Ethiopia declares war against Somali militants

[jolinar of malkshor]

Ethiopia has moved openly for the first time against Islamic militants in neighbouring Somalia, striking in border towns Sunday amid fears that the violence could engulf the Horn of Africa.
Until now, Ethiopia has supported Somalia's weak interim government against the militants, but has denied that its troops have crossed the border to fight — even though witnesses have been describing such attacks for weeks

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi went on television Sunday to announce that his country was at war with the Islamic movement — the Council of Islamic Courts — that wants to rule Somalia by the Qur'an.
"Our defence force has been forced to enter a war to defend [against] the attacks from extremists and anti-Ethiopian forces and to protect the sovereignty of the land," Meles said a few hours after his military attacked militant-held towns with fighter jets and artillery.

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2006/12/24/somalia.html

Religion sure brings peace to the world.

[Devils'Advocate]

I doubt this has anything to do with religion. Somalia and Ethiopia have been fighting over land for years. A friend of mine comes from Somalia; he worked for the national statistical agency similar to Statistics Canada as the head of the computer centre. Then one day the head of the country announced that all public servants were required to join the army and fight the Ethiopians.... that's when my friend figured he'd better get his ass out of the country and into Canada. That war wasn't about religion and neither is this one.

According to my friend, Ethiopia is using just the perfectly right language to get funding from the U.S.. They are fighting "Islamic extremists" and have characterized the Somalis as "terrorists". While it is extremely unlikely the US would help with an invasion of Somalia, they might be persuaded to send money, arms and supplies to a country willing to fight against "Islamic extremists".

[Looger]

same trick being used on us to define iraq's internecene struggles, the sunni insurgents are more of an ethnic identity and a nationalist force than a religious one (no matter how many mosques the CIA, the SAS, and mossad bomb), their support structure the former baathist regime which consisted also of christians in iraq - whom, it should be noted, are under far more persecution today than they ever were under saddam, whose #2 man tariq aziz is in fact a christian.

apparently every conflict is a religious one when there is a desire to get us to hate the 'bad guys'. what a joke.