahi Yusuf was not involved and opposed the deal.

"The president was not in any way involved in this agreement, therefore nothing agreed there is binding on him," Abdirashid Mohamed Iro, an MP and close adviser to Yusuf, said.

• The agreement provides for the enlargement of parliament to 550 members from the current 275.
• Two hundred seats will go to the ARS and 75 to civil society, including women, the business community and the diaspora.
• The talks also extended the life of the transitional period for two years, from August 2009.
  

Iro described the deal as unworkable. "A 550-member parliament for Somalia is simply unrealistic and unsustainable," he said. "We don't even have space big enough to hold meetings."

An analyst said it would be difficult to implement.

"Increasing the size of the parliament may just complicate matters and will make reaching decisions extremely difficult," Timothy Othieno, a regional analyst at the London-based Overseas Development Institute (ODI), said.

The arrangement between the TFG and one faction was bound to come into conflict with the Asmara faction and Al-Shabab "which, unfortunately, once again, spells doom for the people of Somalia".

He added: "I am afraid this arrangement may fail."

Neither the armed wing of the Islamic Courts, the Al-Shabab group, nor the Asmara faction of the ARS, led by Sheikh Hassan Dahir, was involved in the Djibouti talks.

A civil society activist told IRIN the agreement was a compromise document "and will not please everybody", including those who signed it.

"The TFG is divided and so is the Alliance and that will make their work even more difficult," he said. "The main challenge now is not only to sell the agreement to the Somali people and the international community but to their own erstwhile allies."

The Rest @ all Africa

Sharif Ahmed Steps Down from Islamic Courts Union

Sharif Ahmed Steps Down from Islamic Courts Union - I believe this is a concesion to Robow and the Shabaab- Somalia Islamists are aiming at reconcilation to make the Emirate of Somalia work.... Watch for other alignment or battles between groups as negotiations occur.

-Shimron


(Apprciation to Terror Free Somolia)

BELETWEIN, Somalia Nov 5 (Garowe Online) - Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, the opposition leader in Somalia, has announced that he is stepping down as executive head of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU).

In a BBC Somali Service interview, Sheikh Sharif said the ICU is planning to hold a general congress and elect new leadership.

Nov. 4: Sheikh Sharif lands in Beletwein/GO"I am not ready to become a candidate because I have been holding [the post] for a long time and I must now give an opportunity to new people," Sheikh Sharif said.

He offered an ambiguous answer when asked whether or not he will join the Somali Transitional Federal Government a charge often voiced by ICU hardliners who have rejected the Djibouti Agreement.

• This week, Sheikh Sharif led a delegation to Somalia that includes other officers of the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS), an opposition coalition formed in Eritrea in 2007 but split into rival factions after the Djibouti Agreement was signed to end the two-year insurgency.
  
• The ARS delegation has been warmly received in Jowhar and Beletwein, two provincial capitals controlled by ICU forces.
• Ahmed Abdullahi, spokesman for Sheikh Sharif's delegation, told reporters Wednesday that the ARS delegation has met with ICU officials and traditional elders in Beletwein.
  "Sheikh Sharif presented our [ARS] political agenda and urged all groups to support the peace process," the spokesman said.
• He welcomed a recent fatwa issued by a group of Islamic scholars that called for the ICU to hold a general conference this month inside Somalia intended to settle internal political differences.
• READ: Big welcome for Islamist chief in central Somalia

The Rest @ Garowe Online

Nuriye Ali Farah Assinated by al Shabaab

Islamist groups waging war in Somalia against the country's feeble, foreign-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG) have been riled by a new fatwa issued earlier this month by self-appointed Somali clerics.

A spokesman for the clerics, Sheikh Nur Barud Gurhan, told an October 27 telephone press conference that the clerics issued a six-point fatwa regarding the internal dispute among Islamic Courts Union (ICU) leaders, who are divided over the Djibouti Agreement.

The group of clerics, including well-known religious authorities of Somali and Oromo ethnicity, decided to hold the meeting and issue the fatwa due to "the colonization of Somalia, the massacre of our people and destruction of our religion and country," Sheikh Gurhan said.

