MOGADISHU (Reuters) – U.S. special forces in helicopters attacked a car in southern Somalia on Monday and killed one of east Africa’s most wanted al Qaeda militants, Somali and U.S. sources said. Kenyan-born Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, 28, was suspected of building the truck bomb that killed 15 people at a Kenyan hotel in 2002, as well as involvement in a simultaneous, but botched, missile... 

3 Killed in Somaliland Protests By VOA News 12 September 2009 Three people were killed and several others were injured in clashes between security forces and anti-government protesters in Somalia’s breakaway region of Somaliland. Peaceful protests in Somaliland’s capital, Hargeisa, Saturday turned violent after police tried to disperse crowds outside the parliament building. Demonstrators... 

Crackdown on Somali Pirates, Based On Letter to UN by Ex-Prez Yussuf, Questioned By Matthew Russell Lee UNITED NATIONS, September 10 — Somali pirates have been the topic at the UN for the past two days. Thursday outside the Fourth Meeting of the Contact Group on Piracy off the Coast of Somalia, Japanese diplomat Masafumi Ishii, who chaired the meeting, told the Press that money will be raised... 

New Somali president plans US tour to bring news from homeland to diaspora By ANDREW WELSH-HUGGINS , Associated Press Last update: September 9, 2009 – 5:03 PM COLUMBUS, Ohio – The newly elected president of Somalia plans a tour of U.S. communities with large Somali populations this fall in hopes of spreading the word about his country’s problems and getting advice for solving some... 

UN role in Somalia comes under fire By Saeed Shabazz -Staff Writer- | Last updated: Sep 7, 2009 – 7:04:37 AM UNITED NATIONS (FinalCall.com) – The UN Secretary-General’s special representative to Somalia, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah has not answered reporters’ questions concerning his involvement in the crafting of a 15-page “Memorandum of Understanding” that would give Kenya... 

Government of Puntland State PRESS RELEASE 7 September 2009 Somalia: Puntland Response to Seychelles-Kenya Pirate Smuggling On Sunday, 6 September 2009, two light aircraft landed illegally at an abandoned airstrip about 12km south of a small village called Gara’ad located on the Indian Ocean coastline, particularly Puntland State territory near the southern boundary with central Somalia. The two... 

Number of Somalis internally displaced is over 1.5 million MAP: SEE HERE (CLICK) The number of internally displaced people living in Somalia is now over 1.5 million*. The main reason for the increase of the overall number of displaced (from 1.3 million in the first quarter of 2009) is the renewed violence in Mogadishu that displaced over a quarter of a million* people since May 7th. Despite the fact... 

Minneapolis Man Killed in Somalia Published : Saturday, 05 Sep 2009, 5:18 PM CDT MINNEAPOLIS, MN – A fifth Somali-American man from Minneapolis has been killed in Somalia, according to his family members. Mohamoud Hassan was a former engineering student at the University of Minnesota and a recent graduate of Roosevelt High School. In the last couple years, about 20 Minnesotan men have left for... 

For Immediate Release PRESS RELEASE 026/2009 SRSG welcomes UNPOS visit to Somaliland Nairobi, 4 September 2009 – A delegation from UNPOS, led by the UN Deputy Special Representative for Somalia Charles Petrie, visited Somaliland this week to meet officials, with a focus on the continued and strengthened engagement of UNPOS in Somaliland. The delegation also met members of the Government as well... 

Somali Continental Shelf Filing Rejected by Parliament Has Norway “Embarrassed,” UN Admits By Matthew Russell Lee Source: http://www.innercitypress.com UNITED NATIONS, August 31 — The Somali parliament recently voted over 90% against a deal cut by UN envoy Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, using Norwegian assistance, to make a joint Kenya – Somali filing about the Somali people’s... 

By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN MOGADISHU, Somalia — In the end, it all came down to a single forgotten bolt. Marc Aubrière, a French security adviser who was held hostage in Somalia for more than a month, said he simply slipped open a lock on the inside of his cell door — a lock his captors had somehow overlooked. He then tiptoed past the sleeping guards, who are part of an extremist Islamist group that... 

By MOHAMED OLAD HASSAN (AP) – 13 minutes ago MOGADISHU, Somalia — A French security agent kidnapped by insurgents in Somalia last month was a free man Wednesday and under protection at the presidential palace, officials said. There were conflicting reports over whether the man escaped or was released and whether he had killed three of his captors. The fate of another French security agent kidnapped... 

