Supply plane for peacekeepers shot down in Somalia POSTED: 3:16 p.m. EDT, March 23, 2007 Story Highlights • Cargo plane had delivered equipment for Ugandan peacekeepers in Mogadishu • Shot down by missile during takeoff; 11 aboard feared dead • Very violent week in city: dozens, mainly civilians, killed; thousands fled • Truce forged between Ethiopian troops, who help government, and clan elders Adjust font size: Decrease fontDecrease font Enlarge fontEnlarge font
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- A cargo plane that had delivered equipment for Ugandan peacekeepers in the Somali capital was shot down by a missile during takeoff Friday, the owner of the plane said. A witness said the aircraft crashed in flames after one of its wings fell into the Indian Ocean.
The fate of the 11-member crew was unknown.
Egi Azarian, the acting head of Belarus-based Transaviaexport, confirmed that the company's plane was shot down Friday.
Transaviaexport, based in Minsk, Belarus, operates only Ilyushin-76s, one of the largest cargo planes in the world. The aircraft requires a crew of six, is 153 feet long and can carry nearly 50 tons of cargo.
Muse Sheik Osman, who lives in the north of the city, said he saw the burning plane come down and heard the sound of an anti-aircraft missile being fired shortly before the crash.
Capt. Paddy Ankunda, spokesman for the Ugandan peacekeepers in Somalia, confirmed a crash. Ankunda said he did not know the nationalities of the crew or whether they had survived, but said: "We are afraid that they have gone."
Muse Hassan, a resident of north Mogadishu, said he saw the burning plane flying at a low altitude along the beach.
"One of the wings fell in the ocean and smoke was coming from the bottom of the plane," Hassan said.
Abdi Mohumed, another resident of northern Mogadishu, said he saw fire and smoke billowing from the plane.
"I have seen one of plane's wings burning and heard a very loud sound. I was so terrified," Mohumed said.
A plane carrying several African Union peacekeepers made an emergency landing on March 9. An Islamic group claimed it had hit that plane with a missile. Four days later, a Belarus official confirmed the plane had been hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. Dozens die this week, mostly civilians
Friday's crash came at the end of a particularly violent week in Mogadishu that killed dozens of people, most of them civilians.
The United Nation's Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that it received reports of thousands of Mogadishu residents fleeing to nearby towns.
Much of the violence halted Friday as a truce took effect between military officials from Ethiopia, which sent troops to neighboring Somalia last year to help overthrow the Islamic movement that had overtaken much of the country, and elders of the dominant clan in Somalia's capital.
Still, sporadic gunfire could be heard around the former defense ministry building in southern Mogadishu, which has been one of the front lines in the two days of fighting.
One civilian was killed early Friday, possibly by a stray bullet, said Mohamed Barre Olad, who lives near the former defense ministry headquarters. Olad saw the body as he walked home. He said he saw also a wounded man being taken to a hospital in a wheelchair. Clan elders meet with Ethiopians, who are helping government
An elder, Mohammed Ibrahim Aden, told The Associated Press that 25 Hawiye clan elders met with "several Ethiopian (military) officials" late Thursday and agreed to stop hostilities and begin talks.
"We have asked the Ethiopian officials to pull their troops back from front line areas and force government troops to do the same," Aden said. "We have also promised on our part to pull our fighters back from the battle fronts."
Meanwhile, Kenya deported more than 100 people from 19 countries to Somalia after they illegally crossed the border between the two countries during fighting earlier this year. The deportees were subsequently arrested by Ethiopian troops, a human rights group said Friday.
The Kenyan government denied refugee status to the group -- which included a U.S. citizen -- and even sent its own citizens back to face an uncertain future in a country with no functioning legal system, said the chairman of Muslim Human Rights, Al-Amin Kimathi. Ethiopian forces fighting inside Somalia then took the suspects and flew them to two detention centers inside Ethiopia, he added.
Kimathi said he had received unconfirmed information that three of the deportees had died while in Ethiopian custody. Government says insurgents follow Somali al Qaeda leader
Government officials had vowed Thursday to continue fighting the insurgents in Mogadishu who they said are led by the newly chosen head of Somalia's al Qaeda cell, Aden Hashi Ayro. He is one of the people the U.S. targeted in a January airstrike in Somalia.
Ayro is a top leader of the ousted Islamic courts and the government had reports he was in Mogadishu, said Deputy Defense Minister Salad Ali Jelle. The Council of Islamic Courts that Ayro served as military commander and was driven from the capital in December after six months in power. The group has promised to launch an Iraq-style guerrilla war, and mortar attacks pound the capital nearly every day.
On Thursday, Somali intelligence officials ordered the satellite television station Al-Jazeera to close its Mogadishu office, said Abshir Mohamed, the channel's head of administration.
Information Minister Madobe Nunow Mohamed told The Associated Press that "Al-Jazeera has conveyed the wrong messages to the world."
"We will shut down additional radio stations and channels if they distort facts," he said.
Somalia has been without an effective central government since 1991. The current administration has failed to assert control throughout the country, and the African Union has deployed a small peacekeeping force to defend it.
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