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Somali fighters seize 2nd town
07/03/2008 13:05 - (SA)
Mogadishu - Islamist insurgents killed five government soldiers while briefly seizing a strategic town in central Somalia late on Thursday, said police and residents.
A police officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, said several military vehicles were also destroyed in Belet Weyne, the provincial capital of the central Somali region of Hiraan, 320km north of Mogadishu.
Belet Weyne was near a critical road junction that linked Somalia to the border with Ethiopia, the government's ally. Hundreds of troops were stationed at the junction, which was also Ethiopia's main supply route.
The officer said: "They launched a surprise attack on the town from different directions, facing pockets of resistance from government forces and immediately took the control of the police station, the prison and a hotel government regional officials were using."
'The area is now calm'
The town's police chief, Colonel Abdi Aden, confirmed that five government soldiers had been killed and several military vehicles destroyed.
Local resident Duniyo Ali said the fighters had retained control of the town for about three hours before voluntarily withdrawing. The area was now calm, she said.
On Thursday, residents said Islamists seized Hudur, a strategic southwestern Somali town that lied along the road leading from Ethiopia into Somalia, without firing a shot.
On the other side of the country, on Monday, the United States launched a missile strike targeting a suspect in the 1998 bombings of two US embassies in Africa.
Islamist fighters had vowed to wage an Iraq-style war on the shaky Western-backed transitional government after Somali troops supported by their Ethiopian allies chased the Islamists from power in December 2005.
Extreme religious laws
The Islamists had seized control of much of the south and the country's capital, Mogadishu, which they had held for six months.
While many Somalis did not support the more extreme religious laws enforced by the fighters, the Islamists managed to significantly reduce the number of militia roadblocks and street fighting between clans that had plagued the Horn of Africa nation since dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown by a group of warlords in 1991.
The insurgents were backed by Ethiopia's archenemy Eritrea, which had faced consistent criticism from human rights groups. Since the Islamists launched their insurgency, thousands of Somalis had been killed.
Somali government troops and officials came under daily attack and the United Nations-backed administration was viewed by many Somalis as corrupt and ineffective. The impoverished country was riven between warring clans and awash with weapons.
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