AMISOM troops in lower region accused of killing civilians

The African Union troops in Somalia have been accused of killing more than 30 Somali Civilians in the Lower Shabelle region for last one year.

Traditional elders in Bulamarer which AMISOM troops killed four civilians two days ago said the soldiers kill the civilians indiscriminately after being attacked by unknown assailants.

Suldaan Abdulkadir Ibrahim expressed his anger over the slaughter of the African Union forces.

“They [AMISOM] have a duty to protect, not to attack, the population. We are not the ones who attacked them,’’ he said, calling for the Federal government of Somalia to bring justice to the ones found responsible.

It is not the first time the AU peacekeepers have committed atrocities or similar acts.

Somalia’s Federal government has not issued a statement on this incident which has created anger among the Somali communities.

But this incident is expected to damage the standing of the peacekeeping force, where it is relatively popular, in particular in Mogadishu and other urban areas that it has helped seize back from the militants linked to al Qaeda.

AMISOM which has over 17,000 peacekeepers from Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibout and Burundi in the country has not yet commented on the incident.