Somali-Canadians Now Joining Jihad in Native Land

From CAN:

Up to five Somalis living in Canada disappeared earlier this month and the authorities are investigating whether they have joined the ranks of the Al-Shabaab terrorist group in Somalia, The National Post reports.

The individuals are believed to have flown together to Kenya, which borders the East African country currently suffering from a civil war.

“As you know, we have one of the largest Somali diaspora communities in the Western world,” the newspaper report quoted William Elliott, the Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mountain Police, as saying during an October 30 presentation.

“The potential follow-on threat, from a Canadian and RCMP [Royal Canadian Mountain Police] perspective, is Somali-Canadians who travel to Somalia to fight and then return, imbued with both extremist ideology and the skills necessary to translate it into direct action.”

The National Post reports that if the group has indeed joined the terrorist forces in Somalia, they wouldn’t be the first Canadians to do so.

A businessman in Toronto was killed in 2008 fighting Ethiopian troops that had intervened in the conflict, and a “handful” of others had also joined the fight.

Somali-Americans have also gone to Somalia to join al-Shabaab, at least two of which have since died in the conflict, including one who became the first American suicide bomber.

Press reports indicate that as many as 20 Somali-Americans have disappeared in the Minneapolis area and are believed to have gone to Somalia.

World Threats

Netherlands: ‘Ambassadors’ appointed to fight female circumcision

'Ambassadors' to fight against female genital mutilation were appointed by the deputy health minister Jet Bussemaker on Wednesday.

The ambassadors, who were appointed at an international conference to fight female genital mutilation in The Hague, are from African communities in the Netherlands.

They will pass on information on the dangers of female genital mutilation to parents who originally come from countries where the custom is practiced, such as Somalia, Ethiopia and Sudan.

In a TV interview on Tuesday, Bussemaker stressed that apart from causing terrible pain, female genital mutilation, also referred to as female circumcision or genital cutting, deprives women of their sexuality and carries grave lifelong health risks.


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Bussemaker also used the conference as a platform to launch a scheme after a French model whereby parents from high-risk countries are invited to sign a contract in which they undertake not to subject their daughters to genital mutilation.

The scheme is aimed at helping parents resist pressure from relatives by showing them the signed contract. It states that female genital mutilation is illegal in the Netherlands, and the parents risk prosecution if they allow it to be performed on their daughters.


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With thanks to Islam in Europe

U.K. Court Orders Release of Alleged Gitmo Torture Details

Britain's High Court ruled Friday that the government must disclose secret details of a former Guantanamo Bay detainee's alleged torture.

Judges said Foreign Secretary David Miliband should release undisclosed sections of a 2008 ruling on the treatment of Binyam Mohamed, despite Miliband's claim that to do so could harm intelligence sharing with the United States.

Mohamed, an Ethiopian who moved to Britain as a teenager, was arrested in 2002 in Pakistan. He alleges he was tortured there and in Morocco before he was transferred to Afghanistan and then to the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay in 2004.

His lawyers claim that seven paragraphs previously redacted from the 2008 ruling, which have seen by legal officials but not publicly released, offer critical details about Mohamed's treatment overseas.

Miliband had argued that disclosing details of Mohamed's treatment could damage intelligence cooperation between Britain and the United States.

He said the paragraphs include a summary of intelligence provided to Britain by the U.S. By tradition, intelligence services vow not to disclose details of each other's intelligence.

But Lord Justice John Thomas and Justice David Lloyd Jones ruled that releasing the paragraphs would pose no serious threat to national security.

They said they could not accept "that there is a real risk that the United States would reassess its intelligence relationship or reduce its intelligence sharing if we made the seven paragraphs public."

The judges did not immediately release the paragraphs or specify exactly when the details would be disclosed.

Miliband said he was "deeply disappointed" by the judgment and intends to appeal.

"It remains my assessment that the consequence of the court's judgment today, if left unchallenged, will be a restriction on what is shared with us," he said in a statement.

