Region | Somalia
Somali Islamists order teenagers' limbs amputated
Somali's Al Shabaab insurgents sentenced four teenagers on Monday to each have a hand and a leg amputated as punishment for robbery in a show of power by the Islamists in a Mogadishu stronghold.
- Reuters
- Published: 22:56 June 23, 2009
Mogadishu: Somali's Al Shabaab insurgents sentenced four teenagers on Monday to each have a hand and a leg amputated as punishment for robbery in a show of power by the Islamists in a Mogadishu stronghold.
It would be the first such double amputation carried out by the rebels, who follow strict interpretation Sharia law in the parts of south Somalia that they control.
Al Shabaab - whose ranks are swelled by foreign jihadists and is seen by western security services as a proxy for Al Qaida in Somalia - has carried out executions, floggings and single-limb amputations before, mainly in south Kismayu port.
It is battling the government of President Shaikh Sharif Ahmad for control of Mogadishu, and is also fighting a government-allied moderate Islamist militia in the provinces.
"Today, the Islamic court sentences these four men who carried out robberies to have their opposite hand and leg amputated," said Shaikh Abdul Haq, judge of the Sharia court in the Al Shabaab-held Suqa Holaha area of the Somali capital.
"They robbed mobile phones and people's belongings."
The judge did not say when the sentence would be carried out at the hearing, attended by hundreds of residents. Shackled and silent, the teenagers were led away into custody.
Al Shabaab's strict practices have shocked many Somalis, who are traditionally moderate Muslims, though residents give the insurgents credit for restoring order to regions they control.
In the latest cycle in 18 years of violence in Somalia, a two-and-a-half year Islamist insurgency has killed more than 18,000 civilians, uprooted 1 million people, allowed piracy to flourish offshore, and spread security fears round the region.
Somalia's government, which controls little more than a few blocks of Mogadishu, declared a state of emergency at the weekend and appealed for foreign intervention, including from Somalia's neighbours.
But international powers are reluctant to do more than beef up an existing 4,300-man African Union peacekeeping force.
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