US operations in Somalia will go on until key al-Qaeda targets are eliminated, a Pentagon official said on Wednesday, as debate sharpened over Washington's next move in the stricken nation.
The remarks followed last week's assault in Somalia using a fearsome AC-130 aircraft which US officials say killed at least eight people, described in Washington as radicals sheltering al-Qaeda's top Africa leadership.
The fact that the top members of Osama bin Laden's network are still presumed at large in the country is sparking speculation of possible follow-up operations and questions on whether Somalia will become the latest hot battlefront in the "war on terror."
PHOTO: AFP
Theresa Whelan, US deputy assistant secretary of defense for African affairs, said on Wednesday US forces were working to ensure "international terrorists who were seeking refuge in Somalia are brought to justice."
"When that is done, our operations will cease," she said, at a half-day conference on Somalia sponsored by US think tanks, without specifying how long operations might continue or offering details on future US troop deployments.
Some observers saw the strike as presaging an attempt to snuff out any resurgence of the fundamentalist Islamic Courts movement, which took control of most of Somalia last year before being ousted in a US-backed Ethiopian offensive.
Al-Qaeda
The strike also fits into a long-term US goal of ensuring East Africa does not succeed Afghanistan as an al-Qaeda terror base.
Speculation over possible future US action is also being spurred by the mighty firepower of a US aircraft carrier battlegroup prowling off the African coast.
"It's a good question, and it's easier to pose it than answer it," said John Pike, an analyst with GlobalSecurity.org.
"It would appear that the Islamic Courts envisioned a Taliban-like enterprise -- just because we have run them out of downtown Mogadishu, doesn't mean we have heard the end of it," he said.
Exaggerated?
Critics of US policy say Washington exaggerated al-Qaeda's sway on the movement, in pursuit of their own geopolitical ends in the strategically sensitive Horn of Africa region.
"I think the US and Ethiopia overstated the case in order to justify the military intervention and ongoing air strikes," said John Prendergast, of the International Crisis Group.
"There is certainly a dangerous al-Qaeda cell on the Indian Ocean coast that used Somalia as a safe haven and transshipment point [but] this kind of short-term military tactic devoid of any political strategy will backfire in the long run," he said.
Senior US officials argue however that security operations in Somalia co-exist with vigorous US diplomatic and political attempts to stabilize the fragile state after its latest political earthquake.
As well as chasing terrorists, Washington was also trying to mobilize global support for Somalia's weak transitional government, and to speed the deployment of an African peacekeeping force, Jendayi Frazer, assistant US secretary of state for African affairs, said at the conference.
Clan elders and residents in the area targeted by the US operation close to the Kenyan border claimed 100 people were killed in numerous air strikes on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of last week.
Washington has said however that no civilians were killed and that US forces carried out only a single air strike.
"High value" al-Qaeda militants the US believes are in Somalia include Comoran Fazul Abdullah Mohammed and Kenyan Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, blamed for the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 people. Materials used in the blasts were smuggled through Somalia.
The other is Abu Taha al-Sudani, a Sudanese alleged to be close to al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
Stephen Morrison, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies which hosted the conference, said a US program that simply prioritized hunting alleged terrorists was insufficient.
"We know [the US] approach has been very concentrated on the counter-terror side that is highly controversial," he said at the conference. "We need to be thinking about how we move beyond that."
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese