EU to train Somali forces
2009-11-17 18:01
Brussels - The European Union may launch its mission to train Somali forces as early as next month, the bloc's foreign policy chief Javier Solana said Tuesday.
EU foreign and defence ministers, holding a rare joint meeting on Tuesday, were expected to give the go-ahead for military planners to mobilise the mission aimed at transforming Somali militia into the nucleus of a regular army.
The mission would send 200 European instructors to Uganda to train up to 2 000 Somali troops there. France, Uganda and Djibouti are already training 4 000 more Somali troops.
"We have been already with people in Kampala, in Uganda ... so it will not be a long time," Solana said. "I think that before the end of the year."
The training is part of a wider international effort to help stabilise Somalia's fledgling government, currently facing a massive rebellion by Islamic militants. The country has been without a functional government and army since 1991, when feuding warlords overthrew longtime dictator Siad Barre.
Recent attacks on African Union peacekeepers in Somalia have heightened fears that al-Qaeda is turning the country into a staging ground for operations in the Horn of Africa. Since the start of the year, US forces have stepped up strikes against the powerful Islamist militia Al-Shabab, which is using foreign fighters to expand al-Qaida operations.
"We have a country that has been devastated by 18 years of turmoil and civil strife, and we have a government ... which is weak and fragile and has great difficulty to consolidate the situation," said Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, whose country holds the EU's rotating chairmanship. "We will do everything to strengthen it."
- AP