Somalia Armed Forces

The State Department said Monday that Somali army looters fired rocket grenades at the U.S. Embassy in the capital of Mogadishu and sacked it hours after American and other diplomats were evacuated from that nation's capital. "Certainly there is no doubt" that the looters were soldiers in the armed forces of Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre, said a member of the department task force monitoring developments in the war-torn African nation.

Somalia has dispatched dozens of heavily armed men to rescue the parliament speaker and other officials in hiding since they were ambushed about 185 miles northwest of Mogadishu, the capital, by an anti-government militia, an official said. The force will not attack the Rahanwein Resistance Army gunmen who ambushed the group, but will meet the group at a village about 40 miles east of the ambush site, the official said. Speaker Abdalla Derow Issak and the others were said to be on foot.

Heavy fighting was reported in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, between government and rebel forces Monday, and Italian Radio said that hundreds had been killed. An Italian diplomat in Somalia said President Mohamed Siad Barre was in a bunker near the airport, directing operations against rebels who had captured part of the city earlier in the day. The diplomat, embassy counselor Claudio Pacifico, said, "The president is at his command post together with the government and is leading operations."

The anguish still penetrates the cloudy brown eyes of Abdillahi Deria Madar as he recounts his brush with death in 1988 at the hands of troops loyal to former Somali dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. With the help of a sympathetic soldier, Madar managed to escape from a lineup of about 800 of his fellow Issaq clansmen who were destined for execution by firing squad.

Somalia has dispatched dozens of heavily armed men to rescue the parliament speaker and other officials in hiding since they were ambushed about 185 miles northwest of Mogadishu, the capital, by an anti-government militia, an official said. The force will not attack the Rahanwein Resistance Army gunmen who ambushed the group, but will meet the group at a village about 40 miles east of the ambush site, the official said. Speaker Abdalla Derow Issak and the others were said to be on foot.

The State Department, endorsing a startling report about massacres in northern Somalia, said Saturday that it is "greatly concerned" about evidence that the Somali army had murdered at least 5,000 unarmed civilians over 10 months because of their ethnic background. The report, prepared at the request of the State Department by Robert Gersony, a private consultant, contained convincing detail of the suffering of the people of the Ishaak clan in the civil war now embroiling Somalia.

Forces loyal to Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre were locked in a fierce battle with rebels and there was no clear sign of who had the upper hand. U.N. staff members evacuated from Somalia's embattled capital, Mogadishu, to Nairobi said chaos reigned as Siad Barre fought to preserve his 21-year rule. Rebels claimed to have seized control of most of the city, but an earlier claim that they had taken over the state radio was apparently untrue.

Last Monday's American helicopter assault on the command center of Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid was timed to strike a morning strategy meeting of his top militia commanders, U.N. officials said Thursday. The officials said that several of Aidid's high-level guerrilla commanders were killed in the attack, carried out under the aegis of the U.N. command in Mogadishu in what officials there said was an effort to halt attacks on U.N. peacekeepers and restore security in the Somali capital.

It was anything but a warm welcome Tuesday afternoon at the Bakara arms bazaar, a dusty road in the heart of Mogadishu lined with rickety wooden stands that offer every known weapon from single bullets to antiaircraft guns. "You American?" an angry, well-armed Somali teen-ager asked two visiting journalists menacingly. Within seconds of their nods, guns started blazing, at first in the air in an unmistakable warning. "Go away!" he added, as the gun barrels lowered. "We hate the Americans here.

Thousands of U.S. Marines are conducting a mock invasion of Somalia this week, sweeping ashore on the northern desert coast as carrier-based jets strafe positions inland. The joint U.S.-Somali maneuvers, which began last Saturday, are aimed at testing Washington's ability to defend oil fields in the nearby Persian Gulf.

Last Monday's American helicopter assault on the command center of Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid was timed to strike a morning strategy meeting of his top militia commanders, U.N. officials said Thursday. The officials said that several of Aidid's high-level guerrilla commanders were killed in the attack, carried out under the aegis of the U.N. command in Mogadishu in what officials there said was an effort to halt attacks on U.N. peacekeepers and restore security in the Somali capital.

It was anything but a warm welcome Tuesday afternoon at the Bakara arms bazaar, a dusty road in the heart of Mogadishu lined with rickety wooden stands that offer every known weapon from single bullets to antiaircraft guns. "You American?" an angry, well-armed Somali teen-ager asked two visiting journalists menacingly. Within seconds of their nods, guns started blazing, at first in the air in an unmistakable warning. "Go away!" he added, as the gun barrels lowered. "We hate the Americans here.

One evening last week, one of the United Nations' armed Pakistani soldiers on duty in Somalia made a rare foray off his base inside Mogadishu's ruined international airport and into town. Within minutes he was shot and wounded by snipers and his vehicle was stolen. That was only one milepost on a bad stretch for the international relief effort in the war-torn Horn of Africa country.

Canada's openness to refugees from around the world has made it an unwitting haven for war criminals from Somalia, a respected Canadian television program says. The report, aired Tuesday by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. program "the fifth estate," asserted that a "rat line," or organized escape route for war criminals, has led from Somalia to Canada through the United States.

At what passes for a hospital in this once-proud town there are 10 beds in the main ward, occupied Wednesday by 45 patients. One of them, a farmer named Yusuf Sheikh Husein, lay prostrate, his muscles wasted to nothingness from months of starvation. A doctor leaned over and roughly pinched the skin between the man's ribs. It came away like a thin leaf of paper. "You see?" the doctor said. "There is nothing left of him."

The State Department said Monday that Somali army looters fired rocket grenades at the U.S. Embassy in the capital of Mogadishu and sacked it hours after American and other diplomats were evacuated from that nation's capital. "Certainly there is no doubt" that the looters were soldiers in the armed forces of Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre, said a member of the department task force monitoring developments in the war-torn African nation.

The anguish still penetrates the cloudy brown eyes of Abdillahi Deria Madar as he recounts his brush with death in 1988 at the hands of troops loyal to former Somali dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. With the help of a sympathetic soldier, Madar managed to escape from a lineup of about 800 of his fellow Issaq clansmen who were destined for execution by firing squad.

At what passes for a hospital in this once-proud town there are 10 beds in the main ward, occupied Wednesday by 45 patients. One of them, a farmer named Yusuf Sheikh Husein, lay prostrate, his muscles wasted to nothingness from months of starvation. A doctor leaned over and roughly pinched the skin between the man's ribs. It came away like a thin leaf of paper. "You see?" the doctor said. "There is nothing left of him."

Forces loyal to Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre were locked in a fierce battle with rebels and there was no clear sign of who had the upper hand. U.N. staff members evacuated from Somalia's embattled capital, Mogadishu, to Nairobi said chaos reigned as Siad Barre fought to preserve his 21-year rule. Rebels claimed to have seized control of most of the city, but an earlier claim that they had taken over the state radio was apparently untrue.

Heavy fighting was reported in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, between government and rebel forces Monday, and Italian Radio said that hundreds had been killed. An Italian diplomat in Somalia said President Mohamed Siad Barre was in a bunker near the airport, directing operations against rebels who had captured part of the city earlier in the day. The diplomat, embassy counselor Claudio Pacifico, said, "The president is at his command post together with the government and is leading operations."