BOSASSO, 13 December 2007 (IRIN) - In mid-November, Fadumo Abdullahi, 30, fled fighting in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, and is now living in a cramped, makeshift camp for the displaced on the outskirts of Bosasso, the commercial capital of the self-declared autonomous region of Puntland, northeastern Somalia.

From Bosasso, Abdullahi hopes to make her way to Yemen, from where she will proceed to Saudi Arabia where she hopes to survive as an immigrant. Abdullahi left her four children with her mother in a camp for the displaced near the town of Afgoye, 30km south of Mogadishu.

Bosasso is 1,500km northeast of Mogadishu and has become the port of preference for those who undertake the arduous journey to Yemen.

"We used to live in Hamar Ja Jab [south Mogadishu] and I worked in the market selling vegetables to support my family, but it got so dangerous we could not go to the market. After we fled, my mother suggested that I leave and look for something better, while she looks after the children.

"That is when I decided to come to Bosasso and then go on to Yemen and from there to Saudi Arabia. The trip to Bosasso took us 10 days; there were many people like me who were going to Bosasso. Many were robbed on the way by Mooryaans [bandits] manning checkpoints on the road. Sometimes they just shoot people.

"Our truck was lucky; we did not have any incidents but I heard that people in another truck were not so lucky. Two of them were wounded and they were left behind in a village on the way to Bosasso.

"I have no relatives here, so I stay at the camp [for internally displaced people] during the night and during the day I go out to people's homes to take away their rubbish. They pay me 5,000 shillings [about 25 US cents] for every load of garbage I remove. On a good day I make about 25,000 [$1.25] but some days I get nothing.

"I know the danger I face going to Yemen, but what is the alternative? In Mogadishu, you don't know from day to day whether you will see another sunset. You hear about women robbed or raped every day. My neighbour was raped and then beaten badly with a gun by soldiers. She was in hospital, not dead but not alive.

"That is when we moved and my mother and I decided that I should take the risk of going to Saudi. I know going to Yemen I may die but only once. There are worse things than that kind of dying, and that was staying in Mogadishu."

ah/mw

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