Kenya will respond if Turkey continues destabilising Somalia’s Jubaland.
Nairobi has also quietly rebuffed a request by Mogadishu to surrender opposition leader Abdiaziz Laftagareen (based in Nairobi).
Kenya is following events in Somalia very closely.
“Any attempt by any external actor to destabilise Jubaland and orchestrate violent regime change will be met with full force of our political, military and diplomatic might,” a Kenyan senior official told me today.
The comments come as Mogadishu steps up violent campaign against opponents and pressures regional states to comply with its wishes.
Key strong indicators of worsening situation in the last one week:
1. Law being amended to conflate terrorism with legitimate political armed struggle against oppression. Aim is to firmly brand the Laftagareen army in South West as terrorist.
2. Turkish air assets deployed to go after and decapitate Laftagareen forces. Doolow attack that targeted Gen Mahad ‘Shub’ just start of campaign.
3. Pro-government cleric Sheikh Ali Wajis gives ‘fatwa’ and green light to state to kill its opponents.
Rawhide Abdi
