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| Africa Horn |
| UN authorizes pursuit of Somali pirates on land |
| 2008-12-18 |
| The U.N. Security Council on Tuesday authorized countries fighting piracy off the Somali coast to take action also on Somalia's territory and in its airspace, subject to consent by the country's government. The United States said for the first time that the United Nations should deploy a peacekeeping force to war-torn Somalia and that Washington would push for a Security Council resolution by the end of the year to authorize one. The text, co-sponsored by Belgium, France, Greece, Liberia and South Korea is the fourth approved by the council since June to combat rampant piracy off Somalia's coast. The vote took place at a high-profile ministerial session attended by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, Chinese deputy foreign minister He Yafei and U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #2 The United States said for the first time that the United Nations should deploy a peacekeeping force to war-torn Somalia and that Washington would push for a Security Council resolution by the end of the year to authorize one. In case nobody remembers their history, that's been tried. Didn't work out too well. Of course, if they wanna blow Eyl off the map as a message to the local swashbucklers, I can't think of too many folks that would have a problem with that. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2008-12-18 10:40 |
| #1 There is zero chance of a UN 'peace keeping' force for Somalia. What this appears to be is cover for commando style raids to free ships. The number of countries that have the capacity, and the political will to ignore the collateral fluffy duck (especially islamic fluffy ducks) damage is pretty short. Off-hand I come up with India. Not sure China and Russia have the capacity. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2008-12-18 01:19 |