Yearbook 1999
Somalia. In divided Somalia, clan militia began to turn into tools for the warring neighbors of Ethiopia and Eritrea. Ethiopian forces led the search for the Oromo guerrilla OLF and other resistance movements deep into Somalia. Visit Countryaah official website to get information about the capital city of Somalia. The Ethiopians had an ally in the Rahanweyn Resistance Army (RRA), which fights for control of parts of southwestern Somalia in conflict with the warlord Hussein Aidid and who in June occupied the important city of Baidoa. Aidid provided the OLF with Eritrean weapons, many of which stayed with his own militia.
- Also see Abbreviationfinder.org to see the acronym of SOM which stands for Somalia and other definitions of this 3-letter abbreviation.
In November, Aidid agreed with Ethiopia to suspend cooperation with OLF. The Oromogerilla was disarmed and ordered to leave Somalia. In return, Ethiopia promised to evacuate occupied land in Somalia. The agreement, a result of Libyan and Egyptian mediation, came to fruition after OLF was already weakened by losses inside Ethiopia.
Peace and some economic recovery prevailed in the outbreak republic of Somaliland in the northwest. President Mohammed Ibrahim Egal visited the United States and appealed to the UN for international recognition.
In February 2012, a conference on Somalia in London was attended by representatives from 60 countries and the UN. However, the conference did not have the participation of al-Shabaab, who continued to control half the country. The focus of the conference was neither peace nor the extensive human rights violations in the country, but the pirate company that cost the British insurance companies with Lloyds at the forefront. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon called for an extension of the conflict by increasing AMISOM from 12,000 to 17,000 soldiers.
In August 2012, Parliament passed a new interim constitution, which transformed Somalia into a federation of states.
In September 2012, presidential elections were held. The president was elected by parliament. In the first round, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud got 22.2% of parliamentarians votes, while Sharif Sheikh Ahmed got 23.7%. In the second round, Mohamud got 70.6% while Ahmed got 29.4%. Six days after the election, Mohamud was deployed to the post, and in October he appointed Abdi Farah Shirdon as his prime minister.
Al-Shabaab repeatedly tried to hit the president. Two days after the election and before he was deployed, two al-Shabaab suicide bombers burst into the air at the Jazeera hotel, where Mohamud was speaking. 10 were killed but Mohamud escaped. In September 2013, his car driver passed a roadside bomb, but he survived as well.
The president’s immediate goal was to lift the UN arms embargo of the country adopted by the Security Council in 1992. However, heavier weapons and ground-to-air rockets were still subject to blockade. In March 2014, the suspension of the blockade was extended for another 7 months.
In 2013, both government forces and al-Shabaab faced serious human rights violations: targeted killings, child soldiers recruitment, arbitrary trials, attacks on journalists, rape. In addition, major actions were taken by al-Shabaab in Mogadishu: In April, the movement attacked the central court of Mogadishu, 30 were killed; In June, the UN complex in Mogadishu was attacked, 14 killed; In September, the Village restaurant was attacked and 15 killed. However, al-Shabaab’s most extensive attack was the attack on the Westgate shopping center in Nairobi, Kenya in September that cost 67 lives.
In August 2013, the central government signed a reconciliation agreement with the autonomous Jubaland government in northern Somalia. As part of the agreement, Jubaland was to continue to be ruled by the autonomous government for the next two years, but with Mohamud as president, and Jubaland’s military was to be integrated into the central government’s military forces.
The European Court of Human Rights issued a ruling in September confirming that a rejected Somali asylum seeker could be sent back from Sweden to Somalia. The Human Rights Court’s ruling was sharply criticized by international human rights organizations.
