MOGADISHU (Somalilandpress) –The Somali envoy to the United nations security council, Elmi Ahmad Du’ale, has said the sanctions imposed on Eritrea by the Security Council on 23 December were “proof” that the country aided terrorism.
The Security Council on Wednesday imposed sanctions Eritrea over providing military support to Islamist insurgents battling the Somali government.
“The sanctions were based, first and foremost, on proof that Eritrea supports terrorism and extremist groups opposed to the Somali government, which have been the stumbling block to stability in Somalia” Du’ale said in a strong drawl in an interview with Hornafrik local radio in Mogadishu on Thursday.
[ad#Google Adsense (250×250)]
He said the horn of Africa nation was on the shoulder of the militant groups fighting to topple Somalia’s weak transitional government.
‘’Eritrea supports these groups by providing arms, financial and moral support. Eritrea continues to host Somalia’s rebel hardliners who are opposed to peace in Somalia. These were the conditions which the sanctions was based on” he added.
The Ugandan-drafted text imposes an arms embargo on Eritrea, as well as travel restrictions and asset freezes on the country’s political and military leadership.
“There were resolutions before the current one, the international community led by the Security Council, African Union, United States and Somalia have all warned Eritrea over and over again against destabilizing Somalia however Eritrean leaders ignored international demands. Eritrea even refuses to recognize the Somali government. That was it,” the Somali envoy said.
Djibouti, like Somalia also welcomed the sanction since Eritrean forces occupy parts of Djibouti and refuse to withdraw it’s troops.
Eritrea has repeatedly denied the allegation. “The draft resolution is based on unfounded accusations against Eritrea on the issue of Somalia,” Ambassador Araya Desta said in a letter.
Thirteen of the council’s 15 members voted in favor of Resolution 1907. Veto-wielding China abstained, while Libya, the lone Arab council member and the current African Union chair, voted against that resolution.
Mr Duale, a medical graduate from Sapienza University of Rome became the Permanent Representative of Somalia to the United Nations in 2005.
Somalia has not had a functional government since 1991 and is been mired in chaos ever since.
MOGADISHU (Somalilandpress) — The United States government which continues to provide support to the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia [TFG] has said senior Al-Qaida members have arrived in Somalia after embarking on a long journey from the Afghan mountains of Tora Bora.
A report from the US State Department said the Al-Qaida fugitives are planning to re-establish itself in Somalia using insurgent groups fighting to topple the Somali government and opposed to the presence of foreign troops in the country as a proxy.
[ad#Google Adsense (336×280)]
The report said their forces in Iraq and Afghanistan have learnt that top Al-Qaida officials have made their way to Yemen and Somalia where they are planning to melt into the community and carry out their global agenda.
The report was published in US government website and has been confirmed by Bryan G Whitman, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs. Mr Brian said it is now inevitable that the United States would be involved and may form and deploy a special task force in Somalia.
He reassured that the US government will continue to support the transitional government of Somalia and other groups opposed to Al-Shabab and other extremists.
It is believed that Ahlu Sunna Wal Jama’a is one of the other group in Somalia that receives support from the United States of America and Ethiopia. Ahlu Sunna, a predominantly Sufi group is opposed to violence in the name of religion and recognises the transitional government.
Early this year, the United State has pledged 48 tonnes of arms to the weak TFG led by President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmad, however recent reports suggested much of the arms fell into the hands of the insurgents opposed to its policies. The US government has expressed deep concerns about how they will continue to support Somalia’s transitional government.
Nonetheless, the US government is now arranging new additional funds and arms for the transitional government to combat Al-Shabab and their foreign operatives, whom control much of Somalia’s south.
Somalia has not had effective government since 1991 and is ideal for militant groups looking for hideouts and training camps.
HARGEISA (Somalialndpress) — Since the resolution at the end of September of the crisis related to the much delayed Presidential elections in Somaliland, there have appeared various analysts, by Somalis and non-Somalis alike, of the causes and effects of this crisis and the likely impact it will have on Somaliland’s future. These include descriptive summaries of events with personal opinions tacked on as conclusions, e.g. Markus Hoehne’s treatise entitled “The current election crisis in Somaliland: outcome of a failed ‘experiment’?” . By contrast, the report by the International Crisis Group (ICG), “Somaliland: A Way out of the Electoral Crisis” is a good example of a well researched, scholarly analysis that not only provides a detailed exposition of the events that lead up to the crisis, but also an objective analysis of these events which leads naturally to a coherent and cogent set of recommendations.
