02 Apr 2007: ISS Today: Guns Silent in Mogadishu, Hundreds Thought Dead

2 April 2007: Guns Silent in Mogadishu, Hundreds Thought Dead
Sahal Abdulle, Reuters

 

One explosion and some gunfire sounded across Mogadishu on Monday morning, but the Somali capital was generally quieter after four days of non-stop battles pitting Ethiopian and Somali troops against insurgents. Residents say several hundred people have died since soldiers launched an offensive against the rebels on Thursday.

 

Commentary

 

By the middle of last week, it appeared that a tentative ceasefire might hold in Somalia’s embattled capital, Mogadishu. Agreement seemed to have been reached between elders of the locally dominant Hawiye clan and Ethiopian forces backing the Darod led Transitional Federal Government (TFG) that might pre-empt the threat by the latter to pursue the policy of disarming the city’s numerous militiamen. This exercise was touted as a necessary preliminary to the holding of a national reconciliation congress in the capital in mid-April.

 

There were already many observers questioning the purpose of this congress, or the likelihood of it being held in the absence of massive foreign funding. Mixed signals were emanating from the leadership of the TFG about the agenda and the selection of clan delegates. Nevertheless, the consolidation of last week’s truce might have left the way open for face-saving compromises, even if reconciliation had to be delayed given the understandable levels of mutual distrust.

 

Then, on last Thursday, Ethiopian forces backing TFG troops launched a massive attack on areas of the city believed to be sheltering remnants of the so-called Islamic militias defeated in the short campaigns of December and January. Resistance was fierce, especially from the Hawiye, who interpret any attempt to disarm them in their own city as subjugation to the Darod supported by a foreign invader. Ethiopia’s use of helicopter gunships, heavy artillery and armour in urban operations has drawn severe criticism form the UN Secretary-General, and the casualty lists seem to be composed principally of unarmed civilians, whose losses have also been increased by the “insurgents’” use of heavy machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades.

 

Not surprisingly, the downing of an Ethiopian helicopter and incidents in which the corpses of slain fighters have been subjected to abuse have given rise to easy comparisons with the incidents commemorated in Black Hawk Down, and eye-witnesses describe this as the most violent and destructive fighting in 15 years.

 

The African Union peacekeeping force, of which only the Ugandan contingent has so far arrived, has done its best to maintain a low profile and to assure the Hawiye of its neutrality in inter-clan conflict. Nevertheless, Yesterday the Ugandans suffered their first fatal casualty, the victim of a mortar round that landed in the presidential compound. Calls for other African countries to fulfil their pledges of troop contributions seem unlikely to receive a response under current conditions, and the worst fear is that this violent military operation has made reconciliation, between the Hawiye and Darod in particular, a very distant possibility.

 

The UN, too, is faced with a conundrum. The Ethiopian government has little incentive to maintain an occupation force, which would continue to suffer a string of casualties even if whole-scale fighting were to cease. The Ethiopians say they cannot complete their planned withdrawal until an adequate AU peacekeeping force is in place, which would take several months even under favourable conditions. Under the current circumstances the AU itself must be at pains not to be seen as a surrogate for the hated Ethiopians, or its potential role as honest broker will be forfeit, in much the same way as has happened in Darfur. Yet one of the understandings at the AU was that its deployment would be a stop-gap measure and that the UN would take responsibility by mid-year for the peacekeeping mission. This, again, now seems fanciful, as do the UN plans for Somalia’s reconstruction.

 

Unless there is a dramatic change of heart on the part of the TFG and its military backers, it seems increasingly likely that Mogadishu is looking at months, if not years of sporadic outbursts of extreme violence, in which the civilian population will suffer, whether it stays put, or seeks refuge in flight.

 

The duration of this latest lull in the heavy fighting will be an indication of whether there is a genuine will to find a political solution to this appalling episode.

 

Richard Cornwell, African Security Analysis Programme, ISS Tshwane (Pretoria)