NAIROBI — Persistent violence and a prolonged drought have plunged Somalia into its worst humanitarian crisis since civil war erupted two decades ago, with a third of its 10 million people needing relief aid, a UN report said Tuesday. One in every five children is acutely malnourished, around 1.42 million have been displaced by violence and up to 3.76 million are in need of humanitarian assistance,... 

By AMY FORLITI (AP) MINNEAPOLIS — One young man attended secret meetings in Minneapolis. Another got a phone call, urging him to leave Minnesota and go to Somalia to fight. Terrorist training videos featuring English speakers pepper YouTube, calling others to the cause. Details are emerging about how terrorists in Somalia have lured young American men — including as many as 20 from Minnesota —... 

Minneapolis — Two Somali-American scholars at the University of Minnesota say they’re outraged by what they consider invasive questioning and searches while traveling abroad this summer. Abdi Samatar chairs the U’s geography department. He’s married to Cawo Abdi, a sociology professor. Since June, the husband and wife say they’ve been pulled aside a total of six times at airports... 

New York, August 24, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists called today for an end to an ongoing government crackdown on independent journalists in Somaliland. On Sunday, the Sahil regional court in the costal city of Berbera sentenced the editor-in-chief of the online publication Berberanews, Mohamed Said, in absentia to three years in jail on defamation charges, according to local journalists.... 

COMMITTEE TO PROTECT JOURNALISTS 330 Seventh Avenue, New York, NY 10001 USA Phone: (212) 465-1004 Fax: (212) 465-9568 Web: www.cpj.org SOMALIA: Kidnapped journalists’ families release statement ahead of anniversary New York, August 21, 2009—Ahead of the first anniversary on Sunday, August 23, of the kidnapping in Mogadishu of Canadian Amanda Lindhout and Australian Nigel Brennan the Committee to... 

Update: 24 dead in Somalia violence, witnesses say MOGADISHU, Somalia — At least 24 people were killed in fighting that pitted Islamist insurgents against government forces and African Union peacekeepers in Somalia’s capital Friday, witnesses and medical staff said. Residents were hiding in their homes as mortars slammed into the city. The bloodshed came one day after fighting killed at least... 

Heavy fighting in Somalia has left at least 15 people dead as government soldiers and al-Shabab fighters battle for control of strategic towns. Fighting started in Bula Burte, a town north of Mogadishu, the capital, on Thursday when government soldiers moved into the town which had been dominated by the opposition group. Sheikh Mohamed Ibrahim, an al-Shabab commander, said: “They attacked us... 

ISLAMIST GROUPS * Hizbul Islam is an umbrella organisation of four opposition groups led by hardline cleric Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, who is an influential figure among Islamists. The group fights alongside al Shabaab in a bid to topple the Western-backed government. * Al Shabaab is a hardline group fighting the government. It wants to drive foreign forces out of Somalia and impose a strict form of... 

BOSSASO, Somalia (Reuters) – Somali pirates found seven dead colleagues floating in the ocean on Saturday and vowed to take revenge against Egyptian fishermen they say killed them during an escape, an associate of the pirates said. The 34 fishermen had been held hostage by the pirates since April, but they managed to overpower their guards on Thursday and fled in their two fishing vessels after... 

* Warning comes after Pakistani sheikhs killed * Minister says clerics’ identity still unclear By Abdiaziz Hassan NAIROBI, Aug 14 (Reuters) – Somalia’s new security minister warned foreigners on Friday not to visit the Horn of Africa nation without government approval after masked gunmen massacred seven Pakistani preachers at a mosque. The clerics were killed on Wednesday in Galkayo,... 

MOGADISHU, Somalia — Using machetes and guns, the men fought a desperate battle to take control of two boats off the Somali coast. But this time, it wasn’t pirates who launched the attack — it was Egyptian fishermen who had been held hostage for four months and who killed two brigands and took others captive as they regained control of their vessels. On Friday, the roughly three dozen newly... 

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: August 12, 2009 A Somali man pleaded guilty to terror-related charges stemming from a federal investigation into Americans traveling to Somalia to fight with Islamic militants. The man, Kamal Hassan, acknowledged lying to Federal Bureau of Investigation agents questioning him in February about the case and admitted spending time at a training camp run in Somalia by... 

Media Release    Somali children at high risk as escalating hostilities against aid work cause postponement of life-saving supply delivery    NAIROBI, KENYA, 13 August 2009: UNICEF has today had to postpone the dispatch of hundreds of tons of life-saving nutritional supplies meant for the prevention and treatment of acute malnutrition in over 85,000 Somali children in certain areas in the central...