At the other end of the spectrum are the pseudo-intellectual rants of the Samatar brothers, published on various Somali sites, which portend the imminent collapse of Somaliland’s polity into the anarchy and chaos which has bedevilled Somalia for so many years. However, the one thing that they all agree upon is that Somaliland’s democracy is young and fragile, and thus needs to be carefully nurtured. It is this common premise that bears closer examination since it is patently untrue. Before we commence our discourse, it is useful to define some basic terms in the interests of clarity and also in order to set the parameters of the discussion within the context of political theory.
Definitions
The first term that needs to be defined is “democracy”, since this concept lies at the very heart of the issue under discussion. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines democracy as “a: government by the people; especially : rule of the majority b: a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections”. The important point to note here is the phrase “…usually involving periodically held free elections…”. Free elections are not, in and of themselves, a necessary pre-condition for a democratic system of government, although they usually comprise an important element of such a system. Indeed, the socio-political structure of traditional Somali, pastoral society is extremely democratic, yet there are no elections in this structure and no provision for any electoral process.
The Somali pastoral, clan system is based upon direct participation by each adult male in the major decisions of the clan, or sub-clan, (e.g. whether to go to war or to resolve disputes with other clans/sub-clans through dialogue and negotiation). One of the foremost academic experts on the history, culture and politics of Somaliland, Ioan M. Lewis, in his seminal work characterised pastoral, Somali society as “…democratic to the point of anarchy…” . He had observed the direct, participatory nature of the system of social and political governance in Somali, pastoral society whereby important issues are openly debated in mass, town-hall type meetings and the majority view prevails and becomes binding upon all clan/sub-clan members after all viewpoints are thoroughly aired and discussed. This indigenous, participatory democracy has neither formal institutions nor any formal office holders (Somaliland Sultanships are purely ceremonial with no formal powers), yet it not only works, but has thrived and commanded the allegiance of its people for centuries, if not millennia.
The central feature of a democratic system of government is that power is vested in the people and they exercise this power either directly, or through freely chosen representatives which act in their name and on their behalf. This central concept of democratic governance has been enunciated, perhaps most famously, by Abraham Lincoln in the Gettysburg Address as “… government of the people, by the people, for the people…”. In fact, this precise and pithy exposition of a democratic system of government has become the popular definition of democracy. This leads to the critically important concept of “political consent”, i.e. the consent of the people to submit to the authority of government.
In a democratic system the people consent to governmental authority because that very authority derives from the people freely choosing their leaders through periodically held elections. In traditional, pastoral, Somali society, clan elders are not elected but chosen through an evolutionary, dynamic, almost osmotic, process whereby those clan members that are perceived by their kinsmen as wise, reflective, decent and honourable emerge as spokesmen and socio-political leaders whose opinions and judgments are widely respected and followed. This may be viewed as a social equivalent of the Darwinian evolutionary principle of ‘survival of the fittest’, except that it may be characterised as ‘emergence of the wise and honourable’.
The 2009 Election Crisis in the Context of Somaliland’s Democracy
Thus, the success of the people of Somaliland in establishing a functioning, democratic system of government in the wake of a prolonged, devastating civil war against a tribally based, military dictatorship that had ruled for over two decades, is not surprising. It is certainly true that there were some armed clan conflicts after the historic Borama Conference in 1993 that established both the institutional and philosophical framework for Somaliland’s system of democratic governance. However, it is also true that those conflicts comprised initial teething troubles as the nation re-established its representative, democratic socio-political heritage. In addition, those conflicts took place against a background of a society in transition from a savage and long civil war, with armed, clan militias roaming the countryside under the leadership of an officer cadre that felt that their status as heroes of the Liberation War entitled them to rule the country. In fact, those conflicts, while costly in human lives lost and property destroyed, provided an essential lesson in political maturity since they painfully demonstrated to ordinary Somalilanders the social and human cost of anarchy. This is evidenced in the fall from grace, in terms of public esteem and adoration, of the officer cadre heroes of the Liberation War that played such a prominent role in the clan wars.
The election crisis of 2009 must be seen in the context of a highly partisan political environment as the government and the opposition parties jockeyed for advantage in the voter registration process, which was mismanaged by incompetent actors, i.e. the National Election Commission (NEC) and its foreign, “expert” Interpeace. Further, the terrorist attacks in Hargeisa on 29 October 2008 which resulted in the sudden departure of the software company that was integrating the biometric data into the voter registration system also did not help. The political impasse on how and when to hold the elections, as both the government and the opposition dug in their heels over irreconcilable positions, grew ever more intractable. The events leading to this crisis and the actions of the various parties which contributed to this outcome are very well detailed in the ICG’s report mentioned above, as well as some others. However, what nearly all the various accounts and analyses of the situation (including ICG’s report) ignore is the role the people of Somaliland played in the resolution of the crisis. Instead, they focus upon the role played by the foreign actors, namely the aid donors and the Ethiopian Government, and it is true that their intervention was very important, maybe even necessary.
