US aims to stop Islamic extremists fleeing Somalia
Source: Reuters
WASHINGTON, Jan 3 (Reuters) - U.S. forces are deployed off the coast of Somalia to stop members of that country's ousted Islamist government with ties to al Qaeda and other extremists from fleeing, a State Department spokesman said on Wednesday. "We would be concerned that no leaders who were members of the Islamic Courts which have ties to terrorist organizations including al Qaeda are allowed to flee and leave Somalia," spokesman Sean McCormack said. "We of course have a presence off the coast of Somalia and Horn of Africa to make sure there are no escape routes by sea where these individuals could flee," McCormack said. He declined to provide details about the U.S. forces. The Islamists, who deserted their last stronghold on Monday after two weeks of war against Somali government troops backed by Ethiopia, have pledged to fight on after melting into the hills between the Indian Ocean port of Kismayu and Kenya. McCormack did not name specific extremists, but U.S. officials said before the war the top layer of the Somalia Islamic Courts Council (SICC) was controlled by a cell of al Qaeda operatives. The head of the council, Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, is on U.N. and U.S. extremist lists. During the six-month rule of the Islamists, U.S. officials tried with no success to persuade the SICC to give up three suspects wanted for the 1998 bomb attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania who Washington believed were in Somalia. Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi said on Tuesday that pro-Islamic fighters from Eritrea, Ethiopia and Arab countries were taken prisoner during the fighting. McCormack said the State Department would announce plans later on Wednesday to send humanitarian aid to Somalia. He also said that Jendayi Frazer, assistant secretary of state for African affairs, would co-host a meeting on Friday in Kenya top discuss the Somali situation. Frazer was in the Ethiopian capital for meetings with the leaders of Ethiopia and Uganda. Uganda is the only country so far to offer troops for an African peacekeeping force for Somalia endorsed before the war by the United Nations. European members of the International Contact Group on Somalia -- the German EU presidency, Sweden, Britain, Italy, the EU Commission and non-EU member Norway -- met in Brussels on Wednesday to push for a revival of the peace process between the Somali government and fleeing Islamists.
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