The Rest @ Rantburg

• Point one of the issued fatwa declares that "it is a duty for the jihad to continue until all enemy soldiers leave the country."
• A key clause calls for an emergency gathering of ICU executive and legislative officials, inside and outside the country, to be held within one month.
• "The signing of agreements must be stopped until after the dispute is resolved," said Sheikh Gurhan, while reading the document.
• The clerics' fatwa prohibited the exchange of conflicting statements over the media that "divide up the fighters and the public," while warning fighters against acts that cause more harm than good.
• Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, the ICU's executive head, signed the peace agreement with the TFG on October 26, which calls for a ceasefire effective November 5 and the withdrawal of Ethiopian troops within 120 days.
• But Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, chairman of the Shura (legislative) council, rejected the peace pact and urged guerrillas to continue the anti-Ethiopia insurgency.
• The two men helped form the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS) in Eritrea in 2007, which included exiled Islamist leaders, ex-lawmakers and Diaspora activists.
• However, after the signing of the Djibouti Agreement, the ARS split into two rival wings, with a Djibouti-based faction led by Sheikh Sharif and an Eritrea-based faction led by the hardliner, Sheikh Aweys.

A spokesman for the ARS-Djibouti faction, Dahir Gelle, dismissed the clerics' fatwa in early comments to the media as "servicing the interests of Hassan Dahir [Aweys]." However, unconfirmed reports told Garowe Online that Sheikh Sharif might be reconsidering the clerics' call for an ICU general conference.

Key Islamist figures associated with the ARS-Eritrea faction have publicly denounced the clerics' fatwa. Sheikh Omar Iman, who was recently crowned ARS chairman by the Eritrea-based faction, said he welcomes the new title while condemning the Djibouti-based peace process as "being organized by Ethiopia and the U.S."

"The jihad will continue and no one can stop it as long as the enemy is in the country," Sheikh Omar said from Eritrea, where he lives in exile with Sheikh Aweys.

On the clerics' fatwa, Sheikh Omar Iman rejected calls for an ICU emergency gathering while dismissing notions that the Islamic clerics take control of the war until the dispute is resolved.

• Another figure, ex-warlord Yusuf Indha Ade, rejected the fatwa and accused the clerics of supporting the Djibouti-based ARS faction. Indha Ade, who was a notorious warlord in the early 2000s before joining the ICU as defense chief, is closely associated with the Eritrea-based faction.

Sheikh Dahir Addow, the ICU chief in Middle Shabelle region, returned to the provincial capital Jowhar on Thursday after attending the peace talks in Djibouti.

• Local reports said Sheikh Addow traveled by land through Hiran region, where he held meetings with ICU officials.
• Also Thursday, the ICU administrator in Hiran region, Sheikh Abdirahman Ibrahim Ma'ow, told a press conference in the regional capital Beletwein that all groups should support the clerics' decision. He held the press conference to respond to Abukar Mohamed, a top ICU military commander based in Hiran, who rejected the Djibouti Agreement and dismissed the ceasefire. "His [Abukar Mohamed] comments do not speak for the ICU administration in Hiran region," Sheikh Ma'ow said

• More divisions became evident when one of ex-warlord Indha Ade's top lieutenants, Nuriye Ali Farah, was assassinated in Lower Shabelle region.
• Indha Ade's supporters immediately blamed al Shabaab, with unconfirmed reports saying three al Shabaab members were killed in retaliation.

Robow & Shabaab Refuse Peace Discussions

A spokesman for Somalia’s al Shabaab insurgent group has rejected a peace agreement signed between the country’s interim government and the opposition Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS).

Muktar Robow “Abu Mansur,” the al Shabaab spokesman, told local radio stations that “the Djibouti Agreement does not concern us [al Shabaab].”

While pledging to continue the insurgency, Abu Mansur said: “The Agreement is false because it cannot stop the bullets.”

He indicated that United Nations peacekeepers or African Union peacekeepers are “no different than Ethiopian troops,” while promising to “continue the jihad until the country [Somalia] is ruled by Islamic law.”

Delegations from Somalia’s interim government and the ARS are currently in Djibouti, where they have established a Joint Political Committee and a Joint Security Committee, which would oversee implementation of the UN-brokered Djibouti Agreement.

The Rest @ Methoxybenzeneboronic-acid.cn

Steve Bloomfield in Nairobi

SOMALIA'S FRAGILE government appears to be on the brink of collapse. Islamist insurgents now controls large parts of southern and central Somalia - and are continuing to launch attacks inside the capital, Mogadishu.

• Ethiopia, which launched a US-backed military intervention in Somalia in December 2006 in an effort to drive out an Islamist authority in Mogadishu, is now pulling out its troops.
• Diplomats and analysts in neighbouring Nairobi believe the government will fall once Ethiopia completes its withdrawal
• Plans have been made to evacuate government ministers to neighbouring Kenya.