[ad#Google Adsense (336×280)]
However, it is also true that without the forceful intervention of civil society leaders acting in response to lobbying by ordinary people, the intervention of the foreign actors may well have come to nought. The deteriorating political situation, particularly the deaths during the opposition-lead demonstration in Hargeisa at the end of September, galvanised the people into action as the prospect of sustained, and possibly armed, conflict loomed. In Hargeisa, there was palpable and widespread public unease and anger with the political elite (on both sides of the dispute) which had allowed the situation to deteriorate to this point. Falling back on traditional avenues of political and social intermediation, ordinary Somalilanders instigated the clan elders, religious leaders and the business community (i.e. civil society leaders) as well as the Guurti to prevail upon the political leaders to tone down the rhetoric and reach a compromise.
It is important to note here that there are political actors that either have a vested interest in derailing the country’s democratic system and plunging it into the same anarchy and chaos that has bedeviled Somalia to the south, or, that are willing to foment internal conflict, armed if necessary, in order to realise their political goals, i.e. the ascent to power. The principle such actor is, of course, Al-Shabaab with its nihilistic mission of plunging the region back into Middle Ages. The thorough rejection of these so-called jihadists by the people of Somaliland is evidenced by the success of the country’s authorities in thwarting repeated attempts by Al-Shabaab to mount attacks, which is due primarily to the vigilance of the public in recognising and reporting suspicious activities and persons to the authorities.
The most recent such incident occurred on 19th December 2009, when a nomadic goat herder noticed some men laying explosives under a bridge that was to be navigated by a high level delegation of Ministers and other political leaders en route to a ceremony inaugurating a new district in Qoyta near Burao. The goat herder reported the matter to a police convoy on an advance security reconnaissance of the route, and the explosives were discovered and safely defused. However, in addition to, and separate from Al-Shabaab, there are political actors in Somaliland which have shown that they are ready to foment civil unrest, and even clan warfare, in order to create sufficient havoc to overthrow the government and instigate a seizure of power under the pretext of re-establishing order. The conflagration of a routine dispute between nomads over water rights at Ceel Bardaleh by the brutal and savage murders of innocent civilians traveling from Hargeisa to Borama was the first shot fired by these local actors which are prepared to instigate clan conflict in furtherance of their ambitions.
The carefully orchestrated subversion of the demonstrations in Hargeisa into an armed confrontation with the police was a second attempt at sowing the seeds of armed conflict in the country. The intervention of the Guurti and the clan elders, not to mention the maturity of the overwhelming majority of the concerned clans, succeeded in preventing the Ceel Bardaleh dispute turning into an ugly, armed clan war. Correspondingly, the widespread public outcry against the political manoeuvrings and recalcitrance of both the Government and the opposition regarding the election issue, quickly forced both sides to abandon their sterile impasse and lower the political temperature. The concerted pressure exerted by the foreign aid donors and the Ethiopian Government supported the groundswell of domestic frustration with their antics and compelled both sides to demonstrate a modicum of statesmanship and reach a reasonable compromise. The fact that these initial attempts at internal subversion have failed does not mean that the local instigators behind these attempts, and their foreign co-conspirators, have given up on their aims.
Conclusions
In answer to the question of this piece, several key points outlined above have to be carefully considered. Firstly, the political culture of participatory democracy is not new to Somaliland, but is in fact a central feature of the country’s socio-political ethos, culture and tradition. This fact is perhaps not fully appreciated by many commentators which consider that democratic governance is a new construct in Somali political history. This would also explain the over-arching focus upon elections in the analyses of many of these commentators, while ignoring other important features of the country’s democratic system. In this context, it is important to remember that during the decade commencing from the Borama Conference in 1993 until 2003, when Somaliland held its first elections, the country had a government that was democratic in that it was representative and enjoyed the freely given consent of its people, not to mention their confidence. This representative democracy, sans elections, was achieved by adapting the indigenous, Somali, clan-based, pastoral democracy to the modern institutions of an executive Presidency, an independent judiciary and a bicameral legislature of a lower House of Representatives and the present Guurti.
