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Thursday, April 10, 2008
MOGADISHU - Heavily armed Islamist insurgents have raided the Somali town of Jowhar, looting government buildings and freeing prisoners, residents told AFP.
"The Islamic courts fighters armed with machine guns and rocket launchers entered the town this morning," local resident Ibrahim Moalin Mohamed said. "They moved around the town for about an hour and a half and they left," he added.
Late last month, insurgents had already briefly taken control of Jowhar, a town located around 90 kilometres north of Mogadishu, sparking battles that left several dead.
This time, a local security official said that government forces had left the town before the raid and so there was no fighting.
During the brief seizure of the town, an Islamist commander urged residents to support Islamic rule.
Several residents said the insurgents looted government buildings, including the police commissioner’s home and the governor’s office.
The so-called Islamic courts are a fundamentalist militia which briefly controlled large parts of Somalia in 2006 and imposed a strict form of Sharia law.
They were ousted the next year by Ethiopian troops. While the Islamist political is now mostly exiled in Eritrea, the movement’s military wing has waged a deadly guerrilla war against Ethiopian forces and the government.
Source: AFP, April 10, 2008 |