Wednesday, November 16, 2011
"We would love to see the international community, with the US right up there, engaging in Somalia in ways in which they have not for quite a long time," Ambassador Macharia Kamau told AFP in an interview.
Kenya deployed tanks and troops to the Shebab-controlled southern Somalia on October 14 to fight the Al-Qaeda-linked rebels Nairobi blames for kidnapping foreigners and making cross-border raids.
"We would like to see the US and the international community taking advantage of basically what Kenya is doing, which is putting troops on the ground, taking risks that need to be taken to achieve the goals that we all say need to be achieved, which is to bring peace and security to Somalia," he said.
The ambassador was due to meet with Democratic Senator Al Franken and Democratic Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota, a state with a vast Somali-American community that al-Shebab has tapped for recruits, and Republican Senator Mark Kirk, who has sounded the alarm over the al-Qaeda linked group.
The diplomat said Shebab was training "over 40 known American citizens" in Somalia, warning that there was "a direct line" from the group "right back to American cities" that "poses a clear and present danger for Americans."
"We should never forget that what's going on in Somalia, while it might appear to be far away, out in the middle of nowhere, has tentacles that stretch back to the United States," he cautioned.
And he made a fresh appeal to the United States to consider imposing a blockade on the rebel-held Somali port of Kismayo to choke off the rebels' supply line, a move Washington has been reluctant to support.