Eritrea warns West on sanctions over Somalia
PRESIDENT Isaias Afwerki of Eritrea has warned the international community that it would regret moves to impose sanctions on the country.
The UN Security Council is reviewing draft plans for punitive measures against the Red Sea state, which could include an arms embargo, travel bans and asset freezes for members of Eritrea's government and military.
The Asmara authorities are accused of backing an insurgency in Somalia by funnelling funds and weapons to rebels battling that country's UN-backed transitional government.
"The distorted and baseless anti-Eritrea accusations and intended measures in connection with the Somali issue would be a resort the authors and implementers stand to regret," state-run website shabait.com quoted the president as saying.
"There is no reason at all for Eritrea to send arms to Somalia where there exists huge arsenal of armaments for a long time and is still the centre of arms sales."
The president was critical of recent attempts to impose peace in the anarchic country.
"The course being pursued by the international community in general and the forces directly involved in the Somali issue in particular has failed to bear any fruitful outcome," he said.
The draft proposes a ban on all sales to Asmara of "weapons and ammunition, military vehicles and equipment, paramilitary equipment and spare parts."
It would also impose a travel ban and freeze the assets of political and military leaders and other Eritrean individuals and firms suspected of backing the hardline Islamist rebels.
Some analysts fear sanctions would punish a population already hit by drought and the global economic crisis, and that it may prove a rallying cry for the government.
But one Western diplomat defended the proposed measures. "They strike the right note between being too egregious to enforce upon a poor country, and being too soft to put any pressure on the government," the diplomat told Reuters.
"We shouldn't underestimate the travel bans and asset freezes, this economy relies on the financial and moral support of the Diaspora, which requires local officials drumming up support in other countries and carrying money back in," the diplomat said.
Fighting in Somalia has killed nearly 19,000 civilians since the start of 2007 and driven 1.5 million from their homes.
Snipers have taken over where bombers left off in Mogadishu, the war-wracked capital of Somalia where African Union (AU) peacekeepers are facing an uphill battle to counter the advance of Islamist insurgents.
Pinned-down peacekeepers here have orders to stay crouched behind their protective sandbags in the centre of Mogadishu.
"Otherwise, they'll take you out," said Lieutenant David Orejcho, one of 4,300 Ugandan and Burundian peacekeepers of the AMISOM force propping up the weak transitional government in the face of an Al Qaeda-inspired insurgency.
Orejcho's unit monitors the southeastern part of the city from a sandbag-cladded flat roof of an Arabian-style building with peeling paintwork.
AMISOM's white armoured vehicles had regularly been targeted by IED's (improvised explosive devices) planted along the avenue, which only stopped when the peacekeepers set up an advance post.
The AU's Somalia envoy said donors have released only 30 per cent of funds they pledged months ago toward bolstering Somalia's security, frustrating efforts to turnaround the lawless country.
His statement echoes similar comments made by aid workers this week about how donors have been slow to release money for health programs aimed at helping Somalis.
AU peacekeepers have not been paid for months, with the Burundian contingent not receiving their pay since April and those from Uganda going unpaid since May, AU envoy Nicolas Bwakira told journalists. Burundi and Uganda are the only countries that have contributed troops to the 5,100-strong AU peacekeeping force.
"No country would keep its forces without payment ... No democracy would do that," said Bwakira. "We are very disappointed and frustrated by the lack of delivery, or slow delivery on commitments."
In April, donors pledged more than $250 million to run an expanded AU force for a year and to strengthen Somalia's security forces. The pledges came after a peace deal saw moderate Islamists join the Somali government, with one of them being elected president in January.
Islamic insurgents have tried to topple the country's fragile UN-backed government for close to three years. It was hoped Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed's election as president would help undercut the insurgents. He has, however, failed in ending the insurgency and his government only controls a few blocks of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, with the help of AU troops.
Different Islamic insurgent groups control southern Somalia, where Mogadishu is located. Al-Shabab, an extremist group that the U.S. State Department has designated a terrorist organization, holds the largest chunk.
Bwakira, who is ending his term as AU envoy later this month, said that during his time as envoy the number of people displaced by the near daily violence in Mogadishu has doubled, exacerbating an already bad humanitarian situation where one in five children under the age of five is malnourished.
He said currently the number of people displaced from their homes is 3.6 million people, almost half the country's population, compared to 1.8 million in January 2008.
"It is a disastrous situation," said Bwakira. He added that the situation is made worse by the lawlessness in southern and central Somalia where many of the displaced people are located, making it difficult to deliver any aid to them.
Eric Laroche, the World Health Organisation's emergencies chief, described Somalia's humanitarian crisis as the worst it has been since the fall of the country's last effective government in 1991..
