Uganda arrests Somali minister as suspected terrorist

Oct 7, 2009, 6:58 GMT

Kampala - Ugandan authorities have detained Somalia's state minister for defence on suspicion of being involved in terror attacks in insurgency-hit Somalia, a Ugandan army official said Wednesday.

Yusuf Mohamed Siad, a former insurgent who earlier this year defected to Somalia's embattled Western-backed government, was arrested in Kampala Tuesday after leaving a mosque.

'We got intelligence reports that he had sneaked into the country,' Ugandan army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Felix Kulayigye told the German Press Agency dpa.

'He was an insurgent about three months ago. We have international conferences here and we had to be vigilant because he is a suspected terrorist.'

Kulayigye said that Siad tried to flee arrest but was captured in the Kisenyi slum, which has a large population of Somali nationals.

Uganda and Burundi provide almost 5,000 troops to the AU peacekeeping mission in Somalia, which has been embroiled in chaos since the 1991 ouster of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.

The latest chapter in the long conflict is a bloody insurgency, which kicked off in early 2007.

Islamist insurgent groups al-Shabaab and Hizbul Islam have been pounding the government, which only controls small pockets of south and central Somalia, although the two militant groups recently began fighting each other in the port town of Kismayo.

The AU has also been targeted by the Islamists. A recent suicide bombing by al-Shabaab claimed the lives of 17 peacekeepers.