A shipment of Ethiopian weapons, including tanks, left Mogadishu port last month as part of the withdrawal.

• Bringing the equipment back to Ethiopia by land would have been impossible - analysts believe Ethiopian troops and their Somali government allies control just three small areas in Mogadishu and a few streets in Baidoa, the seat of parliament.
• There are now estimated to be just 2500 Ethiopian soldiers left inside Somalia, down from 15,000-18,000 at the height of the war.
• Violence and insecurity have made it almost impossible for aid to get through, and 24 aid workers have been killed in Somalia so far this year.
• A recent shipment of food aid needed a military escort to navigate Somalia's pirate-infested waters. But within hours of the food being unloaded in Mogadishu's port most of it was stolen by gun-toting gangs.
• Oxfam, Save The Children and 50 other aid agencies working in Somalia last week said the international community had "completely failed Somali civilians".
• As the crisis worsens thousands are trying to leave the country every week. Around 6000 people are now crossing the border into Kenya every month - despite the Kenyan government's decision to close the border.
• Some are arriving at the overcrowded Dadaab refugee camp in eastern Kenya, which is now one of the largest refugee camps in the world with nearly 250,000 people.
• Others try to leave by sea, travelling to the northern town of Bosasso and paying $100 to people smugglers who ram more than 100 people onto a small fishing boat and set sail for Yemen. Many do not make it. Smugglers last week forced 150 people off the boat three miles off the Yemeni coast. Only 47 made it to shore.

Attempts to find a political solution have stalled. The UN claims progress has been made, citing an agreement signed in neighbouring Djibouti by the Somali government and the opposition Alliance for the Reliberation of Somalia (ARS).

But the deal has been signed only by the moderates on each side: Prime Minister Nur Adde and the ARS's Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.

The Islamist leaders they were so keen to oust are the same ones they are now engaged in negotiations with. US officials have met both Sheikh Sharif and the more hardline Sheikh Aweys in an effort to find a peace deal.

Meanwhile, in Somalia, the Islamists taking control of towns and villages across the country are considered far more extremist than Aweys. "They are real international jihadis," said one Nairobi-based diplomat. "The Americans' fear of al-Qaeda in Somalia is becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy."

The Rest @ The Sunday Herald

Mohammed Usman Maye Assassinated in Baidao, Somalia

The Transitional Federal Government lost a Member of Parliament earlier today on September 9, 2008 after he was shot with a pistol at a close range three times by an unidentified Gunmen In Baidao, the interim Capital of the war-torn Somalia.Several witnesses said the killers shot MP Mohammed Usman Maye near Dahabshiil office in Baidao. He died at the scene while the assassins escaped un-confronted by anyone.

It is rare that the culprits are caught in assassinations like this, said one witness.According to Dalkanews.com the dead MP complained about his safety in Baidao recently as he was threatened by other TFG government members. Recently, there were threats on his life coming from other MPs such as MP Shati Gudud and Sh. Aden Madobe.

The city's residents have seen a surge of assassinations, bombings, and armed clashes between the TFG and anti-goverment forces.

Currently, the city is surrounded by Al-Shabab fighters in all corners while the Parliament is surrounded by a mix of Ethiopian and TFG forces for the security of the MPs.

However, all over the city, Al-Shabab fighters walk about freely.Contrary to the believes of Baidao's residents - that the city is not safe - MP Shati Gudud who is from Baidao told the press after MP Mohammed Usman Maye's assassination that the city is safe for everyone to live in.

So far, no one claimed responsibility which is in line with previous assassinations in Somalia.

Somalia Bombers Kill 21 Street Cleaning Women

MOGADISHU, Somalia (CNN) -- A roadside bombing in Somalia's capital killed 21 women who were cleaning rubbish from a southern Mogadishu street on Sunday morning, a hospital official said.

The bomb blast wounded another 46 people, most of them Somali women who had gathered to clean Maka Al Mukarama Road in southern Mogadishu's Kilometer 4 district, according to Medina Hospital director Dr. Dahir Dhere.

"It suddenly turned the area into a carnage, scattering body parts of the street cleaners into a large area," said witness Asha Ise Gedi. "There were pools of blood everywhere. I have never seen such mass killing."

"They were innocent poor mothers or sisters," Gedi said. "Why did they deserve this?"
It is unclear who is behind the attack.

