It is a disputed region of Somalia where clashes erupt from time to time between militias loyal to the Somali government and separatist forces. At least 96 people have died in a Somaliland town in two weeks, the director of the main local hospital said on Thursday. “We have 96 dead and 560 injured registered in the main hospital” in the town of Las Anod, Ahmed Mohamed Hassan said by telephone.
An important traditional chief of Somaliland, involved in the fighting against the soldiers of the separatist forces, had for his part told journalists in Las Anod on Wednesday evening that more than 150 people had died. “The death toll reached 150 people and more than 500 others were injured,” said the official, Garaad Jama Garaad Ali.
A broken ceasefire
A former British territory, Somaliland declared its independence from Somalia in 1991, an act not recognized by the international community. The latest violence in Las Anod began seventeen days ago, on February 6, hours after customary chiefs issued a statement pledging to support “the unity and integrity of the Federal Republic of Somalia urging the Somaliland authorities to withdraw their forces from the region.
A ceasefire was decreed on February 10 by the authorities, but the two parties accuse each other of having violated it. In particular, the clashes seemed to have resumed on Thursday, according to witnesses and customary chiefs.
More than 185,000 have fled
“It started early in the morning and already several mortar and artillery fire fell on the town,” resident Mohamed Saleban told AFP by phone, saying residents were fleeing. On February 16, the local UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha) declared that more than 185,000 people, 89% of whom were women and children, had fled the violence in Las Anod.
Somaliland, a region of 4.5 million people, remains poor and isolated but enjoys relative stability as Somalia has been ravaged by decades of civil war and Islamist insurgency.