By C. Bryson Hull
Friday, December 29, 2006
Crowds lined the streets as the Western-backed interim government's premier drove into the bullet-scarred capital in a 22-car convoy including six "technicals", pick-up trucks mounted with heavy weaponry, a Reuters witness travelling with Gedi said.
He drove to Mogadishu international airport before heading for the city's sea port, where Somali government soldiers stood guard on nearby streets. Six Ethiopian military trucks were positioned inside the port territory.
Somali government troops and their Ethiopian allies earlier took control of the former US embassy building in the west of Mogadishu, tightening their hold on the capital.
Residents had begun venturing out of their homes as the sporadic gunfire heard through the previous day abated, and there were no further reports of widespread looting seen on Thursday.
"Ethiopian troops and government soldiers have settled in the compound of the former US embassy. I can see more than 30 Russian-made military trucks," said Abdi Hassan, one of hundreds of local residents gathered outside the former US mission.
The embassy compound, in a western neighbourhood of the coastal city, was abandoned more than a decade ago after US forces made a humiliating retreat from Somalia following an ill-fated mission depicted in the film Black Hawk Down.
Government forces took effective control of Mogadishu on Thursday after a 10-day offensive with Ethiopian allies to reclaim much of the territory seized by the Somalia Islamic Courts Council (SICC) since June.
Gedi said parliament would vote to declare martial law to maintain control of a country which has been without an effective central government since the 1991 overthrow of a dictator.
The flight of the Islamists was a dramatic turn-around in the Horn of Africa nation after they had spread across the south imposing strict sharia rule and confining the interim government to its base in the provincial town of Baidoa until less than two weeks ago.
Ethiopian troops and air strikes were critical to the government's assault, experts say, and there is some question what will happen when Addis Ababa finally withdraws its forces.
With Eritrea accused of backing the Islamists, many feared the conflict could engulf the Horn of Africa. Ethiopia, like the United States, says the Islamists are supported by al-Qaeda.
Source: Reuters, Dec 29, 2006