MOGADISHU, SOMALIA — Ethiopian jets pounded Islamic-held positions in southern Somalia, a sharp escalation Sunday of a conflict that diplomats fear could ignite a regional war.
Several hundred people have been killed in five days of fighting between Ethiopian forces and Somalia's Islamic militias. Witnesses and officials said early morning strikes by Ethiopian planes killed about 80 fighters and civilians and wounded an additional 300 in the town of Beledweyne, which has been held by Somalia's Islamic Courts Union.
Early today, Mogadishu International Airport was also bombed by two Ethiopian jets, damaging the main runway and wounding two employees, said Abdi Rahim Adan Weheliye, the airport manager.
The strike was the deepest foray by Ethiopian forces into Islamist-held areas of Somalia. The airport was believed to be an important transit point for arms and fighters.
"The enemy launched full-scale war against Somalia," Sheik Mohamoud Ibrahim Suley, an official of the Islamic courts, said Sunday. "The fighting has commenced, and it will not stop unless Addis Ababa stops the aggression."
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi went on national television to say his country had been "forced to enter into war ... to blunt repeated attacks by Islamic courts terrorists and anti-Ethiopian elements they are supporting." Ethiopia until now had acknowledged only sending several hundred military advisors to Somalia.
International diplomats warn that Somalia's worsening strife could ignite a broader war in the Horn of Africa.
Somalia has been without a functioning government since 1991. The courts union, an alliance of Islamic religious leaders, seized control of Mogadishu, the capital, and most of southern Somalia this summer and has been battling the weak transitional federal government for control of the rest of the country.
The government of Ethiopia, a country with sizable Muslim and Christian populations, is fearful of an Islamic takeover in neighboring Somalia and backs the shaky transitional regime.
A third country in the region, Eritrea, has been backing the Islamic militias. The U.S. government, which has worked with Ethiopia's military in the past, has worried that the courts union could provide sanctuary to Islamic radicals from outside Somalia.
Sunday's attack came one day after the Islamists' top security officer called on Muslims worldwide to come to the assistance of Somalia in what the militias are characterizing as a "holy war" against Ethiopia.
