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Somalia: Somali legislative body probes troop's acts against civilians
Wed. July 02, 2008 09:53 am.- By Bonny Apunyu. -
(SomaliNet) Members of Somali legislative body have started an investigation on crimes they said were committed to Somali civilians by both Ethiopian and Somali soldiers.
Speaking to Shabelle radio by phone from Baidoa town the information chief of the parliamentarian committee Awad Ahmed Ashra has stated there were careful examinations underway wanted to snuff out crimes against the human rights he said were jointly committed by the government troops and their ally Ethiopians.
He added that they've geared up special committee to report on this matter.
" we have to realize if there are crimes against human rights committed by The Ethio-Som troops , we will take tough action adjacent to any criminal we find out" Awad said in the interview.
The search movements of the MPs comes following it has been collected extensive evidence that confirms allegations of Crimes against human rights committed by Somali government and Ethiopian troops in their military campaign to crush the rebel movement in Somalia in particular the capital Mogadishu.
On Tuesday, Amnesty International accused Ethiopian troops in Somalia of killing civilians and committing atrocities, including slitting people's throats, gouging out eyes and gang-raping women.
In a several reacors several Human rights commissions, detailed chilling witness accounts of indiscriminate killings in Somalia and called on the international community to stop the bloodshed? The Ethiopian government said the report was unbalanced and "categorically wrong."
Amnesty said testimony it received suggested that all parties to the conflict had committed war crimes. But it cited Ethiopian troops, in the country to back Somalia's UN-sponsored government, for some of the worst violations.
The Somali transitional government invited Ethiopian forces into the country to help it battle Islamic insurgents. Somalia has been torn apart by years of violence between the militias of rival clan warlords.
The rights group said it had scores of reports of killings by Ethiopian troops. In one case, "a young child's throat was slit by Ethiopian soldiers in front of the child's mother," the report says.
Amnesty said about 6,000 civilians had been reported killed and more than 600,000 had been forced to flee their homes in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, last year.
"The people of Somalia are being killed, raped, and tortured.
Looting is widespread and entire neighborhoods are being destroyed," Michelle Kagari, the Amnesty deputy director for Africa, said in a statement from Nairobi that accompanied the report.
The report quotes testimony from 75 witnesses as well as scores of workers from nongovernmental organizations. People are identified only by first name to protect them from retaliation.
In one testimony, Haboon, 56, said her neighbor's 17-year-old daughter had been raped by Ethiopian troops. The girl's brothers tried to defend their sister, but the soldiers beat them and gouged their eyes out with a bayonet, Haboon was quoted as telling Amnesty.
"The testimony we received strongly suggests that war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity have been committed by all parties to the conflict in Somalia and no one is being held accountable," Kagari said.
Somalia has been mired in chaos since 1991, when warlords overthrew the longtime dictator, Mohamed Siad Barre, and then turned on each other. Last year, Islamist militants took control of most of southern Somalia, including Mogadishu.
Troops from neighboring Ethiopia dewere ployed in December 2006 and ejected the Islamists from the capital.
Since then, Mogadishu has been caught up in a guerrilla war between the government and its Ethiopian allies, and the Islamist insurgents.
Amnesty urged the United Nations, the African Union and other groups to halt the violence.- Shabelle Media Network
News Category: Somalia
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