The chief commander of Somaliland presidential palace in northern
Somalia was shot dead Monday night by one of his soldiers
in his house inside the palace.
According
to sources close to the presidential palace, Colonel Osman
Farah Mohamed received three bullets, which killed him instantly
on the spot. Over 300 heavily armed soldiers sealed the presidential
palace to search for the culprit.
However,
to the embarrassment of the secessionist authority of Mohamed
Hajji Ibrahim Egal, the killer escaped unhurt.
The reaction
force soldiers rounded up all of the nearly 100 soldiers which
guarded the presidential palace at the time of the attack.
Farah
Mohamed was buried Tuesday at the graveyard of Hargeisa where
Egal and his "cabinet ministers" attended the funeral.
The reason
for the attack is not yet known, however it was indicated
that the killer, one of the soldiers in the camp, had been
punished a few days earlier for disciplinary action.
Mohamed
Waranaddeh, "interior minister" of the breakaway authority,
told reporters in Hargeisa that the killing of Farah Mohamed
had nothing to do with clannish or political matters, but
was merely an action carried by an annoyed soldier.
The murder
took at a time when Hargeisa is feeling political pressure
from the international community following the decision by
Egal not to attend the on-going peace conference in Djibouti
for the formation of a government for Somalia.
Two days
ago, Egal deported 19 clan elders and senior military officials
from Puntland who were travelling on their way to Djibouti
through Somaliland for the conference.
Abdullahi
Yussuf Ahmed, war lord of Puntland, also refused to attend
the Djibouti peace conference.
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