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Somali protesters chant anti-Ethiopia slogans during a rally inside Mogadishu Stadium. (Reuters)
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MOGADISHU — A cohort of Somalia lawmakers on Monday, July 24, pressed for the withdrawal of Ethiopian forces from their Horn of African country as thousands of Somalis protested military intervention by their powerful arch-foe neighbor.
"Ethiopian troops should get out of Somalia as soon as possible and should cease from the constant aggression against Somalia," sixteen legislators said in a statement cited by Reuters.
"This move is a clear interference against the freedom and sovereignty of Somalia," they insisted.
More than 100 Ethiopian military trucks carrying troops and supplies were reported by residents in Baidoa, about 250 kilometers (155 miles) northwest of Mogadishu.
Addis Ababa dismissed the claims as propaganda, but said it would crush the Islamic Courts should they attempt to attack the largely powerless government of President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed.
Nominally Christian-led Ethiopia, which backs Yusuf's secular-based government, has invaded neighboring Somalia in the past.
Home to about 10 million largely impoverished people, Somalia has lacked almost all the trappings of a functional state, such as national systems of education, healthcare and justice, for the past 15 years.
Illegal
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"We are talking to the international community to avoid serious bloodshed and we are urging the Ethiopians to withdraw from Somalia," Sharif said. (Reuters)
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The Somali MPs stressed that the intervention of Ethiopian troops runs in the face of the national security plan laid down by the parliament," the Somali MPs said.
"Therefore the Ethiopian troops have to be withdrawn from Somalia immediately and stop the violation against the territory of Somalia.
"They are in our territory illegally and this is undermining our efforts to bring the people of Somalia together under a national federal government," they averred.
The interim government and the Islamic Courts have agreed to recognize each other under a deal brokered by the Arab League.
But the Courts withdrew Saturday, July 22, from talks with the interim government in protest at Ethiopian intervention.
Tensions have risen between the two sides since the Islamic Courts defeated the US-led warlord Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism (ARPCT) and seized full control of the capital Mogadishu on June.
Warlords had controlled the capital since the 1991 overthrow of president Mohamed Siad Barre.
Protests
At least 3,000 Somalis also gathered in northern Mogadishu's stadium Monday to protest Ethiopia's military intervention, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Burning the Ethiopian flag, the angry protestors vowed to fight the invading troops to the last man to defend their homeland.
"Down with the Addis Ababa regime", "Somalis have to prepare themselves for the occupation of Somalia", "We are ready for jihad against Ethiopia", read some of placards carried by the protestors.
Islamic Courts leaders said they were keen to avoid bloodshed, warning that they would have to fight if the international community failed to force an Ethiopian pullout.
"The former armed forces of Somalia, Islamic volunteers and Islamic courts troops are ready to engage face to face with Ethiopian troops, but they are waiting for our instructions," Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, the head of the executive committee of the Islamic Courts, told the rally.
"We are talking to the international community to avoid serious bloodshed and we are urging the Ethiopians to withdraw from Somalia. Patience has its own limitations."
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