With news that Ethiopian troops shelled a marketplace in Mogadishu-
(Reuters) - At least 11 people were killed in Mogadishu on Saturday when troops at the Villa Somalia presidential palace returned fire against Islamist insurgents who attacked it with mortar bombs, witnesses said.
President Abdullahi Yusuf was meeting Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin there at the time, an aide told Reuters, but no one in the hilltop compound was hurt.
Residents said Ethiopian soldiers guarding Yusuf then launched shells at Bakara Market in the city below, killing a number of people and wounding dozens more.
One notices in various reports that the consensus narrative on the current conflict has now emerged – Ethiopian forces came to the aid of the Somali government to fight Islamist militias – (not unlike the stories told to justify the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in Pravda- which was provoked by the US). No mention of US involvement in the invasion, or that humanitarian groups have said the invasion (sorry, ‘intervention’) has produced a far worse disaster than anything happening under the Islamic courts which actually was a period of relative calm. I chose the Reuters report because it does at least include these details-
The fighting, which killed 6,500 people last year in Mogadishu alone, has sharply worsened what aid workers warn is a fast deteriorating humanitarian disaster. More than 1 million Somalis are now internal refugees, and some 20,000 flee the capital every month. Most of them end up in areas suffering from the worst drought in years.
One story that got zero coverage (1 result on Google news as far as I can tell) was this yesterday-
A US military drone crashed in a Somali coastal area south of Mogadishu on Friday, a local government official and witnesses said.
“It’s a small unmanned American plane. It’s small and can be carried by three people,” said Mohamed Mohamoud Helmi, the government official in charge of security in the town of Merka.
The cause of the crash was not immediately clear.
“I saw the small plane, it’s about one metre and a half,” local president Mohamed Saddam said. “It has cameras on it and things like computer components.” – Sapa-AFP
Because that kind of story could cause one to ask what America is doing there and that could lead to discovering the Disneyland version of recent events is just that, a childish fantasy designed to keep the simple minded herds content. Otherwise known as the ‘War on Terror!!!!’
