Somali Islamic leader orders holy war against Ethiopia

The leader of Somalia’s Islamic fighters called on all Somalis to wage holy war against Ethiopia today, a day after Ethiopian troops rolled into Somalia to protect the weak UN-backed government the Islamic group has challenged for power.

Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys, in a radio broadcast, said Ethiopia deployed troops to the government’s base in Baidoa, 150 miles north-west of Mogadishu, to bolster what he described as a puppet regime.

“I am calling on the Somali people to wage a holy war against Ethiopians in Baidoa,” said Aweys, who the US government says has ties to al-Qaida. “They came to protect a government which they set up to advance their interests.”

Residents of Baidoa reported seeing hundreds of Ethiopian troops, in uniform and in marked armoured vehicles, entering Baidoa yesterday and taking up positions around transitional President Abdullahi Yusuf’s compound.

Ethiopian and Somali government officials have denied Ethiopian troops are in the country, though witnesses from five towns have reported seeing them.

“Abdullahi Yusuf is in the pocket of Ethiopia,” Aweys said on the radio, heard across the country. “He's been a servant of Ethiopia for a long time.”