Secondly, the drafting of a constitution and its ratification, along with the establishment of political parties and instituting elections for the seats in the House of Representatives, marked Somaliland’s transition from a clan-based pastoral democracy to a modern, representative nation-state. However, this does not mean that the country is qualitatively more democratic now than it was during the 1993-3003 decade. The fact is that Somaliland upgraded its traditional, pastoral political system to benefit from institutional and methodological structures of the modern, democratic state, much as one might upgrade from an older computer to a newer, more advanced model. The content of the work performed on the machines does not change although, hopefully, the efficiency and productivity of the user does. Thus, the shift from the clan-based, pastoral democracy of the pre-2003 era to the present one whereby local and national office-holders are elected doesn’t change the democratic values, if you will, of the government in terms of representation and the consent of the people to its authority, but hopefully the transparency and accessibility of the system is enhanced.
Thirdly, the determination of the ordinary citizens of Somaliland not to surrender the independence, stability and peace they have enjoyed under their home-grown system of representative government and a free society remains the powerful foundation that ensures its durability. During the election crisis, this determination trumped the machinations of both the political elite and the malevolent plots of would-be usurpers of their state institutions. The timely support of the foreign aid donors and Ethiopia in reading the riot act to the political leaders was an invaluable stick with which to compel the political elite to look beyond their narrow self-interests and see the ‘big picture’.
This desire for self determination through representative government and a free society is deeply ingrained in the people of Somaliland and formed the basis of the revolt against the Siyad Barre dictatorship and the subsequent, long War of Liberation. It is also a fundamental and enduring feature of the history and culture of Somaliland’s pastoral society, which has survived some 75 years of, an admittedly benign, British colonial rule; the perfidy of a union subverted by the calculations of regional domination; an oppressive, tribal dictatorship that declared war on its own citizens; armed, clan conflict motivated by an overweening lust for power; sustained efforts by internal and external forces to subvert the very existence of Somaliland as an independent nation including acts of terror and violence and trade embargoes; and, most recently, the inability of the political elite to look beyond their own naked ambitions.
Finally, one has to conclude that far from being fragile, Somaliland’s democracy is indeed strong and robust. It is founded in the cultural fabric of Somaliland’s pastoral society and is nourished by the determination of ordinary Somalilanders to enjoy their freedom and pursue their lives in peace. This is not to say that the institutions, constitution and political parties of Somaliland’s system of government do not require continual review and improvement, in fact they do. Nor does it mean that the political culture of Somaliland is mature and developed; in fact it needs to progress from the clan-centric nature of the pastoral system to the platform-centric focus of the party system. It is a fact that the three national parties are presently broadly organised around particular clans, and are vehicles for their respective leaders, rather than being organised around philosophies of the state and its relationship to the people it governs. Having said that, however, it is undeniable that Somaliland’s democratic system is not only robust and muscular, but its future looks bright since its fate is in very safe hands – those of the people. To the many foreign supporters and analysts of Somaliland’s re-emergence as a nation state, I can confidently say: “Don’t cry for Somaliland’s democracy”!
Dec. 23 (SomalilandPress)- Bolloré Africa Logistics, a unit of Bollore SA, may sign an agreement to manage the port of Berbera and oversee $700 million of upgrades to the facility in Somalia’s breakaway northern Somaliland region, Abdillahi Duale, the foreign minister, said.
“Our discussions are already in an advanced stage,” Duale said today in an interview in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. “We have already made a basic agreement.”
Representatives of Bolloré, an investment company controlled by French billionaire Vincent Bollore, have met with Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and Somaliland President Dahir Riyale to discuss the agreement which will probably be signed next year, he said. Berbera port handles food aid and other cargo bound for landlocked Ethiopia.
Port revenue provides approximately 75 percent of the Somaliland government’s $50 million in annual revenue. Somaliland, a former British protectorate that merged with Italy’s Somali colony in 1960 to form Somalia, has remained largely free of violence during the 18-year civil war in central and southern Somalia.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jason McLure in Addis Ababa via Johannesburg on pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.
GALKAYO (Somalilandpress) — Fresh fighting has erupted in the central Somali town of Galkayo between militias loyal to Puntland and Galmudug on Wednesday morning. The two administrations, who share the city clashed after at least one police man from Puntland was shot dead in the outskirts of the town by unknown gunmen.
Sources on the ground, told Somalilandpress that Puntland speculated that Galmudug carried out the attacks and has ordered its forces to retaliate with force. Shortly after Puntland forces attacked key positions in the south of the town controlled by Galmudug, the fighting escalated into a heavy-gun fight, spreading to number of areas.
[ad#Google Adsense (336×280)]
Meanwhile, an eye witness said Puntland has ordered more reinforcement from its capital, Garowe.
There is no official statement from either side. The number of casualties is not yet known.
This is not the first time the two traditional rival administrations had fought over the town. In October, at least twelve people were killed when the two opposing sides clashed in the city centre.
