CSI Somalia: Interpol Targets Pirates

The war on Somali pirates has moved to the bargaining table,to the crime labs, and to Somalia’s white beaches. With the beginning of East Africa’s stormy monsoon season, hijackings at sea are down, giving the coalition of pirate-fighting nations a chance to counter-attack. Their weapons: fingerprints, grassroots anti-piracy leagues… and 500 Somali men, in shorts and t-shirts.

The U.S. Navy, NATO and the other military forces patrolling East African waters, say it’s not hard to fight pirates, once you identify them. But Somali sea bandits blend in with innocent fishermen and toss their weapons over-board when they’re caught, so that nobody can prove they were up to no good. Piracy is a “complex legal issue linked to national law, international law and the law of the high seas,” NATO General Karl-Heinz Lather said, in May. Without good evidence, NATO has been releasing captured pirate suspects on the nearest Somali beach.

Interpol, the international police force, is hoping to change that, by collecting fingerprints of pirate suspects. “Without systematically collecting photographs, fingerprints and DNA profiles of arrested pirates and comparing them internationally, it is simply not possible to establish their true identity or to make connections that would otherwise be missed,” Interpol executive director Jean-Michel Louboutin said yesterday.

Meanwhile, on land in Somalia, the U.S.- and U.N.-backed “transitional government” has recruited 500 men to fill the ranks of an anti-piracy force. The men began training last week, in their “simple uniforms of shorts and white T-shirts.” The force is riding a rising wave of popular opposition to pirates, whose crimes have disrupted international efforts to stabilize Somalia. Some reports have pirate bosses pleading for leniency from incensed imams and elders.

[PHOTO: The Somaliland navy, via American Chronicle]

Courtesy: Danger Room blog by David Axe

From the Midwest to Mogadishu

An article in The Times by Andrea Elliott on Sunday examined the case of more than 20 young Somali-Americans who are now the focus of a major domestic terrorism investigation.

Most of the men are refugees who left Minnesota, which has one of the largest Somali communities in the United States, and are suspected of joining Al Shabaab, a militant Islamist group in Somalia. One of the men blew himself up in a suicide attack in Somalia in October.

We asked some experts what dynamics in the Somali community might make it more possible to lure these young men to that group. While “homegrown” jihadism has caused alarm in Britain and other European countries, does the United States face challenges of its own? Can the government detect and prevent such movements from gaining footholds here?

• Ken Menkhaus, political scientist
• Bruce Hoffman, professor of security studies
• Zainab Hassan, The Minneapolis Foundation
• Steven Simon, co-author, “The Next Attack”
• Thomas Sanderson, Center for Strategic and International Studies
• Guido Steinberg, German Institute for International and Security Affairs
• Bill Durodié, Chatham House in London

Click here to read the entire debate

Madaxda Raad TV Fawzia Y. Adam oo waraysi siisay Idaacadda VOA

Todobaadkan Barnaamijkeena MaridaMikrafoonkaWaxaa Studio-yaha VOA ee magaalada Washington ku sugan oomartikuahbarnaamijkan Fowsiya Yuusuf Xaaji Adan, oo ah Madaxa telefishanka caalamiga ah ee Raad TV ee fadhigiisu yahay London.

Halkan Riix si aad u dhegeysato waraysiga.

Katherine Kersten: Lawsuit could tear down the TiZA curtain

Ms. Kersten's revelations are serious that may shine light on the current Somali Youth disappearance in Minnesota. The least, we may find out who to blame now that some names are mentioned in her article. Jamici and the rest that she is blaming must respond to defend their dignity and clarify the articles perception.


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We may learn about its possible links to missing Somali youth, MAS-MN.

The ACLU of Minnesota made headlines in January when it sued Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (TiZA), a public K-8 charter school in Inver Grove Heights. The suit -- which followed media reports of organized prayers and a pervasive religious environment at TiZA -- alleged that the school is violating constitutional prohibitions against government endorsement of religion.

Click here to read More..

It is been Long since I updated my blog.

What really entice me to write on my blog from time to time mostly depend on the current affairs that I encounter which interests me or my flowers. But due to travel that made impossible for me to stay up to date for what is happening in the world of Somali people had contributed the abandonment of my beloved blog.

Fortunately, I have my ever demanding friends that not only remind me attention the blog needs, but also criticize the choice of my articles. I have to say, I miss all those emails and discussions on the topics I choose for us to read and for this summer, or whatever left of it, I will dedicate more time to post interesting articles and my experience in traveling in the US, Canada and/or Europe.

For my readers, friends and foes, thank you all for your feedback and commentaries. Please keep them coming.

Magan@ymail.com

New Dawn in America: Watch Obama's Speech on his inauguration day: Part 1 and Part 2

Part 2 of 2

Somali Islamists destroying historical and religion monuments

Ethiopia begins Somalia pullout

Fikirka Xorta ah - Ethiopian military forces have begun pulling out of Somalia after two years helping the transitional government fight insurgents.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's spokesman said the withdrawal would take several days.

A convoy of about 30 Ethiopian vehicles loaded with troops and equipment left the Somali capital, Mogadishu.

Hours earlier a roadside bomb killed two Ethiopian soldiers and a number of civilians died when troops opened fire.

"The withdrawal of our troops from Somalia has entered the implementation phase," Bereket Simon, special adviser to the Ethiopian premier, told Reuters news agency.

Click here to read more

Eric Wilson, was the oldest living holder of the Victoria Cross

Fikirka Xorta ah - LONDON — A British World War II hero who fought in North Africa despite severe wounds has died 68 years after he was "posthumously" awarded the nation’s highest combat honor by officials who thought he had been killed.

Eric Wilson, 96, who had been the oldest living holder of the Victoria Cross, died Dec. 23 in Stowell, where he lived.

Mr. Wilson had been reported killed in North Africa in 1940, but was later found alive and trying to tunnel his way out of a prison camp.

His family was notified in August 1940 that he was killed while staying with his machine gun, though wounded and ill, in a futile effort to repel a larger Italian force. The Victoria Cross was awarded two months later. Mr. Wilson was commanding a company of the Somaliland Camel Corps when Italian forces attacked their position in what was then British Somaliland. Italy had declared war the day before.

Mr. Wilson later served in North Africa as adjutant of the Long Range Desert Group, a motorized force that harassed Italian positions; he later served in Burma as second-in-command of the 11th King’s African Rifles. Two years ago, Mr. Wilson said: "What is bravery? I don’t know. You just did what you had to do."