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Somali: Kenya threatens to impose sanctions on Somali MPs
Saturday, 22 November 2008 SMC Kenya has threatened to impose sanctions against Somali leaders if they do not spearhead efforts to restore stability in the Horn of Africa country. Foreign Affairs minister Moses Wetang’ula issued the threat on Friday saying leaders must be responsible for the political situation in Somalia. The minister said member states of the Intergovernmental Agreement on Development (Igad) would impose sanctions on the leaders and their family members. He said this would ensure that the Somali leaders no longer sought “safe havens abroad. We are faced with an embarrassing situation where Somali Members of Parliament came to Kenya for a meeting and have refused to go back home,” the minister said. “They have to go and build their country. They can’t leave it to warlords that are partly benefiting from this criminal enterprise. I think hard decisions have to be made in one way or the other to enable us move to the next level.” Mr Wetang’ula was speaking at the InterContinental Hotel in Nairobi, where he hosted heads of foreign missions in the country for a consultative meeting over the escalating incidences of piracy along the East African coastline. He attributed this increase to the political instability in Somalia. Defence minister Yusuf Haji also attended the meeting. The international community has raised concern over the growing number of hijacked ships in the Indian Ocean reportedly by Somali pirates. The minister said President Kibaki would host an international conference in Nairobi to discuss the matter. He however did not give a date for the meeting. “The plot has been thickening day by day, and has now turned into a major international enterprise affecting all of us,” the minister said. He said the fact that pirates were now hijacking ships from as long as 800km from the shore showed that the problem was big. Praising a decision by India three days ago to destroy one of its hijacked vessels, Mr Wetang’ula said that all countries must now prepare to act tough on the pirates. “I think sometimes we must take decisions that are harsh... We must act now,” he said. Source: Daily NationSomaliweyn Media Center “SMC”
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