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Somalis Request AU to Speed Up the Troop Deployment

Shabelle Media Network (Mogadishu)
NEWS
February 28, 2007
Posted to the web February 28, 2007

By Aweys Osman Yusuf
Mogadishu
The Somali Diasporas in the Kenyan capital Nairobi appealed to African Union to
hasten the deployment of the African peacekeepers to the anarchic country,
Somalia, to let the thousands of Ethiopian troops leave the country.
Shabelle correspondent in Nairobi, Ismail Ali Abdi, said the Somali immigrants
in Nairobi's impoverished Eastleigh neighborhood have voiced anxieties over the
exacerbating plight in their homeland.
Meanwhile an African Union delegation is in the Somali capital Mogadishu on
Wednesday to evaluate the situation on the ground and the bases the
peacekeepers due to arrive in the country would be positioned, government
sources said.
Ugandan military spokesperson, major Flex Kulaza, who spoke with Shabelle on
Tuesday in an interview, said 1,500 Ugandan troops would be the first African
peacekeeping mission to arrive in the capital Mogadishu in a matter of days.
He refused to give a specific date when Ugandans would be in Somalia.
Major Flex said the Ugandan troops will be responsible for peacekeeping mission
in Mogadishu, while the other African peacekeepers would be stationed in other
provinces of the country.
Asked how they would react if the Ugandan troops were attacked while keeping
the peace in Mogadishu, "Of course, if the Ugandan troops are raided, they will
defend themselves," he said.


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