AFRICA/SOMALIA - Al Qaida alarm in Somalia. “Annalena Tonelli was the frist victim of a new fundamentalist group connected with the international network of terrorism which wants to turn Somalia into another Iraq”

Monday, 11 July 2005

Mogadishu (Fides Service)- Italian doctor Annalena Tonelli, murdered on 5 October 2003 (see Fides 6 October 2003) at Borama, Somaliland (northern Somalia) was killed by a group linked with the international network of terror active in Somalia in recent years according to a report issued yesterday Sunday July 10 by the International Crisis Group. The information has been confirmed to Fides by local sources which we will not name for security reasons. “Annalena Tonelli and other western humanitarian workers killed in the last 2 years in northern Somalia were victims of a fundamentalist group connected with the international network of terror” our sources say and they recall the alarm raised last year with regard to a “price” put on the heads of westerners in Somalia (see Fides 15 April 2004). “Foreign terrorists present in Somalia, offer 5,000 US dollars for every foreigner murdered. The family of a suicide bomber receives 25,000 US dollars” although they cannot say whether this still holds.
“Somali groups connected with international fundamentalist-Islamic terrorism have formed an alliance with Mogadishu warlords who do not want the new government to be installed” (see Fides 14 June 2005) the sources say.
International Crisis Group said the new group “based in lawless Mogadishu and led by a young militia leader trained in Afghanistan, made its presence known by killing 4 foreign humanitarian workers in the relatively safe territory of Somaliland between October 2003 and April 2004”.
“The threat of Jihad terrorism in Somalia is real” the report says, warning that the group may exploit the presence of foreign peacekeepers in Somalia. This group sees the arrival of foreign troops in Somalia (mainly from bordering countries) as an opportunity to make Somalia another Iraq”. In fact the group is still small but it wants to enter political life in Somalia taking advantage of warlord rivalry and growing hostility towards foreign troops sent to support the new government of Somalia.
The report said if the government fails to take control of the situation, “the jihadis will gradually find growing purchase among Somalia's despairing and disaffected citizenry, and it will only be a matter of time before another group of militants succeeds in mounting a spectacular terrorist attack against foreign interests in Somalia or against one of its neighbours”. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 11/7/2005 righe 38 parole 445)


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