Friday, April 13, 2007

More Grim News From Somalia -- Innocents Trapped In The Terror War

A Swedish teenager, who was imprisoned for weeks after being caught trying to flee from the violence unleashed in Somalia by the US-backed Ethiopian coup, says she was captured by Americans, and that American troops supervised her captors. US authorities have claimed Americans played no role in the events, but Safia Benaouda contradicts the official account, saying
three men in U.S. uniforms led the Kenyan troops who detained her and other women and children fleeing Somalia on Jan. 18.

"After the American soldiers had detained us they kept in the background, but it was very clear that they were the ones in charge," Benaouda, who was freed from an Ethiopian prison March 27, was quoted as saying by the Stockholm daily Svenska Dagbladet.
...

Benaouda said she was captured along with a group of women and children as they tried to cross into Kenya. The soldiers shot a woman in the group, she told the paper, but didn't give details.

They were brought to Nairobi and then returned to Somalia, blindfolded and handcuffed, before being transferred to a prison in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, she said.
All's fair in counter-terror, apparently. Not just in Iraq but everywhere. If they can claim you're a terrorist -- plausibly or otherwise -- you can spend a long time in prison, in very uncomfortable circumstances to say the least. Chris Floyd has much more about this very sad continuing story:

Terror War III: U.S. Forces Capture, Render Refugees From Somali "Regime Change"