Word: somali
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...drug called kat, their fingers quick on the trigger. Makeshift hospitals dot the city; the existing ones were looted long ago. The wounded must bring their own beds, so most end up lying on the floor, a weeping relative holding aloft their intravenous solution -- when it is available. Somali doctors and foreign volunteers move so quickly from patient to patient that trails of blood pattern the floors...
...overthrown by a coalition of clan-based armies last January, he was replaced as President by Ali Mahdi Mohammed of the Hawiye clan in central Somalia. In September the new President's authority was challenged by General Mohammed Farrah Aidid, a fellow clansman and chairman of the ruling United Somali Congress. The President, meanwhile, has been trying to have Aidid ousted from his position as party leader. An estimated 500 people were killed in street fighting two months ago. Weapons flooded the city, and most urban males began carrying rifles. After a lull, the struggle resumed last week...
Prospects for the new government in Mogadishu seemed bleak. The coalition of rebels, which represents three Somali clans that have feuded for centuries, named hotel owner Ali Mahdi Mohammed, 52, interim President until elections could be held. But Mahdi's party, the United Somali Congress, grew angry at his appointment by a clique of elders and attacked the action as "hasty" and "unnatural." The tenuous troika could swiftly come unglued...
...rebel fighters from the United Somali Congress called in reinforcements, the U.S., Italy and France flew 800 diplomats and other foreign residents to safety in separate rescue missions last week. Soldiers looted the American embassy as soon as the last helicopter took off. Reported Italian Ambassador Mario Sica, who left Saturday: "The city is being sacked as in the days of Genghis Khan...
Somalia's three rebel fronts dismissed Siad Barre's call for a cease-fire and negotiations last week, and the United Somali Congress marched reinforcements into Mogadishu for what it called the "final offensive." In a joint statement issued in London, the three groups announced their agreement to form a "transitional government that will pave the way for the restoration of democratic institutions...