Somalia Urges Residents To Flee Capital

Somalia's fragile government blamed a local al Qaeda cell Monday for a failed assassination attempt on its top military commander, while urging civilians to abandon homes in insurgent-held areas ahead of a new military offensive.

As the U.N and aid agencies warned that tens of thousands of people have fled some of the most intensive fighting seen in Mogadishu for 15 years, fears were growing a brief lull in four days of heavy fighting was about to end.

Deputy Defense Minister Salad Ali Jelle said the government does not recognize a Sunday night cease-fire negotiated between the Ethiopian military and clan elders as Ethiopian troops were seen reinforcing positions close to insurgent strongholds.

Meanwhile Gen. Abdullahi Ali Omar, the commander of Somalia's army, narrowly escaped a roadside bombing as he drove in a government convoy from his hotel Monday morning. One soldier was injured in the blast, said Somali presidential spokesman Hussein Mohamoud Hussein. "An al Qaeda cell was behind the explosion. They want to kill key government officials. They want to do here what they are doing in Iraq."

International efforts to help try and resolve the crisis were under way with European, African, Arab and U.S. diplomats expected to meet in Cairo on Tuesday for ongoing talks on the crisis. In Eritrea, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni was holding talks with President Isaias Afwerki on the Somali crisis, according to the Eritrean information ministry web site. Eritrea is accused of backing the Islamic movement who were driven from power in December by its long time rival Ethiopia.

"We call on the civilians living in terrorist-held areas in Mogadishu to abandon their houses because it is possible that government troops may target these areas any time," Jelle said. "We have to clean al Qaeda elements from Mogadishu."

There was a glimmer of hope Sunday when Mogadishu's highly influential and dominant clan said it had brokered a truce to stop the fighting.

But mortars were raining down hours after Hawiye clan spokesman Ahmed Diriye made the announcement, and military officials were not available for comment.

Four days of fierce fighting in between Ethiopian-backed government forces and Islamic insurgents has killed 381 people in Mogadishu, a local human rights organization said Monday.

"For the last four days we have registered 381 deaths and 565 people wounded," said Sudan Ali Ahmed, chairman of Elman Human Rights Organization.

Ethiopia says its killed more than 200 insurgents during the four day offensive that ended late Sunday. That figure would not be independently confirmed. Rotting bodies still lay in some streets in the Ali Kamin neighborhood and around Mogadishu soccer stadium where the heaviest fighting took place, residents said.

Otherwise there was calm in the capital early Monday.

Some businesses were reopened and the public transport system started to operate in the deserted streets of the capital.

Jelle said his government had been fighting for the past four days with terrorists, not clan militias. "The Hawiye clan are not terrorists," he said, calling the so-called cease-fire "null and void."

He also dismissed reports that Ethiopian reinforcements were pouring into the city of 2 million, although resident Muridi Hassan Abati told the AP he had seen dozens of battle wagons and several hundred Ethiopian troops entering the city. Around 4,000 Ethiopian troops are in Mogadishu, said Western diplomats who spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because it related to security matters.

A Ugandan soldier, part of an African Union peacekeeping force, was killed by a mortar Saturday. Uganda has about 1,400 troops here as the vanguard of a larger AU peacekeeping force. So far, it is the only country to contribute to the peacekeeping force.

The insurgents are linked to the Council of Islamic Courts, which was driven from power in December by Somali and Ethiopian soldiers, accompanied by U.S. special forces. The U.S. has accused the courts of having ties to al Qaeda.

The Islamic courts stockpiled thousands of tons of weapons and ammunition during the six months they controlled Mogadishu. The insurgency will likely last until that stockpile is depleted, or key leaders are killed.

The militants have long rejected any secular government and have sworn to fight until Somalia becomes an Islamic emirate.

Experts fear the conflict in Somalia could engulf the region. In Egypt, Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit sent urgent letters Sunday to the United Nations, Arab League and the African Union urging a speedy intervention to end the fighting in Somalia.

Somalia has been mired in chaos since 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned each other.

A national government was established in 2004, but has failed to assert any real control.