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U.S. Does Not Plan To Send Troops Against al-Qaida in Somalia

15 December 2006

State's Frazer calls for dialogue, support for U.N.-backed peacekeepers

By Vince Crawley
USINFO Staff Writer

Washington -- The United States has no intention of sending military forces to Somalia to remove al-Qaida-backed militants from power, a senior U.S. diplomat told reporters December 14.

Jendayi Frazer, assistant secretary of state for African affairs, called on Somalia’s competing factions to open talks aimed at achieving a stable government. She also urged international follow-through on a December 6 U.N. Security Council resolution that authorizes an African peacekeeping force to protect Somalia's Transitional Federal Government. (See related article.)

“That’s not a plan that we have on the table, for the U.S. government and our U.S. military to deploy to Mogadishu [Somalia],” Frazer told reporters at the State Department. “That’s not really something that we’re saying to our Congress and our public that we want as part of our strategy.”

Somalia has lacked an effective national government since early 1991. The Transitional Federal Government was formed with international cooperation in 2004 and currently is based in Baidoa, Somalia. The main city of Mogadishu and the majority of other population centers are controlled by the Union of Islamic Courts, also known as the Council of Islamic Courts (CIC), which is a group of regional courts that emerged after the chaos of the 1990s to restore local order by administering Islamic law, or Shariah. However, in recent months, the courts increasingly have been led by East African al-Qaida militants, including terrorists responsible for the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

Frazer said the United States does not seek the overthrow of the Islamic Courts. However, the United States does want to foster moderate leadership within them. The United States also wants the court group to stop its military expansion and to open talks with the transitional government, which has a five-year international mandate to develop a stable, permanent government for all of Somalia, she said.

“The problem is that the CIC is led by extreme radicals right now, not the moderates that we all hoped would emerge,” Frazer said. One leading group within the courts, the al-Shaaba, “are radical youth killers,” Frazer said. “That’s what they are. They’re killing nuns, they’ve killed children and they’re calling for jihad.”

Radicals within the courts have introduced extreme versions of Islamic law that are at odds with Somalia’s history and traditions, Frazer said. “Frankly, public executions, killing people for watching soccer matches, is not consistent with the Somali culture and traditions,” she said.

U.S. GOALS

The first U.S. goal for Somalia is to work within the Transitional Federal Charter, which is recognized by the United Nations as the framework for restoring governance to Somalia, Frazer said. The United States wants civil-society groups to join with clans and sub-clans to establish a nationwide system of government for the first time in more than 15 years. “That’s our ultimate aim,” Frazer said.

The Transitional Federal Government, she stressed “is transitional. That’s the key point. At the end of five years, the Somali people will have to decide how to govern themselves.” So the goal of the transitional government is “not in fact to get rid of the CIC.”

The second U.S. goal for Somalia “is to have these terrorists turned over, particularly the ones who attacked our embassies,” Frazer said. Terrorists associated with the 1998 bombings either are part of Islamic courts groups or have been sheltered and assisted by them, she said.

“The analysis is that there are many more in the courts that are moderate and are just going along,” Frazer said, “and we would hope that, eventually, the conditions will be such that they can break off and join with governing Somalia in the traditions of Somalia.”

U.S. ambassadors are in talks throughout Africa seeking countries willing to be part of the regional peacekeeping force that would assist the Transitional Federal Government in asserting control and entering into constructive dialogue with the Islamic Courts, Frazer said.

The U.N. Security Council expects the African force to deploy within 30 days, Frazer said.

(USINFO is produced by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)