Mogadishu, Somalia – Several Somali Islamist fighters and possibly some of their leaders were arrested trying to escape into Kenya, Kenyan authorities said Wednesday, raising the possibility of a sticky asylum issue.
“We have detained a number of people, but we are still trying to determine their identities,” said Alfred Mutua, spokesman for the Kenyan government.
Somali officials said Kenyan soldiers might have captured Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed, the second in command of the defeated Islamist forces.
According to Ismail Qasim Naji, a Somali general, Sharif’s briefcase was recently discovered at a jungle hideout in southern Somalia.
“It had some important documents in it,” Naji said at a news conference in Mogadishu, Somalia’s seaside capital. When asked what documents, the general replied, “Top secret.”
Ethiopian-led forces routed Somalia’s Islamist army last month after the Islamists attacked Baidoa, the seat of Somalia’s transitional government. The U.S. military jumped in last week, bombing two areas in southern Somalia where the Islamist leaders and several terrorist suspects were believed to be hiding. A small contingent of U.S. special operations troops has been deployed to help track down suspects and identify any bodies.
Since then, the Islamists have been caught between the advancing Ethiopian-led army and the heavily-fortified Kenyan border near the Indian Ocean, which is patrolled by U.S. warships.
U.N. officials said the Kenyan government was deliberating whether to grant Islamist leaders political asylum, in the interest of bringing the fighting across the border to a close by allowing the Islamist leaders a graceful exit from the country.
Somalia’s officials have agreed to give amnesty to rank-and-file fighters but said they want the top Islamists handed over.
In Baidoa, lawmakers Wednesday ousted the speaker of Parliament, Sharif Hassan Sheik Adan. Adan fell out of favor with President Yusuf and Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi after he tried to strike a peace deal between the Islamists and the transitional government. He also demanded Ethiopian troops leave Somalia.
