Farmajo under pressure to clarify fate of youths killed in Tigray war

Also, the parliament's foreign affairs committee wrote a letter to Farmajo asking him to explain the fate of the youths dead or alive and immediately send a team to Asmara to investigate the shocking matter.

News Keydmedia Online
22 January 2021

MOGADISHU, Somalia - Somalia's outgoing President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo is facing intense pressure from within the country following reports that thousands of youths sent by his government covertly to Eritrea for training have been killed in Ethiopia while fighting in the Tigray region last year.

Mothers have staged protests in parts of the country, including Mogadishu, and Galkayo last week, demanding the government to clarify the whereabouts of their boys aged 20 and 25 who were taken to Eritrea without their consent.

Also, the parliament's foreign affairs committee wrote a letter to Farmajo asking him to explain the fate of the youths whether they are "dead or alive" and immediately send a team to Asmara to investigate the shocking matter.

This came after the former Deputy Somali Spy Chief Abdisalam Guled announced that 3,000-400 young Somalis who have been undergoing training in Eritrea were taken by buses by their Eritrean trainers and crossed into Ethiopia to join the fight against TPLF.

Guled, citing Ethiopian Intelligence sources added that as many as 180 out of the thousands of Somali cadets survived the Tigray battle. The wounded have been admitted to hospitals in Mekelle city.

The parents say their sons were high school students and they had been lured into high-paying jobs in Qatar by Farmajo’s right-hand man, Fahad Yasin, the NISA chief who maintains close ties with Asmara.

As public anger grows with each passing day, the government is trying to cover up the youngsters it has recruited with the information ministry describing the claims as “politically motivated and baseless”.

“According to the information we’re receiving, those boys were taken to the war in northern Ethiopia. We’re calling for an independent national commission to investigate the matter, and if it is proven to be true, it will amount to the treason of national scale,” said opposition leader Abdirahman Abdishakur.

To stay in power beyond his mandate, Farmajo has established close ties with Eritrean dictator Afwerki in 2018 and has sent many young men to Asmara for training as part of his hidden plans to stage a coup.

Farmajo, Afwerki, and Abiy have been accused of working together to rule their countries with an iron fist after reaching a security co-operation agreement in Asmara in 2018 in a bid to form an alliance in the East African region.

KON English News Desk