Originally published on the CGS blog on May 15, 2007.
“U.N. officials say the exodus from Mogadishu is the largest displacement of people in the world so far this year.” — Washington Post , May 15,2007
While the eyes of the world have been fixed on Darfur and Iraq, Somalia has quietly surpassed both of them in terms of refugee flows. Some progress was made in addressing the humanitarian crisis when the transitional Somali government announced today that it will allow a visit from a top UN human rights official. However, the question remains — how can the international community respond effectively to this crisis? And how can we avoid a recurrence of such a crisis in the future?
I am deeply disturbed by how little attention has been paid to the situation in Somalia over the past five months, and in particular how little discussion there has been about the U.S. role in sparking this most recent conflict. Driven by concern that the Council of Somali Islamic Courts would provide a harbor for terrorists, the U.S. sanctioned and provided “logistical support” of the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia in January.
With strong public support for withdrawing from Iraq, how did U.S. involvement in the invasion of a sovereign state pass virtually unnoticed? Why did the Bush administration choose to support a course of armed intervention rather than conflict prevention and robust humanitarian support?
Matt Bryden’s December predictions of the consequences of this choice seem, unfortunately to be on the way to coming true.
As the human cost of that decision becomes more and more apparent, I hope we will begin asking ourselves and our elected leaders these hard questions.
