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Wednesday, August 03, 2011

Somalia: amid famine and drought, Al-Shabab is training children as soldiers and murdering NGO workers


It has been widely reported in the media that as a result of the famine in East Africa, Somalia is facing ‘not only a humanitarian crisis’ but also ‘a human rights crisis and a children’s crisis.
This indication is contained in a report by the Prayer Communication team of Open Doors UK a United Kingdom based Christian humanitarian organization (www.opendoorsuk.org) adding that the Islamist insurgent ("terrorist" group), Al-Shabaab, the main armed group opposed to the government in Somalia, is reported to be systematically recruiting children under 15 as child soldiers.
...some UN agencies working in Somalia suspect that several local organizations which  they have funded and through which they have distributed aid, were giving money to al Shabaab, payments that the Islamist group called “taxes” .
The report details several cases where members of al Shabaab have asked for bribes to the UN and aid agencies in exchange for allowing them to work in rebel areas and in some cases, burning food and medicine when they didn’t get the required money.
...Al-Shabaab currently controls the majority of southern Somalia and targets Christians, who are then routinely killed. Kidnapping and killings of NGO workers have also been reported.

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