Kids on the beach

Al Shabaab fighters parade on the beach somewhere south of Mogadishu. This photo was taken last month. These fighters, in their headscarves, guns and matching uniforms, are children.

Journalism and technology

http://zed-books.blogspot.com/2011/12/interview-with-mary-harper.html

Rageh Omaar on my book

"For the past two decades, books on Somalia have tended to mirror some of the attitudes about the country itself. They have been either analyses by a small and highly specialised field of policy analysts and academics, or written from and for the perspective that caters to the most common cliches and impressions about this most failed of failed states; a nation of warlords, pirates, jihadists and refugees fleeing in unseaworthy boats often only to drown. All of these are of course part of the narrative of Somalia's inability to break from its repeated cycles of the failure of domestic politics and outside intervention over the past 25 years, but what Mary Harper has done is to explain this narrative as a whole - rather than a series of snapshots. This is a book which is clear, accessible and thorough. It has done what books on Somalia rarely do, which is to examine the multitude of failures, misunderstandings, and wilful acts of destruction that have caused Somalia's downfall, but it has also gone much further, by outlining the huge part of the hidden Somalia that have survived the decades of turmoil and which are the only foundations upon which anything approaching a post conflict and stable Somalia can be built. There are significant parts of Somalia where civil society is functioning with fragile but functioning institutions of business and commerce, security and representation. She has written and explained this detailed yet vital aspect of the Somali crisis in a way that is accessible and enlightening not just to the international reader but also to those shaping global policy on Somalia. This is an important book for both."

Al Shabaab's Twitter Account

Here is my report for the BBC on Al Shabaab's latest experiment with the power of the internet:

(With the fiercest fighting for months in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, and Kenyan troops deployed deep into southern Somali territory, the country is experiencing a particularly heavy period of violence. On one side is the Islamist group Al Shabaab, which controls much of southern and central Somalia. On the other, transitional government troops, African Union peacekeepers, and Kenyan and Ethiopian soldiers. Fighting is not only taking place on the ground. As Mary Harper reports, it’s also going on in cyberspace:)

At exactly five thirty-five on Wednesday evening, an email dropped into my inbox. It was from the Al Shabaab press office and it invited me to follow Al Shabaab on Twitter. I did so instantly, and there, with its distinctive white logo on a black background, was an image of the Al Shabaab flag.

The first tweet was in Arabic, b-ismi-llāhi r-raḥmāni r-raḥīmi, which translates as ‘In the name of God, the most gracious, the most merciful’. After that, Al Shabaab switched to English and got down to the serious business of military propaganda.

The first tweets gave a hint of what was, within a few hours, to become the most intense fighting for several months between the Islamists and government troops backed by African Union or AMISOM peacekeepers in Mogadishu.

The tweets spoke of an attack by Al Shabaab on an AMISOM base in the north of the city. This was despite the fact that Al Shabaab in August announced that it had withdrawn from Mogadishu, something the transitional government described as a massive victory.

The tweets then launched into what Al Shabaab described as the utter failure of Kenya’s military intervention in Somalia. One quoted a BBC story about the plan for Kenyan troops to join AMISOM. It said this was proof that Kenya had run out of money to pay for the military operation, so need the African Union to pay for it instead. The advice to the Kenyan soldiers was put into one word, in capital letters. It said simply ‘FLEE’.

There was also a tweet referring to the need for Somali government soldiers to sober up, accusing them of being intoxicated by the narcotic leaf, qat, which has been banned by Al Shabaab.

The Al Shabaab Twitter site has attracted dozens of followers since it was launched a few hours ago. So far, Al Shabaab is following nobody.

The Islamist movement has in recent months become increasingly adept at communicating its activities and messages to a non-Somali audience. It writes sophisticated press releases in excellent English, complete with photographs.

And now it has a Twitter account. Perhaps this is in response to the highly active Twitter account of Kenya’s military spokesman, Major Emmanuel Chirchir. He issues a steady stream of information about what he says are Kenya’s military successes in Somalia.

So far, he appears to be winning the Twitter war. He has nearly ten thousand followers. Al Shabaab has four hundred, but its site has only been active for a few hours, and that number increases every time I look at it.

The Guardian's assessment of my book

'Somalia is one of the most neglected and misunderstood casualties of the war on terror. If you want to understand more, this is your book: succinct, perceptive, judicious, it traces a compelling narrative which brings vividly to life an extraordinary country and its turbulent history. Its scope is wide, ensuring that there are many questions here relevant to places far beyond Somalia: issues of how a people and culture adapt to the challenges of globalisation with ingenuity, as well as how they suffer from its impact; of how Western interventions pursue their own agenda. This was a book which urgently needed writing.'