- Troop pull-out leaves government on brink

Troop pull-out leaves government on brink

Sunday Herald - October 15, 2008

Ethiopian withdrawal marks end of disastrous intervention that sparked new violence and suffering.

SOMALIA'S FRAGILE government appears to be on the brink of collapse. Islamist insurgents now controls large parts of southern and central Somalia - and are continuing to launch attacks inside the capital, Mogadishu.

Ethiopia, which launched a US-backed military intervention in Somalia in December 2006 in an effort to drive out an Islamist authority in Mogadishu, is now pulling out its troops.

Diplomats and analysts in neighboring Nairobi believe the government will fall once Ethiopia completes its withdrawal, and secret plans have been made to evacuate government ministers to neighboring Kenya.

That may happen sooner rather than later. A shipment of Ethiopian weapons, including tanks, left Mogadishu port last month as part of the withdrawal. Bringing the equipment back to Ethiopia by land would have been impossible - analysts believe Ethiopian troops and their Somali government allies control just three small areas in Mogadishu and a few streets in Baidoa, the seat of parliament. There are now estimated to be just 2,500 Ethiopian soldiers left inside Somalia, down from 15,000-18,000 at the height of the war.

Somalia's overlapping conflicts go back, at the very least, to 1991, the year the country's last recognized government was overthrown. Men & women who were children then have since given birth to a second generation of Somalis who have known only war. Read More.