Hargeisa, 30 October 2008 (Somaliland Today)- Somaliland police are hot on the heels of the suspected accomplices of the suicide bombers who carried out three simultaneous massive explosions that shook the Somaliland capital of Hargeisa yesterday, killing over 20 innocent people and wounding 29 others. Police had already identified the plate number of one of the vehicles used by the suicide bombers and quickly traced it to a second-hand car market in the port city of Berbera where the vehicle was originally bought. The police were also able to locate three different residences rented by the terrorists before carrying out their despicable acts of terror.
The severed head of one of the terrorists was also reportedly recovered from a place not far from the presidential palace where the terrorist attacks were carried out.
“We located three residences rented by the bombers and found explosives including bomb-making chemicals in these properties”, said the Somaliland interior minister, Abdillahi Ismail Ali.
In an interview with the BBC Somali Service, Mr. Ali stated that several suspects were being held in custody and two of the bombers had already been identified. He stopped short of saying which group the bombers belonged to. However, he indicated that they [the bombers] were from Mogadishu where suicide bombings are common place.
Reliable sources told Somaliland Today that the security guard of one of the properties rented by the bombers alerted to the neighbours and took his concerns to the police after he became suspicious of the men- a charge vigorously denied by the interior minister.
“We are just beginning to put together the jigsaw puzzles”, said a senior CID officer who wants to remain anonymous. “ Soon we will find out what had happened, where those evil men came from, who they were consorting with and their connections as well as those who sheltered and rendered support to them [the terrorists] and don’t forget we have already apprehended some of accomplices”.
The suicide bombers had driven vehicles laden with explosives into three high profile targets namely the presidential palace, the UNDP headquarters and the Ethiopian Commercial Attaché where most of the fatalities occurred. Among the dead was the president’s personal secretary, Dahir Ali Idd, who happened to be standing outside the presidential palace when the bomber rammed his vehicle into the gate of the palace. Idd took the full brunt of the blast and his remains had been buried at The National Cemetery in Hargeisa yesterday evening. Terrorists also struck the self-declared autonomous region of Puntland, Somalia, at the same time and day, which shows that the bombings were co-ordinated. The bombings elicited harsh condemnation throughout the world and an outpouring of sympathy for the innocent victims.
A Somaliland Today correspondent says the bombers appeared to have chosen these high profile targets to maximise publicity but more importantly to paint Somaliland as an unstable entity after enjoying 16 years of relative peace and tranquillity. Somaliland had held presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections successfully, which the international observers praised them as free and fair. Enemies of Somaliland are still hell-bent on stopping its democratisation process in its tracks, authorities believe. A little over two years ago, Somaliland security forces had thwarted a massive terrorist plot intended to disrupt parliamentary elections. Yesterday’s terrorist outrages coincided at a time when a huge registration campaign is underway in the country for the upcoming presidential elections.
Somaliland has already been severely penalised by the international community, which insist that Somalia should remain undivided and Somaliland should wait until Mogadishu come to terms with itself. Somaliland got its independence from Britain in 1960 and later voluntarily united with Somalia. In 1991, after the collapse of the government in Somalia, the territory asserted its independence as the Republic of Somaliland although it has not yet received international recognition again as a sovereign state.
Somaliland TodayNews desk
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