# No-win situation :  Why Ethiopia is pulling its troops out of Somalia - BBC News



## Yrys (17 Dec 2008)

Ethiopia's Somalia dilemma

Ethiopia entered Somalia two years ago to remove the Union of Islamic Courts , 
elements of whose leadership had been making provocative and aggressive 
statements about Ethiopia.

But the reality is that Ethiopian intervention, backed by the US and others, seems 
to have bolstered precisely the elements of the UIC, al-Shabab, that are most at 
odds with Ethiopia's interests and may very well have fatally undermined any chance 
Somalia's Transitional Federal Government (TFG) had of gaining legitimacy.

Ethiopia has announced that they will leave Somalia, come what may, by the end of 
the year. This announcement follows warnings to Somalia's government from its 
major backer to get its act together.

Ethiopian troops helped install the internationally recognised government in Mogadishu 
last year and without Ethiopian support ministers would still at best be holed up in Baidoa 
or more likely comfortably in the hotels of Nairobi.

But without popular support or local legitimacy the government has singularly failed to 
establish itself, as even President Abdullahi Yusuf appears to be admitting. 

More (Golden age, Hardship posting, Ongoing chaos,Best of a bad situation) on link


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## CougarKing (17 Dec 2008)

And here is an older BBC article from earlier this year which confirms the that the mostly Ugandan AU force there is too small for the task of helping the Somali transitional goverment stabilize the country if the Ethiopians leave...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7633625.stm



> *Stuck in the middle
> 
> But the AU troops are too thinly deployed to impose a military solution.
> 
> ...



From how I see it, if the International community wants to get rid of Somali piracy instead of just defensively reacting against individual pirate attacks, they should stabilize Somalia once and for all and finish the job they didn't finish back in the early 1990s. And such a mission, from what  observed at the other thread discussions here regarding how Sudan should be handled if it ever came to a mission being sent there, should be a peacemaking/combat mission, not a peacekeeping mission and the troops should be equippped as such.


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## Yrys (17 Dec 2008)

In the Somali pirates thread : UN chief rules out Somalia force



> "If there is no peace to keep, peacekeeping operations are not supposed to be there,"
> the UN chief said. Instead, he said, more efforts were needed on an inter-Somali
> peace process and to bolster the current African Union force.





Stabilizing Somalia seems to me a too long terms goal for politicians,
as oppose to sending the Navy to crush a few pirates boats and
gain voters approval.


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## Yrys (18 Jan 2009)

Islamists take bases in Mogadishu







The last Ethiopian troops in Somalia's capital have left Mogadishu and Islamist 
forces have taken over most of the bases they have left behind.

A BBC reporter says four of the six vacated bases have been taken over by 
insurgents from different factions, seemingly working together. Troops loyal 
to the interim government, which Ethiopia was supporting, have control of 
only two of the bases.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein says he wants to be president.
Abdullahi Yusuf resigned as president last month after falling out with Mr Hussein 
over attempts to negotiate a peace deal with the Islamist-led armed opposition.

But the opposition is split into various factions, and the more hardline groups do 
not support the peace process.

Ethiopia intervened in Somalia two years to help oust Islamists, who had taken 
control of much of the south of the country.

*Power vacuum*

The BBC's Mohamed Dhore in Mogadishu says African Union peacekeepers are 
guarding Mogadishu's presidential palace, but most positions in the capital have 
been filled by Islamist insurgents. He says government troops are in the former 
Ethiopian base at the southern entrance to the city and at the empty central 
hospital, Digfer.

Analysts had feared the withdrawal of the Ethiopians would lead to a power 
vacuum and fighting between rival Islamist factions. But at the moment all 
factions - whether they back the peace process with the government or not - 
seem to be working together.

Some 16,000 civilians have been killed in the conflict between Somalia's 
transitional government and the Islamists, and a million more have been 
forced from their homes.