• Mogadishu Mayor Mohamed Omar Habeb Mohamed Dhere, who was recently fired by the country's prime minister, blamed the Islamic Courts Union for waging the attack.
• But the head of the Islamist insurgent group, Abid Rahim Ise Adow, denied any involvement and blamed Somalia's government for orchestrating the attack. \

The victims were participating in a program that allows Somali women to work as street cleaners in exchange for food. The United Nations' World Food Program organized the program, which began last year and is administered by Mogadishu's regional authority.

On Saturday, two-thirds of the Somali government ministers announced their resignations, blaming Prime Minister Nur Hassan Nur Ade's "dictatorship," which they said included his firing of Mogadishu's mayor.

Nur Ade said he suspects the mass resignations were aimed at weakening implementation of the peace agreement between Somalia's transitional government and the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia.
He said he had no plans to resign.

CNN's Alan Duke and journalists Mohamed Amin Adow and Abdi

The Rest @ CNN

Aweys takes Control of Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS) Killing Somalia Peace Accord

(allAfrica -Garowe) An exiled Somali Islamist leader has declared himself the new chairman of an opposition coalition, which is led by another Islamist who inked a peace pact with the country's Ethiopian-backed interim government on June 9th.

Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, who lives in Eritrea, told the BBC Somali Service on Tuesday that he is now chairman of the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS), a coalition formed in September 2007 in Asmara that is composed of Islamists, ex-lawmakers and Diaspora activists.

"These men left...and the place [ARS] cannot be without leadership," Sheikh Aweys said, while referring to ARS Chairman Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and Central Committee head Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden.

Sheikh Aweys, whom the U.S. government accuses of having terror links, rejected the Djibouti Accord between the Somali government and the ARS as "dividing the people."

When asked if he was anti-peace, the Islamist leader responded by questioning how genuine the governments of Ethiopia and Somalia are about the prospects of peace in the country.

"There is no pure, dependable peace included in it [Djibouti Accord]," Sheikh Aweys said, adding: "The biggest problem is that Ethiopia is supposed to be expelled from the country [Somalia] and the expulsion of Ethiopia is not very clear in the paper [Djibouti Accord]."

The sheikh suggested that there is no question about the withdrawal of Ethiopian forces from Somalia, saying: "Ethiopia will leave, God willing."But he said the difference was in the way the Ethiopian army left Somali soil:

"The United Nations and the [Somali] Transitional Government want Ethiopia to leave saviors and helpers, but we want Ethiopia to withdraw as criminals who attacked a Muslim country."

In 2006, Sheikh Aweys and Sheikh Sharif were the twin heads of the Islamic Courts movement that seized the capital Mogadishu from warlords and threatened the Transitional Government and its Ethiopian allies with war.

Analysts describe Sheikh Aweys as a hardliner, while Sheikh Sharif has been embraced by many for his moderate qualities.

But one Islamist insider, who spoke with Garowe Online on the condition of anonymity, said that commanders of the Somali insurgency "are more in line" with Sheikh Aweys' position on the Djibouti peace deal.

AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.

The Rest @ All Africa.com

al Qaeda Afghanistan Gives Orders to al Qaeda in Somlia

On June 22, 2008, Islamist websites posted a video message by Al-Qaeda commander in Afghanistan Abu Yahya Al-Libi, titled "Somalia – No Peace without Islam."

• Al-Libi denounced the agreement signed earlier this month by the Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS) and the Somali government,
• He urges the Somali mujahideen to continue their jihad until an Islamic state is established in the country.
• He also calls on the mujahideen to oppose the deployment of international peacekeeping forces in Somalia, and exhorts them to fight "the collaborating apostate government in Mogadishu" even if some of its members are their own relative

Source - MEMRI

Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aways to Replace Sharif Sheikh Ahmed?

ASMARA, Eritrea June 21 (Garowe Online) - An Islamist hardliner has said that he will rise to become chairman of the opposition Alliance for the Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS), a Somali opposition group founded in Eritrea last year. (Picture - Garowe Online)

Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, designated a terrorist by the U.S. government, told Arabic newspaper Asharq al Awsat that he will replace current ARS Chairman Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed.

He accused Sheikh Sharif of being "too close the U.S. government," starting in January 2007 when Sheikh Sharif was apprehended by Kenyan police and later questioned by American officials at a hotel in Nairobi.

Sheikh AweysAccording to Sheikh Aweys, the current chairman of the ARS "violated" the opposition alliance's bylaws when he signed a peace pact with the Somali government on June 9th.

ARS members in the Eritrean capital of Asmara will convene in July to hold a meeting, where Sheikh Aweys is expected to be nominated to lead the opposition.