The town of Galkayo is divided between Puntland and Galmudug administrations, where each side is backed by warring clans.
The two administrations function with relative peace outside Somalia’s weak transitional government and do not claim outright independence from the rest of Somalia.
HARGEISA (Somalilandpress) — A Kenyan delegation comprising of seven members visited Somaliland’s capital on Tuesday morning for talks on wide range of issues of common concern.
The delegation headed by Kenya’s Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly, Mr Farah Maalim, visited Hargeisa after receiving an official invitation from Somaliland’s parliament speaker, Mr Abdirahman Irro.
Upon arrival, the Kenyan delegation were received at Egal International airport by Somaliland’s parliament speaker, Mr Abdirahman Irro, Finance minister, Mr Awil Ali Duale, Interior minister, Mr Abdullahi Ismael Ali, mayor of Hargeisa, Mr Hussein Mohamoud, and members of parliament.
[ad#Google Adsense (300×250)]
At the airport’s VIP room, Mr Maalim told local reporters that their main objective was to gain first-hand experience of Somaliland and also find more about the living conditions of the displaced people from neighbouring Somalia.
Later in the evening, Mr Maalim met with the Somaliland president where the two discussed ways to further cement and develop bilateral relations between the two democratic states.
Rayale receives Kenyan delegation
President Rayale briefly discussed the situation in Somaliland and it’s past history before thanking the Kenyan officials for their visit. Rayale also said it was unfortunate that African states, in particular East African nations were not acknowledging Somaliland’s democratic success and its ability to establish functioning institutions without outside help.
Mr Maalim, on behalf of the Kenyan delegation, thanked the president, government and the people of Somaliland for their warm welcome and host.
The delegation will spend few days in Somaliland and are scheduled to meet with various political leaders, civil society and other officials before they return to Nairobi.
This is the first such visit by high level delegation from Kenya since Somaliland reclaimed it’s statehood from Somalia, after a brief never-ratified union between the two states failed.
The visit, though brief, is seen rich in content and a step forward in Somaliland’s regional policy.
Bia Lounge, 45 -47 Golden Hillock Road, Small Heath, Birmingham B10 OJU
Refugee Advice Group [Birmingham] in partnership with Kayd Somali Arts and Culture, and other Somali community organizations will facilitate the first Birmingham Somali Art and Culture Festival on 28th December 2009 from 2pm to Midnight at Bia Lounge, 45 -47 Golden Hillock Road, Small Heath, Birmingham B10 OJU.
The festival will focus on Somali heritage and culture, storytelling, poetry, Somali contemporary literature and music. The idea behind the festival is to provide an opportunity for Somali people living in the Birmingham area to come together to celebrate their culture. We plan to invite popular Somali artists from a variety of arts disciplines and diverse backgrounds to give performances in Birmingham. Each artist has something distinct to bring – our vision is to raise the profile of the Somali community and establish the festival as an annual event in Birmingham. We want to cultivate cross-cultural artistic collaborations. The festival aims to deliver work that challenges perceptions and speaks to the Somali community as well as the general public.
[ad#Google Adsense (300×250)]
We are proudly presenting a mix of renowned commentators and entertainers: Mahamoud Abdi Ali Dualle, Abdilahi Hirsi “Beeldaaje”, Amine Muse Weheliye (BBC Somali Service), Abdi Shire Jooqle, Nimco Yaasiin Caraale, Raas Ismail, Mohamed Mukhtar Oday, Ali Seenyo, Mowlid Abdi, Abdirahman Abees and many more.
Join us at this first Birmingham Somali Art and Cultural Festival, get a taste of a great cultural tradition and explore the uniqueness of Somali heritage and culture. For more information about the program call 07984632044 or email refugeadgrp@hotmail.com
Hargeysa (Somalilandpress)- Wefti ka socda dalka Kenya oo ka kooban todoba xubnood, oo uu hoggaaminayo guddoomiye xigeenka Baarlamaanka Kenya Faarax Maxalin, ayaa maanta ka soo degay garoonka Cigaal International lee magaalada Hargeysa.
Wefttigan, ayaa la sheegay inay ku yimaadeen martiqaad uu siiyey baarlamaanka Somaliland, islamarkaana mudada ay joogaan ay kulammo kala duwan la yeelan doonaan Goleyaasha qaranka Somaliland.
Guddoomiye xigeenka Baarlamaanka Somaliland Cabdicasiis Maxamed Sammaale, ayaa imaatinkan weftigan saaka ka sheegay kal-fadhigii Golaha Wakiillada ee saaka, isagoo sheegay in maalinta khammiista soo socota ee todobaadkan weftiga ka socda Kenya ay kullan kula yeelan doonaan Xarunta Baarlamanka.
