Bazookas, machine guns, hand grenades and other weapons of mass destruction were also directed against civilian targets in Hargeisa which had also been attacked as well as in Burao."[117]. Another factor behind the strong support from the Isaaq was the fact that the border that was drawn between Ethiopia and Somalia cut off important grazing grounds for Isaaq tribesmen. According to Human Rights Watch's Africa Watch, hundreds of Isaaqs have been executed and subjected to other reprisals on the basis of such suspicions. [141], Government attacks on Berbera included mass arrests, wanton killing of civilians, confiscation of civilian property, especially cars, luggage and food at the city's port, which were taken to Mogadishu. These included long-range artillery guns that were placed on the hilltops near the Hargeisa Zoo, artillery guns were also placed on the hilltops behind the Badhka (an open ground used for public executions by the government). A report by Africa Watch stated that the policy was "the outcome of a specific conception of how the war against the insurgents should be fought," with the logic being to "punish civilians for their presumed support for the SNM attacks and to discourage them from further assistance". Residential properties which were near important government offices were also blown up. The report also stated that the city was without electricity or a functioning water system, and that the Somali government was "actively soliciting multilateral and bilateral donors for reconstruction assistance"[140] of cities primarily destroyed by the government's own forces. The most extensive damage appeared to be in the residential areas where the concentration of civilians was highest, in the marketplace, and in public buildings in the downtown area. [142] Eight of the passengers detained were killed, the remaining 21 were imprisoned in Berbera and later released. However, when its goal is to exterminate and expel large numbers of people based on their group identity alone, it becomes clan cleansing. The Garissa Massacre was a 1980 massacre of ethnic Somali residents by the Kenyan government in the Garissa District of the North Eastern Province, Kenya. [142] The victims were killed in batches of 30-40. Killings, rape and looting became common. The use of large-scale aerial bombardment was unprecedented in the history of African civil unrest. [24] The killings happened during the Somali Civil War and have been referred to as a "forgotten genocide". Aid officials said that up to 800,000 people almost all of them Issaq nomads have been displaced as a result of the civil war. A United States Congressional General Accounting Office team reported the Somali government's response to the SNM attack as follows: The Somali army reportedly responded to the SNM attacks in May 1988 with extreme force, inflicting heavy civilian casualties and damages to Hargeisa and Burao.The Somali military resorted to using artillery and aerial shelling in heavily populated urban centres in its effort to retake Burao and Hargeisa. Berbera, a city on the Red Sea coast, at the time the principal port of Somalia after Mogadishu, was also targeted by government troops. It showed a woman in a white skirt and red cardigan hanging from a tree in a wood outside Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia. [126] They then began to shell the city. Many of the 43 victims had been detained in the city's central prison for some time on different charges. During the period of unrest in the north of the country, the government started arresting civilian Isaaq residents of the capital, Mogadishu. [187] African historian, Lidwien Kapteijns in discussing the targeting of Isaaq people as a distinct group in relation to other groups also targeted by the Barre government states: Collective clan-based violence against civilians always represents a violation of human rights. "[108], Somali historian Mohamed Haji Ingiriis refers to "the state-sponsored genocidal campaigns leveled at the Isaaq clan-group", which he notes is "popularly known in public discourses as the 'Hargeisa Holocaust'" as a "forgotten genocide".[109]. Their huts were burned and their animals killed. Other descriptions of what took place in Hargeisa include: Siad Barre focused his wrath (and American-supported military might) against his Northern opposition. [105] Civilian Isaaqs were "killed, imprisoned under severe conditions, forced to flee across the border, or became displaced in the far-off countryside". [18][19] The number of civilian deaths in this massacre is estimated to be between 50,000 and 100,000, according to various sources,[1][9][20] whilst local reports estimate the total civilian deaths to be upwards of 200,000 Isaaq civilians. Among the victims were many students. The U.N. had declared these enclaves. [177] It is reported that thousands of people were affected by mining in that area, by either abandoning their farmlands entirely due to land-mines or by severe restrictions on farming due to the presence of mines in their fields or the roads network.[177]. The term "genocide" came to be used more and more frequently by human rights observers.[138]. The looting has resulted in the opening of what are called "Hargeisa markets" throughout the region, including Mogadishu and Ethiopia, were former residents have spotted their possessions. [62] The Somali Army managed the training of both groups, and costs incurred including any expenditure for their arms and equipment, radio communications and fuel came from the army's budget. They were all accused of assisting the farmer's wife to shelter the SNM fighter. One example of this is the case of Abdi Rageh, an Isaaq former military officer, was forcibly removed from a flight leaving for Frankfurt. This was especially harsh due to region's semi-arid climate and frequent water shortages. [169][170], In addition to the "systematic destruction of Isaaq dwellings, settlements and water points", bombing raids were conducted on major cities in the northwest regions inhabited mainly by Isaaq on orders of President Barre.