2008-05-12 14:31:43-Armed with vehicles and machine-guns propelled grenades Ethiopian soldiers have started to walk on guard in Beledweyne town the regional headquarter on Hiran region central Somalia.
Some eyewitnesses confirmed Mareeg online that the soldiers have entered in some houses in the town seeking some people they suspected as anti-Gov and Ethiopian troops fighters in the town.
Somewhere the regional officials in the town have started to decorate and arrange the offices of the region’s administration with the commissioner was appointed for the region by the TFG is expected to arrive in the town today.
The Ethiopian troops have arrived Beledweyne after the Islamic fighters in the recent times have been patrolling the town have pulled out to undisclosed locations.
The inhabitants of the town have fully hailed on the Islamic courts union fighter’s security activities rather than the Ethio-Som soldiers according to the residents.
The fighters have vacated the town on early Friday morning at around 5:00AM local time to the undisclosed locations.
The islamists have also started regrouping and equipping in some parts of the region as reliable sources confirmed Mareeg.
The armed maneuver of the Islamic fighters comes as the government officials of the region with hundreds of soldiers set out to the region to take back the control of the town from the islamists.
Somalia’s shaky transitional government took over Mogadishu in the last days of 2006 with the help of Ethiopian troops and air power, unseating an Islamic movement that had reigned for six months over most of southern Somalia. Now remnants of the Islamic movement are waging an insurgency.
The Islamists have attacked and taken control of in recent months, three have been provincial capitals. The Islamists typically free prisoners and attack government forces before voluntarily withdrawing.
There are daily skirmishes in Mogadishu, which the government has never fully controlled. Although the government is backed politically by the U.N. and by Ethiopian firepower, many Somalis say it is heavily corrupt and ineffectual.