Sheikh Aweys, ARS defense secretary Yusuf Indha Ade and al Shabaab militants have all refused to recognize the June 9 agreement and vowed to continue the insurgency until Ethiopian troops leave Somali soil.

Sheikh Sharif and Sheikh Aweys were the leaders of the Islamic Courts movement, who ruled much of south-central Somalia in 2006 until being ousted by Ethiopian troops

The Rest @ Garowe OnLine

Somalia Peace Conference in Djibouti-update

Somalia groups want UN sanctions on warmongers

Published: Wednesday, 4 June, 2008, 01:57 AM Doha Time

DJIBOUTI: Somali civil groups yesterday urged the UN Security Council to impose sanctions on political leaders opposed to peace talks and to call for the withdrawal of Ethiopian forces backing the interim government.

The Somali government had said it hoped for a peace deal after members of the 15-nation Council met separately with its officials and opposition critics on Monday in Djibouti.

But leaders of the Islamist Al Shabaab insurgent group and more hardline elements of the Eritrea-based Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS) were absent.

The opposition figures who did attend demanded Ethiopian forces leave Somalia.In a statement released as Security Council members left for Sudan and the next leg of an African tour, nine Somali groups representing rights activists, women and elders lamented the “graveyards of missed and lost opportunities” in Somali history.

“The Security Council should impose targeted sanctions against any Somali leaders who are fomenting further violence and reject the Somali peace process,” it said.The group said Council members should also ask for the withdrawal of Ethiopian soldiers who helped the government oust an Islamist movement from the capital Mogadishu in late 2006.Since then, the Shabaab - remnants of that Shariah courts movement - have waged an insurgency of ambushes, roadside bombs and mortar attacks, sometimes briefly seizing smaller towns.

In March, Washington formally designated the militia as a foreign terrorist organisation, describing it as Al Qaeda’s main link in the Horn of Africa nation. Meanwhile, a prominent trader who had been instrumental in initiating a security scheme aimed at curbing violence in Mogadishu’s main commercial district was gunned down yesterday, witnesses said.Mogadishu traders committee spokesman Abas Mohamed Duale was shot dead by unidentified gunmen in the capital’s southern Debke neighbourhood.

“I saw three men intercepting the spokesman’s car. They sprayed gunfire on the vehicle, leaving him dead and his driver badly wounded,” said eyewitness Husein Mohamed.“We are very upset because we lost a man who was very important for the business community in Mogadishu,” said Ali Mohamed Siad, chairman of the capital’s Bakara market.Bakara market is Mogadishu’s main commercial hub and had been ravaged by daily clashes between Islamist insurgents and Ethiopian-backed Somali government forces since 2007.

An initiative was launched earlier this year whereby Bakara traders were allowed to take charge of their own security, with a pledge from the government to stop raids so long as insurgents were also kept at bay.The murdered Abas was a key figure in the implementation of the measure, which received support from Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein but met with some resistance from other key officials, including President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed.

The scheme had so far been relatively successful in restoring some stability to the Bakara area, where much of the Horn of Africa nation’s trading is done. Meanwhile, gunmen holding a Dutch-owned ship off northern Somalia yesterday demanded a $1.1mn ransom for the vessel, a day after the UN Security Council gave countries the right to combat piracy off the coast.The MV Amiya Scan, managed by the Dutch Reider Shipping BV, was hijacked by Somali pirates on May 25 as it made its way to Romania from the Kenyan port city of Mombassa.

“The pirates holding the Dutch ship demand a ransom of $ 1.1mn while the owners say they are willing to pay $700,000,” said a close ally of the pirates who gave his name only as Abdullahi. The company was not immediately available to comment.“Negotiations are ongoing and the crew are in good health,” Abdullahi added about the nine Russians and Filipinos.Abdullahi said he took food and other goods to the gunmen who were holed up in Eyl, a fishing town along the Indian Ocean.

The Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution on Monday authorising some countries to conduct anti-piracy actions in Somali waters after a surge in hijackings.Some Somali residents praised the resolution.“I think it is not an easy task to eradicate pirates from Somali waters, but Western countries can do a lot about it if they mean what they say,” said Abdi Naeem Olad, a 40-year-old Mogadishu resident. But others were sceptical that the resolution would have an impact on piracy that has made that section of the Indian Ocean one of the world’s most dangerous waterways.“If they can really stop the piracy it will be good. But I don’t think they can. That’s mere talk,” said Abdirizak Ali Ismail, a resident of the northern port city of Bosasso. – Agencies

The Rest @ Gulf Times (Doha)