Ethiopia Asks UN to Deploy Peacekeepers in Somalia

Ethiopia wants the UN to deploy a peacekeeping mission in Somalia, where insurgent attacks by Islamist militants are increasingly undermining the efforts of the AU peacekeepers in the country. Addressing the UN General Assembly on Monday, Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin asked the world body to either send a peacekeeping deployment urgently, or supply resources to bolster the current 2,600-strong African Union mission. Sources say Ethiopia, which helped rout the Islamists from Mogadishu and install a secular interim government in 2006, wants to withdraw its troops. The Islamists have ran a bloody insurgence that has claimed an estimated 9,000 lives and has lately seemed to gain strength, with attacks increasingly targeting the AU peacekeepers and aid workers.[PE]