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May 3, 2006

Somalia: Vengeance And Violence Of The Islamic Courts

We reported on Thursday (April 27) that militia connected with the Islamic Courts in Mogadishu were, along with their opponents from the Counter-Terror Alliance, preparing for more battles. On March 22 militia from the Islamic Courts began a battle at a warlord's checkpoint at Galgalato, a northern suburb of the capital, Mogadishu. This soon escalated, leading to the deaths of 93 civilians and fighters.

The Counter-Terror Alliance was set up in February by warlords, to oppose the fundamentalism and the aims of rulership of the Union of Islamic Courts. Soon after the Alliance was formed, between February 18 and 22 violence between the two sides had caused 22 people to be killed.

Yesterday, militia again provoked violence, this time at the base of the temporary government at Baidoa. The UN-brokered interim government, led by President Abdullahi Yusuf, moved its seat of operations here when the violence in Mogadishu became too threatening to its operation. The government of Yusuf, the 14th attempt to create a legitimate control of Somalia, was set up in Kenya in 2004.

According to South African Reuters and Harowo.com, the violence started when militia tried to seize an official government car, which was driving through Baidoa. The violence which ensued caused two people who were travelling in the vehicle to be injured, and five of the militia who attacked it.

The incident at Baidoa was caused by a militia belonging to a local leader. It happened one day after a UN envoy, Kjell Magne Bondevik, had visited the Baidoa government under tight security.

The Union of Islamic Courts is headed by Sheikh Sharif Ahmed. This group was founded in 1994, following the collapse of the government of the ousted dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991. Following the absence of the rule of law and order, the capital Mogadishu became overrun by warlords. Some of these have been seconded into the current interim government, but have failed to ensure peace.

The Islamic Courts accuse the Counter-Terror Alliance of being funded by the United States, while the Alliance in turn accuses the Islamic Courts of trying to impose Islamic fundamentalism as the rule of law. In 1995, the Islamic Courts began to dish out sharia "justice", with individuals stoned to death for adultery, and thieves having hands amputated. The Islamic Courts have not had any public executions for more than a decade, and have concentrated mainly on closing down bars, cinemas and venues they consider to be "un-Islamic", but a new sign is emerging of their intransigence.

Yesterday, in a grim reminder of what they see as the future of Somalia, they authorised the public execution of a teacher in Mogadishu. Details come from the Washington Post, the BBC, South Africa's Independent and Reuters.

Hundreds of people gathered at a Koranic school at Mogadishu to see Omar Hussein, a 45-year old teacher, being stabbed to death under an Islamic Court shariah ruling. The court had been set up in Bermuda (Permuda) district, Mogadishu, and authorised that the person to carry out the killing was the son of the man's victim. Omar Hussein had been approached by Osman Moallim, the father of a teenage boy at the school, two months ago. The father was complaining of his son's education, and the teacher stabbed him to death.

The execution (see picture, right) happened as the teacher was tied, with his head hooded, to a pole, while members of the Islamic court stood by. 16 year old Mohamed Moalim approached the man, and then repeatedly stabbed him in the chest, throat and head. The teacher's last words were: "There is no God but Allah!"

After fatally stabbing the man who murdered his father in the grounds of his school in Bermuda district, Mohamed Moalim said calmly: "I am happy now because I killed the man who killed my father."

UPDATE - MAY 4: The Somali news organisation, Shabelle has a gruesome series of "before, during and after" pictures of the public killing.

Under the terms of Sharia law, a killer can escape the death penalty if he agrees to pay compensation to the murdered person's relatives, and conditional upon them accepting the blood-money. Shabelle reports that the Makka Al-mukarma Islamic court in Permuda village had rushed through the public execution. The wife of the executed teacher's uncle, Leila Ahmed, claims that an agreement had been reached between the two families to settle the matter with blood-money, but the court had made its verdict and gone ahead with the execution without her family's knowledge.

She said: "The relatives of the stabbed man and those whose man was killed agreed on compensation, but the court itself ruled the execution case against Sheekha Omar Hussein and the verdict was not in common ground."

Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at May 3, 2006 7:26 AM

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