Middle Shabelle, an agricultural province north of Mogadishu, would be entirely taken over by the Shebabs, according to the Somali army. It would be a major victory six months after the launch of an unprecedented military offensive against the terrorist group.
The Somali Minister of Defense laconically welcomed the latest victory of his army, this Thursday, December 22. On Twitter, he published the name of a strategic city held by Shebabs, Run-Nirgood, followed by a green countermark. The spokesman for his ministry, General Abdullahi Ali Anod, confirmed the information in the morning on the antennas of public television: the city would have been retaken from the jihadists this Thursday morning at 6 a.m., he announced. .
Unprecedented military means
This would be a major victory for the Somali army. This would mean that the whole of Middle Shabelle, an important agricultural province located northeast of the capital Mogadishu, largely controlled until recently by the Shebabs, would have come under the control of the federal army.
It must be said that the government of new President Hassan Cheikh Mohamoud has engaged unprecedented military means against the group affiliated with al-Qaeda since last summer. He requested and obtained the support of the air force and the American special forces to carry out his operations. Significant pressure was put on traders paying the group a forced tax to finance its fighters. And he added the assistance, apparently decisive, of local militias to dislodge the cells of the shebabs in the small peasant localities where they had hitherto been firmly established.
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