HARGEISA, 22 December 2009 (Somalilandpress) — A Somali just home from eight years in the US jail at Guantanamo Bay told AFP the prison was “hell on Earth”, and alleged torture there had scarred some of his fellow inmates.
Mohamed Saleban Bare, who arrived in his hometown of Hargeisa on Saturday, said he was innocent of any charges that would have caused security forces to arrest him in Pakistan in 2001 and transfer him to the US jail via Afghanistan.
“Guantanamo Bay is like hell on Earth,” he said in an interview Monday with an AFP reporter who visited him at his hotel in Hargeisa, capital of the northern breakaway state of Somaliland.
[ad#Google Adsense (336×280)]
“I don’t feel normal yet but I thank Allah for keeping me alive and free from the physical and mental sufferings of some of my friends,” he said.
Sporting short hair and a long scrawny beard, Bare says he is in good physical health but looks dazed, speaks very softly and walks gingerly.
Bare, 44, was among a dozen Guantanamo detainees from Afghanistan, Yemen and the breakaway Somalia region who were sent home at the weekend, bringing the number of detainees at the “war on terror” prison in Cuba to below 200.
He and another Somali, 45-year-old Osmail Mohamed Arale, were handed over to their relatives in Hargeisa by the International Representative Committee of the Red Cross in the presence of Somaliland authorities.
“Some of my colleagues in the prison lost their sight, some lost their limbs and others ended up mentally disturbed. I’m OK compared to them,” he said.
Bare said he was picked up in the Pakistani port city of Karachi in December 2001, weeks after the United States launched its “war on terror” following the September 11 attacks on Washington and New York.
He claims he had been there for some time with several relatives who had fled the violence in Somalia and were hoping to find asylum in a western state.
After about four months he was transferred to US military prisons in Kandahar and Bagram in Afghanistan, he said.
“At Bagram and Kandahar, the situation was harsh but when we were transferred to Guantanamo the torture tactics changed. They use a kind of psychological torture that kills you mentally,” he said.
This included depriving prisoners of sleep for at least four nights in a row and feeding them once a day with only a biscuit, he said.
“And in the cold they let you sleep without a blanket. Some of the inmates face harsher torture, including with electricity and beating,” he said.
Bare was reluctant to answer questions about his alleged ties with Al-Ittihad Al-Islamiya, a Somali Islamist movement which produced many of the current leaders of the Al Qaeda-linked Shebab.
“Guantanamo is a place of humiliation for Muslims. All the inmates are Muslims but they (Americans) claim the prison is for terrorists. Why don’t they arrest non-Muslims belonging to these so-called terror groups?”
“No human rights convention stands in Guantanamo. Interrogators force inmates to confess crimes they didn’t commit by torturing them and sullying their religion,” Bare said.
“They would throw Korans into the toilet and raise the volume of their music during prayers,” he recounted.
Bare said the US authorities had never told him why he was arrested.
“They used to ask many questions, most of them relating to my background like what I was doing in Somalia and about the people I know. It was all about suspicions and not a clear case,” he said.
US President Barack Obama has vowed to close down the controversial Guantanamo Bay detention facility by January with some of the inmates to be moved to a maximum-security prison in the state of Illinois. By Mustafa Haji Abdinur (AFP)
HARGEISA, 22 December 2009 (Somalilandpress) – Carol Rosenberg at the Miami Herald broke the news on Saturday that 12 prisoners have been released from Guantánamo. The news followed hints in the Washington Post on Friday that six Yemenis and four Afghans were set to leave, but Rosenberg — and the East African media — reported that the men had already been freed and that two Somalis were also released. I’ll be writing soon about the Afghans and the Yemenis, but for now I’d like to focus on the stories of the two Somalis: Mohammed Sulaymon Barre and Ismail Mahmoud Muhammad (identified as Ismael Arale).
Rosenberg reported that the two men “were processed by the Somaliland government and then released to rejoin their families in Hargeisa,” the capital of “the breakaway region in northern Somalia that has its own autonomous government.” She added, “The United States does not recognize the government in Somaliland and there were no official statements on how Arale and Barre arrived there. A local newspaper, the Somaliland Press, said they arrived aboard a jet provided by the International Committee of the Red Cross, suggesting that the United States had released the men to the Red Cross in a third country.”
