MOGADISHU — Somalia’s powerful Union of Islamic Courts began massing thousands of troops on the border with Ethiopia over the weekend, days after Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said he was ready to confront the Islamic militants in Somalia.
“War is imminent. There is no other alternative,” Islamist military officer Sheikh Mohamed Ibrahim Bilal said by satellite phone from the border. “Ethiopia declared war, so we will defend ourselves and protect our country and people.”
The Islamists have declared a jihad on Ethiopian troops in the country to back the weak transitional government based in the northern town of Baidoa.
Ethiopia last week said it was ready for a confrontation with the Muslim militants, who control most of the country.
Residents of the border area have begun fleeing.
Meles told a news conference on Saturday he had explained Ethiopia’s position to western powers. “Both Brussels and Washington appear to believe that any military response on our part might be counterproductive, saying that dialogue is the best way forward,” he said.
“We, too, agree that dialogue is the best way, nevertheless as the direct victims of the aggression, we feel we might be forced at some stage to respond with force.
“It is our country that is being attacked. Naturally, we do not seek any green, red or yellow from anyone to protect ourselves.
“If, and when, we are convinced that all options of resolving the invasion through peaceful means are exhausted, only then we may act to respond in kind,” Meles said. The Islamists had trained, armed and smuggled hundreds of Ethiopian rebels into the country, he said.
Ethiopia has in the past sent troops into Somalia to fight Islamist radicals, fearing they could stir up trouble in ethnic Somali regions on its side of the border.
Senior Somali Islamist Sheikh Sharif Ahmed has accused Washington of giving Ethiopia the go-ahead to fight his movement.
Meles was speaking two days after appearing in parliament to urge legislators to back plans to fight the Somali Islamists, although he has refrained from declaring outright war on them.
Ethiopia insists it has only sent a few hundred military trainers across the border, but a United Nations-commissioned report says it has deployed thousands of soldiers and weapons in Somalia.
In Mogadishu, senior Islamists and visiting parliamentary speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan on Saturday condemned the parliamentary address by Meles as “naked aggression”.
The group also issued a 10-point communique which called for the Islamists and the interim government to resume talks in Khartoum next month.
Talks between the two sides collapsed last month, with the Islamists saying they would not negotiate unless Ethiopian troops withdrew from Somalia.
Interim government Deputy Defence Minister Salad Ali Gele said the Islamists had to drop their demands before the government would return to talks.
Meanwhile, some 320 Ugandan soldiers arrived in a military plane at the Baidoa airstrip overnight on Friday as part of a regional peacekeeping mission that is vehemently opposed by the Muslim militants, said a government official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Security was stepped up at the government’s base in Baidoa, where the internationally backed government put a stop to all civilian flights. Experts have warned the conflict could escalate into an larger regional war.
Somalia has been without strong central rule since the 1991 ousting of a dictator plunged the country into anarchy. DPA, Reuters
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