[99]. [53] However, the official position changed following the meeting of the newly formed SNM Congress in October 1981 to one of liberation "with the expressed aim of ridding Somalia of Barre and instituting a democratic government in Somalia that would be inclusive of and based on the clan system". "[152] In a separate case, a man leaving Erigavo with money and food was "robbed, beaten and shot by the military". [154] The government continued to commit atrocities in Sheikh despite the lack of SNM activity there. As expressed animosity and discontent in the north grew, Barre armed the Ogaden refugees, and in doing so created an irregular army operating inside Isaaq territories. "[53] ""[127] The attacks on civilians were the result of the military's realisation the local Isaaq population of Hargeisa welcomed the SNM attack. Extensive boobytrap activity has also been reported from Hargeysa."[176]. According to Human Rights Watch's Africa Watch, some 700 Isaaqs from the armed forces were brought to one prison, this particular prison was already overcrowded, an additional 70 military personnel were then also brought for detention (40 from Gabiley and 30 from Hargeisa). [151] The report denounced the "lack of basic freedom and human rights" in Somalia, which resulted in the agency's decision to leave Somalia due to what it described as a "drastic decline in security and human rights". In 2001, the United Nations commissioned an investigation on past human rights violations in Somalia,[18] specifically to find out if "crimes of international jurisdiction (i.e. [44] The political marginalisation that majority of northerners felt was further exacerbated by economic deprivation, the north received just under 7 percent of nationally disbursed development assistance by the late 1970s,[45] as more than 95% of all development projects and scholarships were distributed in the south. [94] According to Alex de Waal, Jens Meierhenrich and Bridget Conley-Zilkic: What began as a counterinsurgency against the Somali National Movement rebels and their sympathizers, and escalated into genocidal onslaught against the Isaaq clan family, turned into the disintegration of both government and rebellion and the replacement of institutionalized armed forces with fragmented clan-based militia. There is no doubt that the unity of these people will restore the balance of the scales which are now tipped in favour of the Isaaq. Soldiers raided mosques and looted its carpets and loudspeakers. They will only be released from detention centers, even after being raped, if the family pays a ransom. The water well at Selel-Derajog was "destroyed and cemented over by government forces". By then, any surviving urban Isaaks that is to say, hundreds of thousands of members of the main northern clan community had fled across the border into Ethiopia. Instead refugees, registered with UNHCR were given jobs in the offices dealing with refugee matters."[59]. [53] Furthermore, Barre heavily favoured the Ogaden refugees, who belonged to the same clan (Darod) as him. Emina erimovi. One of the militias formed by the Ogaden refugees was the WSLF, officially created to fight Ethiopia and "reclaim ethnic Somali territory" in Ethiopia[63] but it was used primarily against local Isaaq civilians and nomads. The Congressional General Accounting Office team noted the extent to which residential districts were especially targeted by the army: Hargeisa, the second largest city in Somalia, has suffered extensive damage from artillery and aerial shelling. In the countryside, the persecution of Isaaq included the creation of a mechanised section of the Somali Armed Forces dubbed as Dabar Goynta Isaaqa (The Isaaq Exterminators) consisting entirely of non-Isaaqs (mainly Ogaden);[31][32] this unit conducted a "systematic pattern of attacks against unarmed, civilian villages, watering points and grazing areas of northern Somalia [Somaliland], killing many of their residents and forcing survivors to flee for safety to remote areas". This resulted in entire villages being depopulated and towns getting plundered. Their counter-attack started with use of heavy weapons. Between June and the end of September, government forces as well as armed Ethiopian (Ogadeni) refugees continued to raid the immediate vicinity of Berbera as well as the villages between Berbera and Hargeisa. In December as the SNM's presence in the mountains around. Amnesty International confirmed the large-scale targeting and killing of civilian population by Somali government troops. Human Rights Watch reported that the refugees often "rampaged through villages and nomadic encampments near their numerous camps and claimed the lives of thousands of others, mostly nomads". [99] The Siad Barre regime targeted civilian members of the Isaaq group specifically,[100] especially in the cities of Hargeisa and Burco and to that end employed the use of indiscriminate artillery shelling and aerial bombardment against civilian populations belonging to the Isaaq clan.[101][102]. The harsh reprisals, widespread bombing and burning of villages followed every time there was an attack by SNM believed to be hiding in Ethiopia. Until about eight months ago, the urbanised population of Issaqi were concentrated in Hargeisa, Berbera and Burao. TOO BAD I NE OF THOSE HAHA. Their property and assets were also seized. The Guardian reported the brutal campaign by the Somali government against the Isaaq: Hundred of Thousands of people have been killed, dispersed or bombed out of their homes in northern Somalia after government military operations which Western aid workers say are little short of genocide. [124] Another major cause of civilian deaths was food robbery, this was reportedily because the soldiers were not being supplied by the government. [177], One of the most densely mined areas in the north were the agricultural settlements around Gabiley and Arabsiyo. The Isaaq tell hilarious, but pathetic stories about Ogadenis who stole modern household appliances from homes in Hargeisa, Borama and Burao, then retreated with their trophies to use them in the remote pasture lands devoid of electricity. The sixth man was charged with being a member of the SNM and accompanying the SNM fighter who escaped. [143] The killings took place near the airport at a site about 10 kilometers from Berbera, and were conducted at night. They were shot as a reprisal when a major military offensive against the SNM in the vicinity failed; some of the victims were very old men. On 21 June a ship called 'Emviyara' had docked at the port of Berbera.
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