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Local aid worker shot dead in Somalia
MOGADISHU, Aug. 6 (Xinhua) -- Abdulkadir Yusuf Kariye, head of the Lafole Orphanage Center in Somalia, was killed by unknown gunmen Wednesday on the outskirts of the capital Mogadishu, witnesses said.
Kariye was at his home not far from the Orphanage Center when the gunmen shot him six times on the head. He was taken to hospital where he died, Juweriyo Ahmed, a witness, told Xinhua.
Kariye is the latest aid worker killed in the restive Somali capital where several other aid workers have been killed or kidnapped so far this year.
The orphanage center, where Kariye managed for more than two decades, is one of the largest orphanage centers in Somalia. The center once cared for hundreds of orphans and street children in Mogadishu and surrounding regions.
The center has not been used as an orphanage since the collapse of former Somali government in 1991. It now houses hundreds of internally displaced families on the outskirts of the capital.
Somalia is facing a humanitarian crisis caused by conflict, drought, and price rises in basic commodities.
Some 2.6 million Somalis, representing 35 percent of the population, are believed to be in need of humanitarian aid.
A huge number of internally displaced people rely on dwindling handouts from local and international aid agencies that have withdrawn most of their foreign staff and scaled down their operations after the increase in violence, particularly in south and central Somalia.
There hasn't been a functioning government in Somalia since 1991, when former president Mohamed Siyad Barre was ousted.
Posted on Wednesday 6th August at 9:35:40 Canada's navy to escort ships carrying food aid for Somalia
OTTAWA (AFP) — A Canadian navy frigate is being deployed to the coast of Somalia to escort World Food Programme ships carrying humanitarian aid to the region beset by pirates, Canada's government said Wednesday.
HMCS Ville de Quebec, at the request of the UN World Food Programme and the UN International Maritime Organization, has been dispatched "to ensure their safe arrival at designated ports," said Defense Minister Peter MacKay in a statement.
"Food supplies are urgently needed in Somalia but deteriorating security has made delivery difficult by land and sea," he said. "Canada is stepping up to the plate."
Formal authorization from Somalia's transitional government to enter its territorial waters over "the next few weeks" is still being sought, he added.
Somalia has been beset by instability and insecurity for almost 20 years and is further affected by regional droughts and increasing world food prices.
Over 2.4 million Somalis currently rely on food aid, of which, 80 percent arrives by sea. While pirates have launched 31 attacks on vessels off Somalia's eastern and northern coasts, to date no escorted World Food Programme ships have been targeted.
Over the last eight months, France, Denmark and the Netherlands have also provided naval escorts for the UN agency.
Posted on Wednesday 6th August at 9:34:38 Ethiopian shelling kills 10 in Somalia
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Mortar shells slammed into a residential area in Somalia's capital, killing at least 10 people — including a mother and her child, witnesses and a hospital official said Tuesday.
The bloodshed Monday came as Ethiopian troops backing Somalia's shaky government battled Islamic insurgents who have been fighting an Iraq-style guerrilla war for more than a year. Thousands of civilians have been killed.
"There were 40 of us gathered under a wall to shield us from the mortars, but one landed near us," Mogadishu resident Shamsa Kheyre told The Associated Press from her hospital bed.
Kheyre said she saw six bodies — including a mother and her young son. Another resident, Shekhey Nur Ahmed, said he and his friends collected the bodies of four people nearby.
"All of them died because of mortar shelling fired from the Ethiopian base," Ahmed said.
Long one of the world's most violent cities, Mogadishu has been decimated in recent months as the U.N.-backed government and its allies try to hold off the insurgency.
On Sunday, a bomb hidden under a pile of garbage killed at least 20 people, half of them women who were sweeping the street in Somalia's capital.
Somalia has been at war since a group of warlords overthrew a socialist dictator in 1991 and then spent years fighting each other. Over the weekend, 10 of the government's 15 ministers broke with the prime minister and announced they would resign.
Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein said Saturday that the resignations were designed "to derail the ongoing reconciliation process." On Sunday, he nominated five new ministers.
Posted on Tuesday 5th August at 9:38:33 Back
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