DAR AL HARB / ISLAM-SOMALIA: ETHIOPIAN FORCES UNDER ATTACK IN MOGADISHU

Ethiopian forces under attack in Somali capital
(AP)8 January 2007

MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Gunmen attacked Ethiopian troops supporting the Somali government, witnesses said, sparking a firefight in the second straight day of violence in a city struggling to emerge from more than a decade of chaos.

Farah Abdi Hussein, who witnessed Sunday’s attack, said gunmen launched grenades on Ethiopians about 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) from the airport. One Somali soldier was wounded, according to a Somali military official who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals.

Ethiopian soldiers, tanks and warplanes intervened in Somalia on Dec. 24 to help defeat an Islamic movement that threatened to overthrow the internationally recognized government, which at the time controlled only the western town of Baidoa.

But many in predominantly Muslim Somalia resent having troops from neighbouring Ethiopia, which has a large Christian population. The countries fought two brutal wars, the last in 1977.

On Saturday, hundreds of furious protesters took to the streets, burning tires and smashing car windows while denouncing the presence of Ethiopian forces and shouting defiance at the Somali government’s call for disarming Mogadishu.

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