Several groups, including The Associated Press, had sued to make the information public.

Source: FoxNews

Egyptian Guards Shoot Man Trying to Cross Border

RAFAH, Egypt — Egyptian border guards have fatally shot an Eritrean man and wounded another trying to cross the border with Israel.

It is the eighth African shot at the border this month.

Security and hospital officials say the men were illegal migrants trying to cross into Israel near the Egyptian border town of Rafah on Tuesday.

They say the Africans ignored warning shots.

Three Ethiopians traveling with them told police they had paid Bedouin traffickers $1,000 each to cross the border.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Hundreds of Africans seeking jobs try to reach Israel every year.

Egypt has killed dozens of migrants at the border, drawing criticism from rights groups.

Source: FoxNews

Ethiopian troops enter Somali town

Ethiopian troops have crossed into neighbouring Somalia and seized control of a town from Islamist fighters, witnesses say.

Hundreds of troops reportedly entered the strategically important town of Beledweyne on Saturday.

Abdinur Ahmed Maow, a local resident, told The Associated Press news agency that the armed opposition fighters had left "without a single shot".

Abdulahi Faramiliq, another resident of Beledweyne, said that the troops were cordoning off residential areas and going from house to house searching for weapons.

However, General Muqtar Hassan Afrah, the Somali military commander in the region, denied that any Ethiopian troops were in the region.

Ethiopian forces withdrew from Somalia in January as part of a peace deal, more than two years after moving in to help the UN-backed interim government battle the Islamic Courts' Union, which had seized control of much of the south and centre of the country.

Their presence was unpopular with the majority of Somalis and was used by local Islamist groups as a recruiting tool.

Rashid Abdi, a Kenya-based Somalia analyst with the International Crisis Group, said that it is unlikely that Ethiopia is planning to send a larger force across the border.

"It's a strategic town for them," he said, referring to the Beledweyne's location near the border.

"They want a buffer zone and they won't allow it to be in hostile hands."

There have been several reports of Ethiopian troops crossing the border in recent months, but the Somali government has not confirmed their presence.

Somalia's government is struggling to control the country, despite including several factions of the Islamic Courts' Union.

Fighters from al-Shabaab and Hizb ul-Islam groups have seized control of large areas of the country and have vowed to topple the administration of Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, the current president and former Islamic Courts leader.

Source: Al Jazeera (English)

Islamist Insurgents Capture Somalia's Parliament Town

Ethiopian soldiers on truck during a farewell
ceremony which took place at the presidential
palace, Mogadishu, Somalia, 13 Jan. 2009

The Somali insurgent group al-Shabab has seized control of Baidoa, home of the country's parliament.

Witnesses say al-Shabab took over Baidoa Monday just hours after Ethiopian troops who supported the Somali government finished withdrawing from the town and the country.

Residents had reported heavy fighting ahead of the takeover. There has been no word on casualties.

Most Somali parliament members are currently in neighboring Djibouti for a special session that began Sunday.

Today, the lawmakers voted to double the size of parliament, to 550 members, in line with a peace deal the government reached in October with moderate Islamists.

Hardline groups such as al-Shabab have rejected that deal.

On Sunday, Ethiopian troops completed their pullout from Somalia after fighting the Islamists for more than two years in support of the Somali government.

Many Somalis were concerned the withdrawal would cause a power vacuum, and lead to more fighting. Various Islamist groups have taken control over much of the country in recent months, leaving the government in charge of only Baidoa and parts of the capital, Mogadishu.

The government has been hampered by infighting that led to the resignation of President Abdullahi Yusuf last month.

The lawmakers meeting in Djibouti are scheduled to elect a new president within days, after the new parliament members are seated.

A moderate Islamist group, the Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia, will take 200 of the new seats.

The alliance's leader, Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, is on a long list of candidates looking to become Somalia's next president.

Source: VOA News