Somali P.M. issues alert to U.N.

UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 24 (UPI) — Somali Prime Minister Abdiweli Mohamed Ali warned the U.N. General Assembly Saturday Islamic militants in his country have international aspirations.
Speaking in New York, Ali said that while the militant group al-Shabaab has backed away from Mogadishu, “it may herald a new and more dangerous phase of the conflict as they increasingly turn to asymmetric tactics such as suicide bombings and the use of improvised explosive devices targeting the civilian populace.”
He said al-Shabaab and other groups affiliated with al-Qaida are “actively planning to strike further afield,” with the United Nations and the United States among their intended targets, a United Nations release said.
“It is also a well-known fact that the al-Shabaab have been focusing their recruitment and radicalization efforts on Somali diasporas in Australia, Europe, Canada and in the United States,” Ali said.
He also blamed al-Shabaab and other militant groups for turning the drought in the Horn of Africa into a famine in parts of southern and central Somalia by looting grain supplies, threatening farmers and their families and recruiting fighters by force.
Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed, president of Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government, met with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to discuss political and security developments in the country, the humanitarian situation across the Horn of Africa and combating piracy.
www.upi.com/