FOLLOWING a rebel attack on African Union (AU) peacekeepers that killed 12 soldiers as well as nine others in Somalia, opposition parties in Burundi have called for the withdrawal of the country's troops from the central African nation.
"If the mandate of our soldiers does not change and if the international community does not give them the means to defend themselves, the government should repatriate all soldiers," Agence France Presse (AFP) quoted Leonce Ngendakumana, head of the main opposition Frodebu party as saying.
"There is no peace there to safeguard or maintain."
The Union for Peace and Development wants "an immediate and unconditional return of Burundian soldiers deployed in Somalia," party spokesman Chauvineau Mugwengezo added.
"These soldiers were illegally sent to Somalia and parliament was not consulted," he said. "The government must bring them back at once."
Leonard Nyangoma, the vocal head of another party said: "In the current state of affairs, keeping our soldiers in Burundi is like asking them to commit mass suicide."
On Friday, the Burundian government declared a five-day national mourning, a day after twin suicide attacks on the African Union peacekeeping forces' headquarters in Mogadishu claimed 21 lives in the deadliest strike against the force since its deployment in March 2007.
The bodies of the soldiers arrived on Saturday at a military base north of the capital Bujumbura. The dead included the number two of the peacekeeping force Amisom, General Juvenal Niyonguruza from Burundi.
The soldiers were buried yesterday.
Burundi and Uganda are the sole contributors to the 5,000-strong Amisom force, which is far smaller than the 8,000 soldiers envisaged.
Twenty-nine Burundian soldiers have been killed in Somalia since 2007.
The AU, meanwhile, has called on the international community to send weapons to the UN-backed Somali government to help it fight Islamist militants.
The AU envoy to Somalia made the plea after the attacks by the al-Shabab group.
"If we go after Shabab, we'd destroy them in no time," said Nicolas Bwakira.
He said the attacks should not deter countries from keeping to their promises to bolster the AU force.
The force currently operates with 5,000 soldiers, instead of an intended 8,000. Nigeria and Ghana have promised troops, but so far these pledges remain unfulfilled.
The UN has also said it would take over the mission - at an unspecified date.
Bwakira told journalists in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, that the deadly attack has not demoralised the force, despite more threats from al-Shabab.
The United Nations has begun probe of the use of its vehicles by the suicide bombers who killed the AU peacekeepers at their main base in Somalia.
The Somali government warned on Friday that Islamist rebels from the al Shabaab group had six more stolen UN cars primed with explosives ready for suicide attacks.
"There are very large numbers of UN vehicles in Somalia that have been used for a variety of projects," Mark Bowden, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Somalia, told Reuters.
He said the United Nations had been given the chassis number of one of the vehicles used in Thursday's blasts. "We are trying to trace whether it's a UN vehicle," Bowden added.
President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed said the attack, which followed last Monday's killing of one of Africa's most wanted al Qaeda suspects by U.S. special forces, would not deter his government and he called on the world to send it more help.
"The bombing was shocking ... I urge the world to help the starving Somali people," Ahmed told reporters in a news conference at his hilltop Villa Somalia palace over the weekend.
He said his administration gave Washington permission to hunt down Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan - a 28-year-old Kenyan wanted over the 2002 truck bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel in Kenya that killed 15 people - because it could not catch him.
Bowden said this week's attack on the AMISOM peacekeepers' heavily-guarded base by Mogadishu airport would not weaken the UN's resolve to deliver aid to half the Somali population. But he said it could hinder operations on the ground.
"We have to take greater precautions around Mogadishu. Clearly the airport is more at risk and that will affect our ability to move staff and humanitarian goods," he said.
Insurgents overran UN compounds in Jowhar and Baidoa in May and July, looting supplies and stealing vehicles.
The al Shabaab rebel group, which Washington says is al Qaeda's proxy in the failed Horn of Africa state, controls much of the south and parts of the capital.
Together with another group Hizbul Islam, it has been fighting government troops and the AU peacekeepers to impose its own strict version of sharia law throughout Somalia.
Al Shabaab gunmen over the weekend,ordered traders at Mogadishu's sprawling Bakara Market to join their fight or quit their stalls. The rebels also demanded they contribute financially or in kind to their cause.
More than 18,000 Somalis have been killed in fighting since the start of 2007 and another 1.5 million left homeless.
Bowden said severe drought for the fifth year in a row had compounded the effects of rising violence and driven half the population into food aid dependence.
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