Correspondents say that Mr Hussein - one of the architects of the peace deal - 
is hoping to capitalise on the Ethiopian withdrawal to win support for his 
presidential candidacy. Mr Hussein, a former humanitarian worker from 
Mogadishu and a member of the area's dominant Hawiye clan, has the 
backing of Igad, the East African regional grouping which brokered the 
agreement that led to the formation of the interim government in 2004.

"Today I want to announce that I am a candidate for the post of president 
which is expected to be contested soon and whoever wins it should peacefully 
and democratically run the country," Mr Hussein said.

*Hindsight*

Meanwhile, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has been defending his decision 
to oust Islamists two years ago. He said the reason Ethiopia had intervened was 
to avert a clear and present danger to its own security and because it was asked 
to by the Somali transitional government. Bringing peace and stability was 
something Somalis could only do themselves, he said.

Speaking at a news conference in the Ethiopia capital, Addis Ababa, he said that 
with hindsight, he would do the same again.

"I would without hesitation, have intervened again if I had to do it all over again," 
he said. "Now that does not mean I would repeat all the specifics of that intervention.
"Only stupid people would repeat everything they did in the past. So obviously if 
we were to do it again we would do it better. But we would do it nonetheless."

He however said Ethiopian troops would not be rushed into leaving the rest of 
the country - and that they would remain in force along the border.

The US wants the United Nations to take over peacekeeping duties from the 
African Union. But last month UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said few 
countries were willing to send troops to Somalia, as there was no peace to keep.

Somalia has not had an effective national government since 1991, since when 
various militias have been battling for control.


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## geo (18 Jan 2009)

let's just blocade the country.... 
Let the various factions fight it out to the very last bullet, the very last man.
If citzens want to leave the country, fine let them exit thru the picket, we can provide refuge in neighbouring countries.
Don't let anything in - no food, no water, no weapons.... Nothing, nada, zip.

Until such time as they are all fought out, there is absolutely no hope of a political settlement.

Last one out, please turn the lights out.


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## Yrys (25 Jan 2009)

Ethiopia pulls its troops from Somalia





Ethiopian soldiers man a position in Mogadishu, Somalia, in June.





Islamist fighters relax on January 12 at a base in Somalia formerly occupied by Ethiopian soldiers.

(CNN) -- Ethiopia said Sunday it has withdrawn all its troops from Somalia, 
two years after the soldiers were deployed to prop up Somalia's transitional 
government.

The troops arrived in the Ethiopian border town of Dollow on Saturday and 
were greeted warmly by residents and officials there, the country's defense 
ministry told CNN.

As troops withdrew from around the Somali capital, Mogadishu, last week, 
forces from different Islamist groups -- including the hard-line Al-Shabab, 
which the United States has designated a terror organization -- took control 
of bases the Ethiopians abandoned. "The city is almost under Islamist rule," 
said a local journalist who did not want his name revealed. "You can hear 
different names of the Islamist groups taking control in many parts of the city."

Ethiopia invaded Somalia in December 2006 to reinstall a U.N.-backed 
transitional government in Mogadishu after a hardline Islamist group 
overtook the capital and seized power.

Ethiopia's invasion had the blessing of the United States, which accused 
the Islamic Courts Union -- which captured Mogadishu earlier that year -- 
of harboring fugitives from al Qaeda.

The Islamists responded with a guerrilla campaign against government 
and Ethiopian troops. Efforts to replace the Ethiopians with an African 
Union-led peacekeeping mission faltered as the violence worsened, and 
heavy fighting in Mogadishu and other cities drove hundreds of thousands 
from their homes.

The lawlessness also spilled onto the seas off the Horn of Africa, where 
international vessels are routinely hijacked by pirates, suspected to be Somali, 
who demand large ransoms. And the transitional government was wracked by 
a power struggle between Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein and President 
Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, who resigned in December.

Ahmed attempted to fire Hussein for being ineffective. But Hussein said the 
president did not have the power to fire him, and the vast majority of members 
of parliament backed Hussein in a vote of confidence.

Hussein said last week that he would run for president, and lawmakers were 
expected to meet this week.


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