Like many of the Somali youth I interviewed in Kenya, “Xarid M.” had braved the streets of Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, for as long as he could to go to school. But that all changed the day the Islamist insurgent group al-Shabaab brought the war to his classroom.Like many of the Somali youth I interviewed in Kenya, “Xarid M.” had braved the streets of Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, for as long as he could to go to school. But that all changed the day the Islamist insurgent group al-Shabaab brought the war to his classroom.
To the outside world, the question might sound puzzling: How can the United Nations stop itself from supporting human rights abusers? Sadly, the issue is by no means theoretical.
Al-Shabaab claims it struck Kampala as retribution for attacks on civilians by the African Union peacekeeping force, led by Ugandan soldiers who are propping up Somalia's internationally backed transitional government. As investigators continue to sift through the evidence and talk of more arrests, international policymakers and governments in the region should work just as urgently to revise their failed Somalia strategies.
Ask people what they know about Somalia and most will probably start talking about pirates, terrorists and Black Hawk Down. Not many would think to mention democracy or free elections as well, but they should. Last month, Somaliland--an impoverished sliver of territory that has maintained de facto independence from Somalia since 1991--held elections that put the democratic pretenses of its neighbors in the Horn of Africa to shame.
Shot at and raped. Arrested and beaten. Detained and deported. Extorted and robbed. Threatened and insulted. Ignored and shunned. The treatment of hardened criminals in some far-flung police state? The fate of political opponents by a repressive regime? Not quite. For Somali refugees - 80% of them women and children - this is their welcome to Kenya.
Stories of abuse are shockingly routine in Somalia, where the beleaguered, US-backed Transitional Federal Government is pitted against powerful insurgents including al-Shabaab, a radical Islamist group with some ties to Al Qaeda.
For the tens of thousands of African refugees fleeing to Yemen each year, the journey across the Gulf of Aden can be heartbreakingly difficult and dangerous - and then things often only get worse.
In recent weeks hundreds of young men and boys from the Dadaab refugee camps have been secretly recruited for the force, lured with false promises of lavish pay and claims of backing from the United Nations and the United States.
Sitting in the world’s largest refugee camp, 17-year-old ‘Amina’ struggles to meet my eyes as she tells me her story.
Fleeing war-torn Somalia early last year, she managed to slip across Kenya’s officially closed border. Like hundreds, if not thousands, of other Somali refugees, Amina and 20 others were picked up by Kenyan police on the edge of the Dadaab camp. The police demanded bribes, threatened to deport them and took them to a police station in the camp.
To the outside world, the question might sound puzzling: How can the United Nations stop itself from supporting human rights abusers? Sadly, the issue is by no means theoretical.