UNITED
NATIONS (Reuters) - A confidential U.N. monitors' report warns of
"systematic abuses" by Somalia's government, which the monitors say has
allowed the diversion of weapons that Somali authorities purchased after
the U.N. Security Council eased an arms embargo on Mogadishu last year.
Some of the arms
believed to have been diverted were earmarked for a leader of the al
Qaeda-linked Islamist militant group al Shabaab, the monitors said in
their report, which was obtained by Reuters.
In its 14-page report to
the Security Council's sanctions committee, the U.N. Somalia and
Eritrea Monitoring Group recommends either restoring the full arms
embargo or at least tightening notification and reporting requirements
related to arms deliveries.
"The Monitoring Group
has identified a number of issues and concerns over current management
of weapons and ammunition stockpiles by the Federal Government of
Somalia (FGS), which point to high-level and systematic abuses in
weapons and ammunition management and distribution," the report said.
The panel of independent experts tracks compliance with the U.N. Somalia-Eritrea sanctions regime.
The 15-nation council's
decision to ease Somalia's decades-old arms embargo last March was a
controversial one, although Washington supported the Somali government's
appeals for restrictions to be relaxed to enable it to better arm its
security forces to fight al Shabaab.
The new report details
difficulties the monitors have had in getting access to weapons
stockpiles in Somalia and information about its growing arsenal. It says
the government cancelled several inspections of armouries that the
monitors and U.N. officials had planned to undertake.
DISCREPANCIES
The monitors describe
how parts of shipments of weapons from Uganda and Djibouti, including
assault rifles, rocket launchers, grenades and ammunition, "could not be
accounted for". The report also mentioned discrepancies in accounts of
what had happened to arms sent from Ethiopia.
"Given the gaps in
information ... it is impossible to quantify what the scale of diversion
of weapons stocks has been," the report said. "However, the Monitoring
Group has obtained other pieces of qualitative evidence that point
towards systematic abuses by the (Somali army)."
The Security Council
imposed the embargo on Somalia in 1992 to cut the flow of weapons to
feuding warlords, who a year earlier had ousted dictator Mohamed Siad
Barre and plunged the country into civil war.
Somalia was virtually lawless until 2012, when it held its first vote in 21 years to elect a president and prime minister.
The monitors said they
had identified at least two clan-based "centers of gravity" for arms
procurement within Somali government structures that were distributing
arms to "parallel security forces and clan militias that are not part of
the Somali security forces".
One of those groups is
within the Abgaal sub-clan of Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud,
who last month said he wanted the U.N. Security Council to extend the
partial lifting of the embargo when it expires in March because
government troops needed more and better equipment to battle al Shabaab.
"A key adviser to the
president, from his Abgaal sub-clan, has been involved in planning
weapons deliveries to al Shabaab leader Sheikh Yusuf Isse ... who is
also Abgaal," the report said.
Mohamud told Reuters in
January his government had met all conditions related to the partial
lifting of the embargo. "We have been following the instructions of the
Security Council and the committee that has been assigned ... to
monitor," he said.
GOVERNMENT MINISTER
The report also referred
to the role played by a Somali government minister from the Habar Gedir
sub-clan in relation to arms purchases from a "foreign government in
the Gulf" - a government the report does not identify.
"The Monitoring Group
has received credible evidence of un-notified weapons deliveries by air
from the Gulf state to Mogadishu during the course of October 2013,
which would constitute a direct violation of the arms embargo," it said.
"Indeed, after delivery, some of the weapons were moved to a private location in Mogadishu," the monitors said.
The easing of the U.N.
arms embargo has allowed sales of such weapons as automatic assault
rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, but left in place a ban on
surface-to-air missiles, large-calibre guns, howitzers, cannons and
mortars as well as anti-tank guided weapons, mines and night-vision
weapon sights.
"The trends described
above demonstrate that the implementation of the (government's) security
policy is being captured by clan and sub-clan politics," the report
said.
"Weapons distribution
along clan lines for the prosecution of clan warfare is ultimately
reducing the prospect of a cohesive strategy by the (government) against
al Shabaab."
The report said private arms markets had popped up in Mogadishu, where weapons diverted from the army had been sold.
The monitoring group
presented eight options for the arms embargo when the current easing
expires next month. They range from lifting the embargo altogether to
restoring the full embargo and possibly adding new measures.
It recommended either
restoring the full embargo or at least keeping it as is and introducing
stricter rules on notification and reporting to the U.N. sanctions
committee.
It also suggested the
possibility of beefing up the U.N. mission in Somalia by attaching a
verification team to track arms deliveries and stockpiles in Somalia.
0 comments:
Post a Comment