Somali leader orders holy war on Ethiopia

updated 3:08 p.m. ET July 21, 2006

MOGADISHU, Somalia - An Islamic militia leader whose forces control the capital called for a holy war Friday against Ethiopian troops protecting Somalia’s weak U.N.-backed government.

Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys, speaking on Radio Shabelle, said Ethiopia’s decision to send troops to protect the transitional government in Baidoa, 150 miles northwest of Mogadishu, must be met with war.

“I am calling on the Somali people to wage a holy war against Ethiopians in Baidoa,” said Aweys, accused by the United States of having ties to al-Qaida. “They came to protect a government which they set up to advance their interests.”

Residents of Baidoa reported seeing hundreds of Ethiopian troops, in uniform and in marked armored vehicles, entering Baidoa on Thursday and taking up positions around transitional President Abdullahi Yusuf’s compound. Ethiopian and Somali government officials have denied Ethiopian troops are in the country, though witnesses from five towns reported seeing them.

“Abdullahi Yusuf is in the pocket of Ethiopia,” Aweys said in the nationwide broadcast. “He’s been a servant of Ethiopia for a long time.”

Islamic militants had rallied people to condemn the presence of Ethiopians after Friday prayers.

Anti-Ethiopian, anti-U.S. demonstrations
Demonstrators in Mogadishu shouted anti-Ethiopian and anti-U.S. slogans as they marched in the capital, accompanied by dozens of Islamic militiamen and trucks mounted with heavy weapons.

“We are against Ethiopian troops invading our country,” read some of the banners carried by demonstrators, most of them men.

“God is Great!” shouted the protesters.

Radical Islamic militia, however, later gunned down two people during a rare demonstration against the rulers of Mogadishu.

“We don’t want Islamic movements!” the protesters shouted before fleeing the gunfire, the Banabir radio station reported.

Baidoa residents appeared unfazed by the presence of Ethiopian troops. Tensions sparked by fears of attacks by Islamic militants eased Friday in the town.

The troops, wearing military uniforms, deployed near the Somali president’s home in Baidoa, at the airport and on the outskirts of the town, residents said by telephone.

Ethiopia’s move could give the internationally recognized Somali government its only chance to curb the increasing power of the militia, known as the Supreme Islamic Courts Council.

But Ethiopia’s incursion also could be the pretext the militiamen need to build public support for a guerrilla war. Militiamen already control the capital and most of the rest of southern Somalia.

Ethiopia continued to deny its troops were in Somalia.

“There are no Ethiopian troops who have crossed the border into Somalia,” Ethiopian Foreign Ministry spokesman Solomon Abebe told The Associated Press. “How can they tell who is Somali and who is Ethiopian?”

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