[ad#Google Adsense (336×280)]
As President Obama attempts to close Guantánamo, with the administration recently announcing its intention of purchasing a prison in Illinois to hold some of the prisoners, the release of these two men — as with the overwhelming majority of releases from Guantánamo — yet again demonstrates how hysterical and unsubstantiated are Republican claims that Guantánamo is full of hardcore terrorists, as their stories demonstrate:
Seized in Pakistan: Mohammed Sulaymon Barre
Mohammed Sulaymon Barre, who was 37 years old at the time of his capture, was one of the first men to be seized in the “War on Terror.” As I explained in my book The Guantánamo Files, he had been living in Pakistan as a UN-approved refugee since fleeing his homeland during its ruinous civil war in the early 1990s, and was seized at his home in Karachi on November 1, 2001 “by police and intelligence agents who had made two previous visits to check his papers, and who seem, therefore, to have seized him on this third occasion because they were looking for easy targets to hand over to the Americans.”
As I also explained in The Guantánamo Files:
Barre worked from his home as the Karachi agent for the Dahabshiil Company, a Somali organization with branches around the world, which provides essential money transfer operations for the Somali diaspora. According to the Americans, Dahabshiil was “closely related to al-Barakat, a Somali financial company designated as a terrorism finance facilitator,” [which had been added to a US terrorism watch list and had its assets frozen]. Barre said that he knew nothing about this allegation, pointing out that his job only involved making small transactions on behalf of Somalis living in Pakistan.
In fact, as was noted in a report in 2004 [for a UN conference on Trade and Development], the enforced US-led closure of money transfer operations with suspected links to terrorism was “disastrous for Somalia, a country with no recognized government and without a functioning state apparatus. After the international community largely washed its hands of the country following the disastrous peacekeeping foray in 1994, remittances became the inhabitants’ lifeline. With no recognized private banking system, the remittance trade was dominated by a single firm (al-Barakat).” Crucially, the report added that, although the US authorities closed down al-Barakat in 2001, labeling it “the quartermasters of terror,” only four criminal prosecutions had been filed by 2003, “and none involved charges of aiding terrorists.”
Nevertheless, the authorities at Guantánamo — operating in a bubble of terror-related allegations that largely bore no relation to the realities of the outside world — had no time for Barre’s protestations of innocence. “I am convinced that your branch of the Dahabshiil company was used to transfer money for terrorism,” the presiding officer of his tribunal at Guantánamo told Barre in 2005. “What I am trying to find out is if you think maybe there were some people that were using your company and using your branch to transfer money, or whether you were just totally not paying attention.”
A year later, as the BBC reported in August 2006, al-Barakat had been removed from the US watchlist of terrorist organizations. The report explained that al-Barakat had been included on the watchlist because US intelligence analysts thought it had been used to finance the 9/11 hijackers, but the 9/11 Commission had investigated the claim and had found it baseless. In February 2009, in a report for the Washington Post, Peter Finn noted that, in the allegations against Barre at Guantánamo, Dahabshiil’s alleged ties to al-Barakat had been dropped by 2006, although even then the taint of the allegation was not entirely removed.
In a letter to the Post, an attorney for Dahabshiil was obliged to point out that the firm has “never been the subject of any investigation in relation to alleged terrorist funding” and that it “has no involvement whatsoever with money laundering or the funding or of terrorist organizations and … places the highest importance on money laundering compliance.” As the Post noted ruefully, “Dahabshiil should have been given an opportunity to comment for the article.”
Shorn of this central allegation, it is no wonder that, as Barre’s lawyers explained in a court filing in connection with his habeas corpus petition, the allegations against him have “varied dramatically.” In 2006, for example, presumably through a false allegation coerced from some other prisoner, the authorities claimed that he was not in Pakistan in 1994 and 1995 — despite the existence of UN papers documenting his meetings in Pakistan in those years — but was actually working in Osama bin Laden’s compound in Khartoum, Sudan, an allegation so worthless that his lawyers described it as “implausible and unsubstantiated.”
According to Emi MacLean of the Center for Constitutional Rights, which represents Barre, most of his problems at Guantánamo stemmed from his opposition to the regime at prison, and his involvement in several hunger strikes. “If you were detained for seven years without charge and any fair process, you might be engaged in activities that would be considered disciplinary violations that are really protests for your detention,” she said.
