US fails to break Somali Islamists

[Adsos Letter]

By Martin Plaut
Source: BBC News



The Islamists, bolstered by powerful al-Shabaab hardliners, have regrouped
The Ethiopian army is preparing to leave Somalia almost two years after it invaded to oust Islamists who had taken control of large areas of the country.

The Ethiopians are withdrawing without having broken the power of what Prime Minister Meles Zenawi described in 2006 as the leaders of the jihadist movement, responsible for "terrorist outrages".

But the Ethiopian departure also marks a reverse for US President George W Bush's policy in the Horn of Africa.

It was the bombing of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania by al-Qaeda in 1998 - attacks that left hundreds dead and thousands wounded - that transformed Washington's approach towards the Horn of Africa.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7807291.stm