Tension grips Somalia
2006-05-15 13:30
Mogadishu - Tension gripped the lawless Somali capital on Monday as a United States-backed warlord alliance denied it had agreed to a truce with Islamic militia to end more than a week of deadly violence.
The Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism (ARPCT) said it had not signed a ceasefire, allegedly brokered by elders on Sunday, but had stopped fighting because the Islamists had suspended attacks on its forces.
Alliance spokesperson Hussein Gutale Raghe said: "There is no ceasefire, only one group was responsible for this violence and if they stop, that is the end of the hostilities.
"The APRCT will not sign an agreement with foreign fighters or their hosts."
Islamists 'waging war'
He was referring to charges shared by the US that some of the city's 11 Islamic courts were harbouring extremists, including al-Qaeda members.
Raghe accused the Islamists of waging war against the local population in Mogadishu's northern Sisi neighbourhood, the epicentre of the fighting that erupted on May 7, killing at least 130 people, many of them civilians.
He said: "We are not fighting against the Islamic courts per se, but hunting for foreign terrorists who belong to al-Qaeda."
Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, the chairperson of the Islamic courts union, denied those charges and said the militia had agreed to a ceasefire at the request of the elders.
'We were attacked without any reason'
He said: "We accepted the ceasefire proposed by elders in north Mogadishu. We are not the attackers who need to stop violence. We were attacked without any reason."
The fighting was third serious round of violence between the factions since February and became the deadliest clashes the capital had seen in 15 years as the battles raged through all of last week.
Taking advantage of the lull, Sisi residents cautiously returned on Monday to inspect their homes after having fled the fighting, and found many hit by the indiscriminate barrage of heavy machine gun, artillery and mortar fire.
Women, kids 'not safe in Sisi'
But, columns of heavily armed fighters from both sides patrolled the tense streets of the district, which residents said had been effectively carved into two distinct sections: one controlled by the warlords, the other by Islamists.
Sisi resident Elmi Hassan said: "They look very tired. It is not yet safe to bring women and children back to Sisi. I am only here to take care of my property."
Hospital sources estimated that at least 130 people had been killed in the fighting with more than 300 wounded, although there were still widely divergent accounts of the death toll.
A doctor at Mogadish's Kayseney Hospital said: "We can't give an exact figure because of the complex nature of the fighting, but we estimate that at least 130 people were killed."