Deadly duel

Two old rivals are playing a dangerous game, as Somalia slips further into crisis

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It's a bit like trying to prosecute a mob boss. Hassan Dhaher Aweis, the bright vermilion henna-stained bearded head of Somalia's Islamic Court's Shura Council, is a difficult man to judge. He had once imprisoned the current Somali President Abdallah Yusuf and there is no love lost between the two men. After his release, however, President Yusuf, armed to the teeth by the Ethiopians, retaliated by routing the forces of Al-Itihad Al-Islami -- the coalition of militant Islamist forces allegedly linked with Al-Qaeda, who fought the Ethiopian army in the 1990s. Al-Itihad Al-Islami is finished as a fighting force, but some of its leaders, including Aweis, recently metamorphosed into leaders of the Islamic Courts. Aweis is all for talks with his old foe, but the Somali president refuses to engage in negotiations with his rival. "I don't see the need for meeting them in Khartoum again," President Yusuf told members of the Somali Parliament in Baidoa -- a city 200 kms northwest of Mogadishu, which is now the seat of the transitional government of Somalia.

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Somalia's Supreme Council of Islamic Courts militia display their flag in front of Hotel Ramadan, Mogadishu

"We will find better solutions," Yusuf declared. "I don't see the point of meeting with warriors". He was referring to Aweis and his followers. The stalled Khartoum peace talks are sponsored by the Arab League.

Aweis, on the other hand, was reconciliatory. His negotiating team is already in the Sudanese capital Khartoum. "We are urging [the transitional government] to get to the negotiating table to avoid further confusion," Aweis was reported as saying. "The problem of Somalia isn't a lack of weapons, but a lack of peace and understanding of each other," he stressed.

His words might sound accommodating, but his fighters are tightening their control of the country, banishing warlords and imposing Islamic Sharia law. The Islamic Courts are now attempting to levy taxes in the areas under their control.

This week, the forces of the Islamic Courts routed the remaining militias of anti- Islamic Courts warlords. The forces of Abdi Hassan Awale, better known as Qaybdeed, received a punishing defeat at the hands of the Islamic Courts militias. Qaybdeed fled to Baidoa. The forces of another warlord, Hussein Mohamed Aideed -- the interior minister of the transitional government in Baidoa -- also received a humiliating beating.

The Somali president himself is derisively dismissed as "an Ethiopian marionette". President Yusuf insists that the Islamic Courts militias violated a peace agreement signed in Khartoum last month. The Islamic Courts vehemently deny the charge. "I think everybody, including the mediators, knows that we did not violate the agreement," explained Sheikh Abdul- Kader Ali, the Islamic Courts deputy chairman.

The leaders of the Islamic Courts insisted that they do not heed the words of Saudi dissident and Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Other Islamist leaders concurred. "We were invited by the Arab League and we are going to attend the Khartoum talks. If the transitional government doesn't come, then the international community will see who wants peace in Somalia and who doesn't," said the Chairman of the Islamic Courts Sheikh Sherif Ahmed.

Like Aweis, Sheikh Sherif Ahmed made several reconciliatory remarks, which have nevertheless failed to assuage the fears of President Yusuf, members of his transitional government in Baidoa, and allied warlords. "We are making it clear that we are not planning to attack Baidoa, Kismayo or any other region in the country. We want to work with whoever wants peace to prevail in Somalia," said Sheikh Sherif Ahmed.

He has strong connections with Sudan. Indeed, he studied at the University of Kordofan, Sudan. But, unlike Aweis, he does not have a military background. Aweis was decorated for heroism in the aftermath of 1977 war between Ethiopia and Somalia.

The United Nations, at the bidding of the United States, might lift the arms embargo imposed on Somalia and there is talk of dispatching peacekeeping troops. Indeed, President Yusuf has requested the African Union and the UN to deploy foreign troops in Somalia.

Worse, the Somali president accuses the Islamic Courts of enlisting foreign fighters. He accredited their recent military successes to the deployment of foreign fighters in their militias. "Our own intelligence sources have confirmed that foreign fighters are present, mostly from neighbouring countries like Ethiopia, but also among them are Turks, Afghans and Arabs," the Somali president warned.

The militant Islamists of Somalia hotly deny this. "I am not a terrorist. But if strictly following my religion and my love for Islam makes me a terrorist, then I accept such a designation," Aweis said recently. He is on Washington's most wanted terrorists list.

The International Contact Group on Somalia met in Belgium this week. The humanitarian situation in Somalia is fast degenerating. The country needs international relief assistance and especially food aid. Perhaps this is why the leaders of the Islamic Courts have adopted a deliberately accommodating tone vis-à-vis the transitional government. The latter, given the growing regional and international sympathy with it, has adopted a more resolute stance.

By Gamal Nkrumah