Somali president: US right to attack

The US launched at least two airstrikes on different locations against terror targets in Somalia, an official and witnesses said today.

A US AC-130 gunship attacked suspected al-Qaida terrorists near Ras Kamboni in southern Somalia, the Somali defence minister said.

Earlier, an eyewitness said a gunship hit targets near Afmadow, 155 miles north of Ras Kamboni.

Somalia’s president today said the US was right to launch airstrikes against al-Qaida suspects in his country.

“The US has a right to bombard terrorist suspects who attacked its embassies Kenya and Tanzania,” President Abdullahi Yusuf told journalists in the capital, Mogadishu.

It is the first overt military action by the US in Somalia since the 1990s and the legacy of a botched intervention, known as Black Hawk Down, that left 18 US servicemen dead.

Meanwhile, the US military today said it had sent an aircraft carrier to join three other US warships conducting anti-terror operations off the coast.

US warships have been seeking to capture al-Qaida members thought to be fleeing Somalia in the wake of Ethiopia’s December 24 intervention.

The US attacks took place yesterday afternoon in Badmadow island.

The area is believed to be a suspected terror training base.