Somali rebel group attacks capital for the third day

• Residents say four people were killed in the early morning fighting

MOGADISHU, Friday

Somalia’s rebel group al Shabaab attacked government positions near the president’s palace in the capital and four people were killed by return fire, residents said on Friday.

The fighting erupted in the Wardhigley district in the early hours of Friday, the third day of battles between the insurgents and government forces backed by African Union troops.

“Al Shabaab fighters arrived this morning at Aden Ade junction near the palace and fired mortars at the palace, prompting heavier shells,” resident Abdi Abdullahi told Reuters.

“The two groups are still exchanging shells. I have seen one dead and four injured.”

Ran away

At least 54 people were killed in the first two days of fighting as rebels tried to destabilise the government before a long-awaited offensive aimed at dislodging the insurgents from Mogadishu.

Another resident said a shell hit the vehicle he was travelling in and three civilians were wounded.

“We were going to Bakara market. When we ran away, we could see three dead men lying in an alley,” Aden Yusuf told Reuters.

Somalia has had no effective central government for 19 years and Western and neighbouring countries say the country provides sanctuary for militants intent on launching attacks in east Africa and beyond.

Meanwhile, A Somali businessman linked to Islamist rebels who likely received a ransom paid for kidnapped French aid workers was a contractor for the World Food Programme and UNICEF, a UN report said.

The confidential report by the UN Somalia Monitoring Group, seen by Reuters on Thursday, said the man, Adbdullah Ali Luway, and his links with Islamist al Shabaab militants was a case study in how UN agencies have unwittingly allowed aid for needy Somalis to enrich rebels.

Three French workers with humanitarian group Action Against Hunger were seized by gunmen in July 2009 and held for several months.

In October, a ransom of $1.36 million was paid into an account belonging to Luway at a money transfer firm in Baidoa, Somalia, the report said.

“A prominent businessman, Luway serves as a contractor for WFP and UNICEF in the Baidoa area,” it said, adding that he rents vehicles to both agencies and his water firm Gargarwadag often works for UNICEF.

He also receives $3,000 a month in rent from UNICEF, the United Nations children’s fund, for use of a building that formerly housed the parliament of Somalia, a virtually lawless country that has lacked an effective government since 1991.

In addition to his work with the United Nations, Luway had been the “local financier” of the al Shabaab authority in Baidoa since the Islamist group took control of the area in January 2009.

He is a “close associate” of Sheikh Muktar Robow Abuu Mansuur, a senior al Shabaab official, the report said.

The United States lists Robow as a terrorist.

Al Shabaab has pledged loyalty to al Qaeda and wants to impose its own harsh version of sharia law throughout the country.

Formal protest

Luway, the report says, is also believed to have been involved in the looting of the UN compound in Baidoa in July 2009, when UN vehicles were stolen and taken to Mogadishu.

“Luway has successfully exploited his social and political connections into an intermediary role between al Shabaab leadership in Baidoa and the United Nations — a situation that has evoked formal protest from clan elders,” it said.

The report, which was submitted to the UN Security Council’s Somalia sanctions committee and will be discussed by the council next week, says that as much as half the food aid sent to Somalia is diverted to a network of corrupt contractors, radical Islamist militants and local UN staff. (Reuters)