The truth, as Barre himself noted at his tribunal in 2005, was that “A lot of interrogators said to me that … a lot of mistakes were made and they must be corrected. They told me many times that I am here by mistake.” Sadly, this was not enough to prevent him from suffering in Guantánamo, and also in US custody in Bagram before his transfer to Guantánamo in 2002, when, as he explained in his tribunal:
They interrogated me and one of the interrogators told me I was from al-Wafa [a Saudi charity that was also regarded with suspicion by the US authorities] and I needed to confess to that. You have no choice. I told them it wasn’t true. They pressured me. They whispered something then spoke to the guard. The guard came in, grabbed me by my neck and threw me. He took me in a bad way to isolation. All my blankets, except one, were taken from me. It was freezing cold. They didn’t feed me lunch and sometimes they didn’t feed me twice. At night it is very cold and if you don’t eat dinner it gets colder. This torture lasted fifteen to twenty days. My feet and hands were swollen. I wasn’t able to stand because I was in so much pain. I asked for treatment and an interrogator brought a nurse and asked if I wanted treatment. They told me they could cut my legs to stop the pain. They did this so I would confess to the accusations that I didn’t do. Nothing happened. After the torture ended, I met another interrogator who told me injustice was done to me and I didn’t have anything to do with this. He said he would do a report so I could go home. He told me I would be released. Suddenly, I was taken back to Kandahar and then to Cuba.
Seized in Djibouti: Ismail Mahmoud Muhammad
Unlike Mohammed Sulaymon Barre, Ismail Mahmoud Muhammad was one of the last prisoners to arrive at Guantánamo, one of just six men flown to the prison after the arrival of 14 “high-value detainees” in September 2006. Identified by the Pentagon as Abdullahi Sudi Arale, he arrived with little fanfare in June 2007, and, as I explained in an article in September 2007:
Possibly … his arrival was little trumpeted because it involved the deliberately under-reported “War on al-Qaeda” in the Horn of Africa, and because the administration had very little information to offer about him. In almost questioning terms, Arale was described as a “suspected” member of “the al-Qaeda terrorist network in East Africa,” who served as “a courier between East Africa al-Qaeda (EAAQ) and al-Qaeda in Pakistan.”
In a press release, the DoD added that, after returning to Somalia from Pakistan in September 2006, he “held a leadership role in the EAAQ-affiliated Somali Council of Islamic Courts (CIC),” and noted, with distressing vagueness, that there was “significant information available” to indicate that Arale had been “assisting various EAAQ-affiliated extremists in acquiring weapons and explosives,” that he had “facilitated terrorist travel by providing false documents for AQ and EAAQ-affiliates and foreign fighters traveling into Somalia,” and that he had “played a significant role in the re-emergence of the CIC in Mogadishu.” Unmentioned, of course, was the subtext of the situation in Somalia: the role of the CIC in returning some semblance of order to one of the world’s least-governed countries, and the US government’s use of Ethiopia as a proxy army in yet another secret, dirty war.
It took some time for the truth about the Pentagon’s “distressing vagueness” to be explained, in part because the US authorities released no further information about him, and, in two and a half years, do not appear to have conducted a Combatant Status Review Tribunal, to ascertain whether he was correctly designated as an “enemy combatant.” However, when Reprieve, the legal action charity whose lawyers represent dozens of Guantánamo prisoners, became involved, another narrative emerged, in which Muhammad not only had no connection to al-Qaeda, but was, in fact, “an English teacher and centrist political activist.”
Born in Mogadishu in 1970, Muhammad had remained in the capital throughout the civil war of the 1990s until the security situation deteriorated to such an extent that he moved north to Somaliland, establishing the first English school in the new country, and working as a journalist. In 1998, he traveled to Pakistan, where he studied English Literature at the International Islamic University, and became, as Reprieve described it, “a respected leader of the Somali community in the country.”
When his father died, he moved back to Mogadishu, “where the rule of the Union of Islamic Courts had brought relative stability to the war-torn capital,” but at the end of 2006, when, backed by the US, the Ethiopian Army invaded, he moved north one more. Opposed to the Ethiopian invasion, he was asked, “as a respected member of the community … to attend a conference in Eritrea aimed at organizing a political campaign” to ensure that the Ethiopians left.
It was while he was on his way to this conference that he was seized by local police in Djibouti, “apparently at the behest of the Americans.” Handed over to the US military, he was taken to Camp Lemonier, the US military base that played a key role in American interference in the Horn of Africa, where other prisoners have been held, possibly including an unknown number of “ghost prisoners.” There, as Reprieve explained, “he was held in a shipping container and interrogated by Americans.”
Compared to Mohammed Sulaymon Barre, Ismael Mahmoud Muhammad was fortunate that his wrongful imprisonment lasted for only two and a half years, but as the eighth anniversary of the opening of Guantánamo approaches, the release of these two men — neither of whom was cleared until the Obama administration’s inter-agency Task Force began its deliberations this year — demonstrates, yet again, that, when it comes to undoing the shameful legacy of Guantánamo, much work still remains to be done.
