The lawless Somali capital fractured along clan lines on Tuesday as members of a United States-backed warlord alliance sought refuge with traditional elders and vowed to resist Islamist control.
A day after Mogadishu’s 11 Islamic courts claimed victory over the warlords in four months of fierce fighting and said they would impose Sharia law, surrender talks were at a stalemate and the city appeared deeply divided.
Although there was no fighting, traditional clan elders in northern Mogadishu voiced support for the warlord alliance and warned the Islamists to stay clear of their territory.
Resistance was being led by the Abgal sub-clan, a faction of the larger Hawiye tribe — which comprises most people living in Mogadishu — which runs the northern part of the city and earlier organised a mass protest against the Islamic courts.
”We want to establish an Abgal sub-clan defence line, politically and militarily,” said Hussein Sheikh Ahmed, an influential elder who participated in failed talks for warlords to hand over checkpoints, weapons and materiel to the Islamists.
He said the Abgal would not accept the imposition of Sharia law in its territory and demanded that the Islamists stop any move to take over the area.
”Advances into Abgal territory should be halted immediately,” he said, noting that three warlords from the Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism (ARPCT) were currently the elders’ guests, and therefore under their protection.
”We are not discussing whether they are members of the ARPCT or not. We are treating them as members of the Abgal subclan,” Ahmed said.
Warlords Musa Sudi Yalahow, Omar Muhamoud Finnish and Bashir Raghe Shirar, who were holed up in northern Mogadishu, insisted their alliance was alive and well despite its apparent military defeat.
”I am still a member of ARPCT, the alliance still exists and there are no plans to disband it,” Shirar told Agence France-Presse.
He repeated long-standing alliance charges that the Islamists were harboring extremists, including al-Qaeda members.
”The Joint Islamic Courts union is not a religious organisation but a political one that wants to seize power and land,” he said.
”The ARPCT will continue to pursue its mandate.”
The alliance was created in February with US support in a bid to curb the growing influence the Islamic courts, hunt down the extremists they are accused of harboring and disrupt possible plans for terrorist attacks.
Immediately after its formation, the ARPCT began battling the Islamists, which declared a holy war against the warlords. At least 347 people were killed and more than 1 500 wounded in four months of clashes that followed.
Washington has never publicly confirmed or denied its support for the alliance but US officials told Agence France-Presse they had given the warlords money and intelligence help to rein in ”creeping Talibanisation” in Somalia.
The Horn of Africa nation was plunged into anarchy with the 1991 ouster of strongman Mohamed Siad Barre and analysts have long warned it could become a hotbed for radical Islam along the lines of Afghanistan. – Sapa-AFP