A snippet of a new UN report suggests that Somali troops where deployed to the war torn Tigray region of Ethiopia, upon completing training in neighboring Eritrea.
The upcoming reported slated to be released in the coming weeks alleges that Somali military contingents embedded with Eritrean forces crossed the border and entered Tigray and took part in the fighting.
The snippet from the upcoming report went further and alleged that Somali troops where present around the historic city of Axum.
This in itself is a very serious accusation knowing hundreds of ethnic Tigray civilians where massacred in the vicinity of Axum as documented by international rights groups such as Amnesty International.
The Somali government is yet to address these damaging accusations. However Eritrea’s minister of information, Yemane Meskel lambasted the claims and said it was long discredited news.
In the past, both Somalia and Eritrea have been involved in what can only be described as clandestine training operations as scores of Somali youth have been sent to Eritrea as conscripts for military training.
As of yet nothing has been made official by either government but backlash and even protests have erupted across Somalia in recent months as families demand to know the whereabouts of there children sent to Eritrea for military training.
The most recent wave of protests that rocked Somalia took place in Mogadishu on May 16th, with hundreds of mothers and women pouring into the streets demanding answers from the government over there loved ones that where flown to Eritrea after being conscripted and never to be seen again.
Therefore the recent revelations in the excerpt from the UN report that took Twitter by storm shouldn’t be taken lightly but the UN report should be scrutinized on all levels knowing the UN has a long and shameful history of misreporting and at the times spewing unfounded allegations against both Somalia and Eritrea.
Passed reports published by the UN which turned out to be baseless include the bogus claims that fighters from the now defunct Islamic Courts Union (ICU) of Somalia sent fighters to Lebanon to fight alongside Hezzbollah during the 33 day war against Israel.
This turned out to be a complete lie and was furthermore being used as justification by the US to topple the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) who defeated, than expelled the CIA backed warlord from Somalia.
Six weeks after this bogus UN report was published, over 100,000 Ethiopian troops invaded Somalia under the cover of American drones which changed Somalia forever and gave birth to a far more extreme and violent element (Al Shabaab) that continues to reek havoc in Somalia to this day.
A few years later after the initial sanctions, it was revealed by Wikileaks that the UN sanctions where politically motivated and aimed at preventing German banks from investing in Eritrea’s lucrative mining sector and more importantly isolating the Red Sea nation who defied Washington’s advances since achieving statehood in the early 90’s.
Therefore those relishing over the latest UN excerpts that allegedly claim the existence of covert Somali involvement in the mass atrocities in Tigray alongside Eritrean military contingents shouldn’t jump on the bandwagon until sufficient evidence surfaces that can attest to such crimes and the snippets from the impending UN report are far from that.
This isn’t to deny or downplay the atrocities unfolding in Tigray nor is it to diminish the severity of the situation on the ground but knowing the UN’s disgraceful track record in regards to there reporting on Eritrea and Somalia, doubt will run deep in the mind of many, including myself.
Mohamed Abdulkadir is a freelance journalist that covers Somali related affairs. Work can be found on an array of international media outlets that include TRT and Sputnik.
Email : info@halganmedia.net
